HKB
recounted wonders at their return, "the impetuosity of whirlwinds; wonderful birds; sea monsters of ambiguous forms, between man and beasts." Strange sights these! or the effects of imagination and fear.
The noise of this wreck, as it animated the Germans with hopes of renewing the war, awakened Germanicus also to restrain them: he commanded Caius Silius, with thirty thousand foot and three thousand horse, to march against the Cattans: he himself, with a greater force, invaded the Marsians, where he learnt from Malovendus, their general, lately taken into our subjection, that the Eagle of one of Varus's legions was hid underground in a neighbouring grove, and kept by a slender guard. Instantly two parties were despatched; one to face the enemy and provoke them from their post; the other to beset their rear and dig up the Eagle; and success attended both. Hence Germanicus advanced with great alacrity, laid waste the country, and smote the foe, either not daring to engage, or, wherever they engaged, suddenly defeated. Nor, as we learnt from the prisoners, were they ever seized with greater dismay: "The Romans," they cried, "are invincible: no calamities can subdue them: they have wrecked their fleet; their arms are lost; our shores are covered with the bodies of their horses and men; and yet they attack us with their usual ferocity, with the same firmness, and with numbers as it were increased."
The army was from thence led back into winter quarters, full of joy to have balanced, by this prosperous expedition, their late misfortune at sea; and by the bounty of Germanicus, their joy was heightened, since to each sufferer he caused to be paid as much as each declared he had lost; neither was it doubted but the enemy were humbled, and concerting measures for obtaining peace, and that the next summer would terminate the war. But Tiberius by frequent letters urged him "to come home, there to celebrate the triumph already decreed him; urged that he had already tried enough of events, and tempted abundant hazards: he had indeed fought great and successful battles; but he must likewise remember his losses and calamities, which, however, owing to wind and waves, and no fault of the general, were yet great and grievous. He himself had been sent nine times into Germany by Augustus, and effected much more by policy than arms: it was thus he had brought the Sigambrians into subjection, thus drawn the Suevians and King Maroboduus under the bonds of peace. The Cheruscans too, and the other hostile nations, now the Roman vengeance was satiated, might be left to pursue their own national feuds." Germanicus besought one year to accomplish his conquest; but Tiberius assailed his modesty with a new bait and fresh opportunity, by offering him another Consulship, for the administration of which he was to attend in person at Rome. He added, "that if the war was still to be prosecuted, Germanicus should leave a field of glory to his brother Drusus, to whom there now remained no other; since the Empire had nowhere a war to maintain but in Germany, and thence only Drusus could acquire the title of Imperator, and merit the triumphal laurel." Germanicus persisted no longer; though he knew that this was all feigned and hollow, and saw himself invidiously torn away from a harvest of ripe glory.
Decrees of the Senate were made for driving astrologers and magicians out of Italy; and one of the herd, Lucius Pituanius, was precipitated from the Tarpeian Rock: Publius Marcius, another, was, by the judgment of the Consuls, at the sound of trumpet executed without the Esquiline Gate, according to the ancient form.