Page:Plutarch's Lives (Clough, v.5, 1865).djvu/205

ANTONY. 197 upon the mass of the heavy infantry, but maintaining his own gromid, and engaging boldlj'. The officers who com- manded in the rear, perceiving how far he was getting from the body of the army, sent to warn him back, but he took no notice of them. It is said that Titius the quaestor snatched the standards and turned them round, upbraid- ing Gallus with thus leading so many brave men to de- struction. But when he on the other side reviled him again, and commanded the men that were about him to stand firm, Titius made his retreat, and Gallus, charging the enemies in the front, was encompassed by a party that fell upon his rear, which at length perceiang, he sent a messeno;er to demand succor. But the commanders of the heavy infimtrv, Canidius amongst others, a particular favorite of Antony's, seem here to have committed a great oversight For, instead of flicing about with the whole body, they sent small parties, and, when they were de- feated, they still sent out small parties, so that by their bad management the rout would have spread through the whole army, if Antony himself had not marched from the van at the head of the thu-d legion, and, passing this through among the fugitives, faced the enemies, and hin- dered them from any further pursuit. In this engagement were killed three thousand, five thousand were carried back to the camp wounded, amongst the rest Gallus, shot through the body with four arrows, of which wounds he died. Antony went from tent to tent to vi.sit and comfort the rest of them, and was not able to see his men without tears and a passion of grief They, however, seized his hand with joyful faces, bidding him go and see to himself and not be concerned about them, calling him their emperor and their genei'al, and saying that if he did well they were safe. For in short, never in aU these times can history make mention of a general at the head of a more splendid army ; whether you con-