Meanwhile frequent letters, disfigured by unmanly flatteries, were addressed by Otho to Vitellius, with offers of wealth and favour and any retreat he might select for a life of prodigal indulgence. Vitellius made similar overtures. Their tone was at first pacific; and both exhibited a foolish and undignified hypocrisy. Then they seemed to quarrel, charging each other with debaucheries and the grossest crimes, and both spoke truth. Otho, having recalled the en- voys whom Galba had sent, dispatched others, nominally from the Senate, to both the armies of Germany, to the Italian legion, and to the troops quartered at Lugdunum. The envoys remained with Vitellius too readily to let it be supposed that they were detained. Some Prætorians, whom Otho had attached to the embassy, ostensibly as a mark of distinction, were sent back before they could mix with the legions. Letters were also addressed by Fabius Valens in the name of the German army to the Prætorian and city cohorts, extolling the strength of his party, and offering terms of peace. Valens even reproached them with having transferred the Imperial power to Otho, though it had so long before been entrusted to Vitellius.
Complete Works of Tacitus. Tacitus. Alfred John Church. William Jackson Brodribb. Sara Bryant. edited for Perseus. New York. : Random House, Inc. Random House, Inc. 1873. reprinted 1942.
