d the guards. The shout spread around
the hill; and puts each to flight from their respective posts. Thus a
great part yielded to an enemy they had not seen. Those whom the panic
had driven within the rampart (they amounted to thirty thousand) were
all slain; the camp was plundered.

37. Matters being thus conducted, the consul, having summoned an
assembly, pronounces a panegyric on Decius, not only that which had been
commenced on a previous occasion, but as now completed by his recent
deserts; and besides other military gifts, he presents him with a golden
crown and one hundred oxen, and with one white one of distinguished
beauty, richly decorated with gilded horns. The soldiers who had been in
the guard with him, were presented with a double allowance of corn for
ever; for the present, with an ox and two vests each. Immediately after
the consuls' donation, the legions place on the head of Decius a crown
of grass, indicative of their deliverance from a blockade, expressing
their approbation of the present with a shout. Decorated with these
emblems, he sacrificed the beautiful ox to Mars; the hundred oxen he
bestowed on the soldiers, who had been with him in the expedition. On
the same soldiers the legions conferred, each a pound of corn and a pint
of wine; and all these things were performed with great alacrity, with a
military shout, a token of the approbation of all. The third battle was
fought near Suessula, in which the army of the Samnites, having been
routed by Marcus Valerius, having summoned from home the flower of their
youth, determined on trying their strength by a final contest. From
Suessula messengers came in great haste to Capua, and from thence
horsemen in full speed to the consul Valerius, to implore aid. The
troops were immediately put in motion; and the baggage in the camp being
left with a strong guard, the army moves on with rapidity; and they
select at no great distance from the enemy a very narrow spot (as, with
the exception of their horses, they were unaccompanied by a crowd of
cattle and servants). The army of the Samnites, as if there was to be no
delay in coming to an engagement, draw up in order of battle; then, when
no one came to meet them, they advance to the enemy's camp in readiness
for action. There when they saw the soldiers on the rampart, and persons
sent out to reconnoitre in every direction, brought back word into how
narrow a compass the camp had been contracted, inferring thenc