No More Learning

He was anxious to gain weight for his advice,
should the mutiny cool.

At nightfall, with the Po in sight, Spurinna decided to entrench 19
his camp. [255] The unaccustomed hard work soon blunted the enthusiasm
of his town-bred troops. The older men began to curse their credulity,
and to point out the fearful danger to their small force of being
surrounded by Caecina's army in the open country. Soon a more sober
spirit pervaded the camp. The tribunes and centurions mingled with the
men, and every one talked with admiration of Spurinna's foresight in
selecting a powerful and wealthy colony as a strong base for their
operations. Finally Spurinna himself rather explained his plans than
reproached their faults, and, leaving patrols behind, succeeded
eventually in leading the rest of the men back to Placentia in a
quieter and more submissive frame of mind. There the walls were
repaired, outworks built, and the turrets increased in height and
number, while Spurinna provided not only for arms and ammunition but
also for obedience and discipline. This was all his party lacked, for
their courage was unimpeachable.

Caecina, on the other hand, seemed to have left his cruelty and 20
profligacy on the other side of the Alps. He marched through Italy
with a well-disciplined force. The people in the country-towns and
colonies took offence at his costume as showing arrogance. While they
wore the plain toga, Caecina addressed them attired in a
parti-coloured plaid and trousers. [256] Moreover, his wife Salonina
rode on a fine horse with purple trappings, and though this did no one
any harm, they grumbled and seemed hurt. It is an ineradicable human
trait to turn critical eyes on new-found fortune, and to insist upon
moderation most of all in those who used to be our equals.
Crossing
the Po, Caecina tried to undermine the loyalty of the Othonians by
negotiations and promises. They retaliated with the same weapons, and
when they had finished bandying empty and fine-sounding phrases about
Peace and Union, Caecina devoted all his attention and plans to an
assault on Placentia in terrific force. He knew that his future
reputation rested on the issue of his first engagements. [257]

But the first day's work savoured more of impatience than of a 21
veteran army's methods. The men ventured under the walls without cover
or precaution, drunk and overfed. Meanwhile the amphitheatre, a fine
building outside the walls, was burnt down. It was set on fire either
by the attacking force hurling torches and heated shot and
fire-brands, or by the besieged in returning their fire. The common
people of the town harboured a suspicion that fuel for the fire had
been surreptitiously introduced from one of the neighbouring colonies,
and that the motive was jealousy, since no building in Italy could
hold so many people. However it happened, they thought little of it,
while worse disasters threatened: safety assured, they bewailed it as
the worst calamity they could have suffered. To return, however, to
Caecina: he was repulsed with heavy losses, and the night was spent in
preparations. The Vitellians provided mantlets, fascines, and
penthouses,[258] to protect the assailants while undermining the
walls: the Othonians procured stakes and huge masses of stone or lead
or brass, to break through the enemy's formation and crush them to
pieces. Both parties were actuated by feelings of pride and ambition.
Various encouragements were used, one side praising the strength of
the legions and the German army, the other the reputation of the
Guards and the City Garrison. The Vitellians decried their enemy as
lazy effeminates demoralized by the circus and the theatre: to which
they replied that the Vitellians were a pack of foreigners and
barbarians. Meanwhile, Otho and Vitellius were held up to praise or
blame, insult providing the more fruitful stimulus.

Hardly had day dawned before the walls of Placentia bristled with 22
defenders, and the fields glittered with the soldiers' armour.