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Pompey courageously crossed the Alps, not in the face of such difficulties as
Hannibal experienced, but he opened another passage around the sources of
the Rhone and the Eridanus. These issue from the Alpine mountains not far
from each other. One of them runs through transalpine Gaul and empties into
the Tyrrhenian sea; the other from the interior of the Alps to the Adriatic.
The name of the latter has been changed from the Eridanus to the Po.
Directly Pompey
arrived in Spain Sertorius cut in pieces
a whole legion of
his army, that had been sent out foraging, with its animals and servants. He
also plundered and destroyed the Roman town of Lauro before the very eyes of
Pompey. In this siege a woman tore out with her fingers the eyes of a
soldier who had insulted her and was trying to commit an outrage upon her.
When Sertorius heard of this he put to death the whole cohort that was
supposed to be addicted to such brutality, although it was composed of
Romans. Then the armies were separated by the advent of winter.
