xpedient than that of
restraining the enemy to the wood until he had sent forward all the
wounded and baggage; for between the mountains and the marshes there
stretched a plain large enough to admit a small army. To this purpose
the legions selected were: The Fifth, for the right wing, and
Twenty-first, for the left; the soldiers of the First legion to lead the
van of the Twentieth to oppose the pursuers.

It was a restless night to both armies, but from different causes. The
barbarians, with festive carousals, songs of triumph, or horrid cries,
filled the vales below and echoing wood. Among the Romans were feeble
fires, low broken murmurs; they leaned, drooping here and there, against
the pales, or wandered about the tents, more like men wanting sleep than
quite awake. The general, too, was alarmed by direful visions during his
sleep; he thought he heard, and saw, Quintilius Varus, rising out of the
marsh, all besmeared with blood, stretching forth his hand and calling
upon him, but that he rejected the call, and pushed back his hand as he
held it toward him. At break of day the legions, posted on the wings,
whether from perverseness or fear, deserted their post and took sudden
possession of a field beyond the bogs; neither did Arminius fall
straight upon them, though they lay open to assault; but when the
baggage was set fast in the mire and ditches, the soldiers about it in
disorder, the order of the standards confounded, and--as usual at such a
time--each man acting hastily for himself, when the ears are slow to
catch the word of command, he then commanded his Germans to charge,
exclaiming vehemently, "Behold! Varus and his legions again subdued by
the same fate!" Thus he cried, and instantly, with a select body, broke
through the mass, and chiefly against the horse directed his weapons.
Floundering in their own blood and the slippery soil of the marsh, they
threw their riders, overturned all they met, and trampled on those that
were on the ground. The greatest distress was around the eagles, which
could neither be carried against a shower of darts nor be planted in the
slimy ground. Caecina, while he sustained the fight, had his horse shot
and, having fallen, would have been overpowered had not the First legion
come up to succor him. Our relief came from the greediness of the enemy,
who ceased slaying, to seize the spoil. And the legions, as the day
closed in, by great exertion got into the open and firm ground. Nor