confusion. The cavalry
pursued them as they fled; and the legions, coming up in a short time
after, assaulted the camp, from whence there did not escape so many
as six thousand men. There were slain and taken above thirty-five
thousand, with seventy standards, and above two hundred Gallic waggons
laden with much booty. Hamilcar, the Carthaginian general, fell
in that battle, and three distinguished generals of the Gauls. The
prisoners taken at Placentia, to the number of two thousand freemen,
were restored to the colony.

22. This was an important victory, and caused great joy at Rome. On
receipt of the praetor's letter, a supplication for three days was
decreed. In that battle, there fell of the Romans and allies two
thousand, most of them in the right brigade, against which, in the
first onset, the most violent efforts of the enemy had been directed.
Although the praetor had brought the war almost to a conclusion, yet
the consul, Cneius Aurelius, having finished the business which was
necessary to be done at Rome, set out for Gaul, and received the
victorious army from the praetor. The other consul, arriving in
his province towards the end of autumn, passed the winter in the
neighbourhood of Apollonia. Caius Claudius, and the Roman triremes
which had been sent to Athens from the fleet that was laid up at
Corcyra, as was mentioned above, arriving at Piraeeus, greatly revived
the hopes of their allies, who were beginning to give way to despair.
For not only did those inroads by land cease, which used to be
made from Corinth through Megara, but the ships of the pirates from
Chalcis, who had been accustomed to infest both the Athenian sea and
coast, were afraid not only to venture round the promontory of Sunium,
but even to trust themselves out of the straits of the Euripus. In
addition to these came three quadriremes from Rhodes, the Athenians
having three open ships, which they had equipped for the protection of
their lands on the coast. While Claudius thought, that if he were able
with his fleet to give security to the Athenians it was as much as
could be expected at present, a fortunate opportunity was thrown in
his way of accomplishing a much more important enterprise.

23. Some exiles driven from Chalcis, by ill treatment received from
the king's party, brought intelligence, that the place might be taken
without even a contest; for that both the Macedonians, being under
no immediate apprehension from an enemy, wer