of the Roman name, of the valour of
your fathers, and of your own, turn this conflagration against the city
of your enemy, and destroy Fidenae by its own flames, which ye could not
reclaim by your kindness. The blood of your ambassadors and colonists
and the desolation of your frontiers suggest this." At the command of
the dictator the whole line advanced; the firebrands that were
discharged are partly caught up; others are wrested by force: the armies
on either side are now armed with fire. The master of the horse too, on
his part, introduces among the cavalry a new mode of fighting; he
commands his men to take the bridles off their horses: and he himself at
their head, putting spurs to his own, dashing forward, is carried by the
unbridled steed into the midst of the fires: the other horses also being
urged on carry their riders with unrestrained speed against the enemy.
The dust being raised and mixed with smoke excluded the light from the
eyes of both men and horses. That appearance which had terrified the
soldiers, no longer terrified the horses. The cavalry therefore,
wherever they penetrated, produced a heap of bodies like a ruin. A new
shout then assailed their ears; and when this attracted the attention of
the two armies looking with amazement at each other, the dictator cries
out "that his lieutenant-general and his men had attacked the enemy on
the rear:" he himself, on the shout being renewed, advances against them
with redoubled vigour. When two armies, two different battles pressed on
the Etrurians, now surrounded, in front and rear, and there was now no
means of flight back to their camp, nor to the mountains, where new
enemies were ready to oppose them, and the horses, now freed from their
bridles, had scattered their riders in every direction, the principal
part of the Veientians make precipitately for the Tiber. Such of the
Fidenatians as survived, bend their course to the city of Fidenae. Their
flight hurries them in their state of panic into the midst of slaughter;
they are cut to pieces on the banks; others, when driven into the water,
were carried off by the eddies; even those who could swim were weighed
down by fatigue, by their wounds, and by fright; a few out of the many
make their way across. The other party make their way through the camp
into the city. In the same direction their impetuosity carries the
Romans in pursuit; Quintius more especially, and with him those who had
just come down from