[Illustration:  Mounted Gauls——­66]

AEduans, Sequanians, or Arvernians, all the Gauls interested in the struggle thus terminated, were eager to congratulate Caesar upon his victory; but if they were delivered from the invasion of the Helvetians, another scourge fell heavily upon them; Ariovistus and the Germans, who were settled upon their territory, oppressed them cruelly, and day by day fresh bands were continually coming to aggravate the evil and the danger.  They adjured Caesar to protect them from these swarms of barbarians.  “In a few years,” said they, “all the Germans will have crossed the Rhine, and all the Gauls will be driven from Gaul, for the soil of Germany cannot compare with that of Gaul, any more than the mode of life.  If Caesar and the Roman people refuse to aid us, there is nothing left for us but to abandon our lands, as the Helvetians would have done in their case, and go seek, afar from the Germans, another dwelling-place.”  Caesar, touched by so prompt an appeal to the power of his name and fame gave ear to the prayer of the Gauls.  But he was for trying negotiation before war.  He proposed to Ariovistus an interview “at which they aright treat in common of affairs of importance for both.”  Ariovistus replied that “if he wanted anything of Caesar, he would go in search of him; if Caesar had business with him, it was for Caesar to come.”  Caesar thereupon conveyed to him by messenger his express injunctions, “not to summon any more from the borders of the Rhine fresh multitudes of men, and to cease from vexing the AEduans and making war on them, them and their allies.  Otherwise, Caesar would not fail to avenge their wrongs.”  Ariovistus replied that “he had conquered the AEduans.  The Roman people were in the habit of treating the vanquished after their own pleasure, and not the advice of another; he too, himself, had the same right.  Caesar said he would avenge the wrongs of the AEduans; but no one had ever attacked him with impunity.  If Caesar would like to try it, let him come; he would learn what could be done by the bravery of the Germans, who were as yet unbeaten, who were trained to arms, who for fourteen years had not slept beneath a roof.”  At the moment he received this answer, Caesar had just heard that fresh bands of Suevians were encamped on the right bank of the Rhine, ready to cross, and that Ariovistus with all his forces was making towards Vesontio (Besancon), the chief town of the Sequanians.  Caesar forthwith put himself in motion, occupied Vesontio, established there a strong garrison, and made his arrangements for issuing from it with his legions to go and anticipate the attack of Ariovistus.  Then came to him word that no little disquietude was showing itself among the Roman troops; that many soldiers and even officers appeared anxious about the struggle with the Germans, their ferocity, the vast forests that must be traversed to reach them, the difficult roads, and the transport