Ab urbe condita

The news of this defeat created a quite unnecessary alarm in Rome. Measures were adopted as though an army had been annihilated;

all legal business was suspended, guards were stationed at the gates, watches were set in the different wards of the City, armour and weapons were stored in readiness on the walls, and every man within the military age was embodied.

When the Dictator returned to the camp he found that, owing to the careful arrangements which the Master of the Horse had made, everything was quieter than he had expected.

The camp had been moved back into a safer position; the cohorts who had lost their standards were punished by being stationed outside the rampart without any tents;

the whole army was eager for battle that they might all the sooner wipe out the stain of their defeat.

Under these circumstances the Dictator at once advanced his camp into the neighbourhood of Rusella. The enemy followed him, and although they felt the utmost confidence in a trial of strength in the open field, they decided to practise stratagem on their enemy, as they had found it so successful before.

At no great distance from the Roman camp were some half-demolished houses belonging to a village which had been burnt when the land was harried.

Some soldiers were concealed in these and cattle were driven past the place in full view of the Roman outposts, who were under the command of a staff-officer, Cnaeus Fulvius. As not a single man left his post to take the bait, one of the drovers, coming up close to the Roman lines, called out to the others who were driving the cattle somewhat slowly away from the ruined cottages to ask them why they were so slow, as they could drive them safely through the middle of the Roman camp.