ving the fleeting mists up the little
valley. The hills were springing out of the gloom, the thrushes were
swinging in the boughs overhead, and pouring out their morning song.
Out from the camp the bugles were calling the soldiers for the march;
the baggage trains were rumbling over the bridge. But still below on
the marge lingered the solitary figure; now walking, now motionless,
now silent, now speaking in indistinct monologue. Drusus overheard
only an occasional word, "Pompeius, poor tool of knaves! I pity him! I
must show mercy to Cato if I can! Sulla is not to be imitated! The
Republic is fallen; what I put in its place must not fall." Then,
after a long pause, "So this was to be my end in life--to destroy the
Commonwealth; what is destined, is destined!" And a moment later
Drusus saw the general coming up the embankment.

"We shall find horses, I think, a little way over the bridge," said
Caesar; "the sun is nearly risen. It is nine miles to Ariminum; there
we can find refreshment."

The Imperator's brow was clear, his step elastic, the fatigues of the
night seemed to have only added to his vigorous good humour. Antiochus
met them. The good man evidently was relieved of a load of anxiety.
The three approached the bridge; as they did so, a little knot of
officers of the rear cohort, Asinius Pollio and others, rode up and
saluted. The golden rim of the sun was just glittering above the
eastern lowlands. Caesar put foot upon the bridge. Drusus saw the blood
recede from his face, his muscles contract, his frame quiver. The
general turned to his officers.

"Gentlemen," he said quietly, "we may still retreat; but if we once
pass this little bridge, nothing is left for us but to fight it out in
arms."

The group was silent, each waiting for the other to speak. At this
instant a mountebank piper sitting by the roadway struck up his ditty,
and a few idle soldiers and wayfaring shepherds ran up to him to catch
the music. The man flung down his pipe, snatched a trumpet from a
bugler, and, springing up, blew a shrill blast. It was the "advance."
Caesar turned again to his officers.

"Gentlemen," he said, "let us go where the omens of the gods and the
iniquity of our enemies call us! _The die is now cast!"_

And he strode over the bridge, looking neither to the right hand nor
to the left. As his feet touched the dust of the road beyond, the full
sun touched the horizon, the landscape was bathed with living,
quivering g