fury and the same hopeless uniformity.  They could neither break the ranks of the lancers nor reach the archers; night alone put an end to the slaughter.  Had the Parthians bivouacked on the battle-field, hardly a man of the Roman army would have escaped.  But not trained to fight otherwise than on horseback, and therefore afraid of a surprise, they were wont never to encamp close to the enemy; jeeringly they shouted to the Romans that they would give the general a night to bewail his son, and galloped off to return next morning and despatch the game that lay bleeding on the ground.

Retreat to Carrhae

Of course the Romans did not wait for the morning.  The lieutenant-generals Cassius and Octavius—­Crassus himself had completely lost his judgment—­ordered the men still capable of marching to set out immediately and with the utmost silence (while the whole—­ said to amount to 4000—­of the wounded and stragglers were left), with the view of seeking protection within the walls of Carrhae.  The fact that the Parthians, when they returned on the following day, applied themselves first of all to seek out and massacre the scattered Romans left behind, and the further fact that the garrison and inhabitants of Carrhae, early informed of the disaster by fugitives, had marched forth in all haste to meet the beaten army, saved the remnants of it from what seemed inevitable destruction.

Departure from Carrhae
Surprise at Sinnaca

The squadrons of Parthian horsemen could not think of undertaking a siege of Carrhae.  But the Romans soon voluntarily departed, whether compelled by want of provisions, or in consequence of the desponding precipitation of their commander-in-chief, whom the soldiers had vainly attempted to remove from the command and to replace by Cassius.  They moved in the direction of the Armenian mountains; marching by night and resting by day Octavius with a band of 5000 men reached the fortress of Sinnaca, which was only a day’s march distant from the heights that would give shelter, and liberated even at the peril of his own life the commander-in-chief, whom the guide had led astray and given up to the enemy.  Then the vizier rode in front of the Roman camp to offer, in the name of his king, peace and friendship to the Romans, and to propose a personal conference between the two generals.  The Roman army, demoralized as it was, adjured and indeed compelled its leader to accept the offer.  The vizier received the consular and his staff with the usual honours, and offered anew to conclude a compact of friendship; only, with just bitterness recalling the fate of the agreements concluded with Lucullus and Pompeius respecting the Euphrates boundary,(9) he demanded that it should be immediately reduced to writing.  A richly adorned horse was produced; it was a present from the king to the Roman commander-in-chief; the servants of the vizier crowded round Crassus, zealous to mount him on the steed.