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62 villages, devastating their fields, and chasing them across morass, forest, and river, the Germans were tolerably united in a common cause. Whereas, rid of the invader, they were pretty sure to quarrel with one another; and thus, by their civil wars, they served Rome far more effectually than she could serve herself by the expenditure of blood and treasure. The campaigns of Germanicus had really no important result. The Germans were often defeated, but never conquered; and perhaps a Teutonic Tacitus would have told of more Roman reverses than the Roman one thought meet to chronicle. From the 'Annals' alone it is clear that the invaders suffered severely from the natural difficulties of a land void of roads and bridges, and studded with swamps and pathless woods. Clear, also, it is, that even in pitched battle the Romans' rank and file suffered severely, and were cumbered by their own armour; while their lightly-clad opponents fought with ease and agility, knee-deep in water, or amid the gloom of a primeval forest. And however successful at the opening, Germanicus was with one exception—his first inroad—always unfortunate at the close of his campaigns. He lost his flotilla: he sacrificed many hundreds, at the very least, of valuable soldiers in extricating himself from the sodden and slippery marshes, many, also, in cutting his way through forest and ambush, many by sudden and unexpected assaults, and many by the false reports of his guides.

By appointing Germanicus to the viceroyalty of the Eastern provinces, the emperor might seem to have ceased to fear him, and to have gratified the wishes of all ranks in Rome. The choice, indeed, was, to all appearance, most happy. Had the tribes been polled,