dashed down the side streets."

"This is Herculanus's discipline of his men! So--we have no horsemen.
Well then, the spears to the front! The wounded in the centre! Here,
Ausonius, behind my troop! There. Draw back the bolts; throw the gate
open. We will fight our way through to the ships. Forward! On!"

Then the gate, hitherto so firmly defended, its right wing half
shattered, the left half burned, opened from within, and the Romans,
summoning their last strength, led by their able General in person, and
stimulated to a final supreme effort by his example and the prospect of
safety, burst out of the camp. The shock was terrible, and the effect
of the unexpected attack upon the Barbarians was very great. All who
had been standing on the narrow strip of ground between the gate and
the ditch were hurled into it. Adalo was not among the number; he had
gone back for a moment to direct the preparation of a bridge of logs
which was to lead directly to the gate; then he intended to have his
men run across with beams to batter the already weakened timbers and
break it down completely. So he escaped the fall into the ditch, which
Sippilo shared, but as in the plunge from the wall, uninjured. The boy
climbed nimbly up the southern side. He had lost the helmet in his
first tumble, but held fast to his spear and shield this time too.

For a moment, it is true, it seemed as if the Romans, as soon as they
had passed through the gate and obtained a view of the lake, would
disperse again in fresh terror; for meanwhile the attack on the ships
and the camp below had apparently succeeded.

Hitherto the defenders on the walls had waited longingly for Nannienus,
and looked in vain over the Barbarians and their flaring pitch torches
toward the lake. But now that they had reached the open country outside
the camp, they saw a vast conflagration on the shore. Surrounded by the
tumult of the battle raging immediately about them, they had been
unable to hear the noise of the conflict which had commenced below half
an hour before; but they now perceived all that Saturninus had long
since concluded by the absence of his brave friend: the fleet itself
was being most hotly assailed.

"The ships are burning! The camp is in flames! Our last refuge is
gone!" With these shouts, many sprang from the closed ranks, fled, and
were instantly overtaken by the Germans and struck down before their
comrades' eyes.

"You see how fugitives fare!" cried Saturn