military tribunes, said
they must desist from this inconsiderate enterprise; and that it
appeared to him to be the safer course, that the troops should be led
back to Beneventum for that day, and then on the following day to
pitch his camp close to that of the enemy, so that the Campanians
could not quit it, nor Hanno return to it; and in order that that
object might be attained with the greater ease, that he should send
for his colleague and his army; and that they would direct their whole
force on that point. This plan of the general was disconcerted, after
the signal began to sound for a retreat, by the clamours of the
soldiery, who despised so pusillanimous an order. Nearest to the gate
of the enemy's camp was a Pelignian cohort, whose commander, Vibius
Accuaeus, seizing the standard, threw it over the rampart. Then
pronouncing a curse upon himself and his cohort, if the enemy got
possession of that standard, he rushed forward before the rest, and
crossing the ditch and rampart, burst into the camp of the enemy. The
Pelignians were now fighting within the rampart, when in another
quarter Valerius Flaccus, a military tribune of the third legion,
taunting the Romans with cowardice for conceding to allies the honour
of taking the camp. Titus Pedanius, first centurion of the first
century, snatched the standard out of the hands of the
standard-bearer, and cried out, "Soon shall this standard, and this
centurion, be within the rampart of the enemy; let those follow who
would prevent the standard's being captured by the enemy." Crossing
the ditch, he was followed first by the men of his own maniple, and
then by the whole legion. By this time the consul also, changing his
plan on seeing them crossing the rampart, began to incite and
encourage his soldiers, instead of calling them off; representing to
them, how critical and perilous was the situation of the bravest
cohort of their allies and a legion of their countrymen. All,
therefore, severally exerting themselves to the utmost, regardless
whether the ground were even or uneven, while showers of weapons were
thrown against them from all sides, the enemy opposing their arms and
their persons to obstruct them, made their way and burst in. Many who
were wounded, even those whose blood and strength failed them, pressed
forward, that they might fall within the rampart of the enemy. The
camp, therefore, was taken in an instant, as if it had been situated
upon level ground, and