While they were fortifying a
camp at
Ticinum, the news of Cæcina's defeat
reached them, and the mutiny nearly broke out afresh from an impression that
underhand dealing and delay on the part of Valens had kept them away from
the battle. They refused all rest; they would not wait for their general:
they advanced in front of the standards,
JUNCTURE
OF VITELLIANIST ARMIES |
and hurried on the standard-bearers. After a
rapid march they joined Cæcina. The character of Valens did not stand
well with Cæcina's army. They complained that, though so much weaker
in numbers, they had been exposed to the whole force of the enemy, thus at
once excusing themselves, and extolling, in the implied flattery, the
strength of the new arrivals, who might, they feared, despise them as beaten
and spiritless soldiers. Though Valens had the stronger army, nearly double
the number of legions and auxiliaries, yet the partialities of the soldiers
inclined to Cæcina, not only from the geniality of heart, which he was
thought more ready to display, but even from his vigorous age, his
commanding person, and a certain superficial attractiveness which he
possessed. The result was a jealousy between the two generals. Cæcina
ridiculed his colleague as a man of foul and infamous character; Valens
retorted with charges of emptiness and vanity. But concealing their enmity,
they devoted themselves to their common interest, and in frequent letters,
without any thought of pardon, heaped all manner of charges upon Otho, while
the Othonianist generals, though they had the most abundant materials for
invective against Vitellius, refrained from employing them.
