Only the discipline of the Romans saved them from speedy destruction.  With the instinct of their training they hastened to gather into larger bodies, and their resistance, at first feeble, soon became more effective.  The struggle continued until night-fall, by which time the surviving Romans had fought their way to a more open place, where they hastily intrenched.  But it was impossible for them to remain there.  Their provisions were lost or exhausted, thousands of foes surrounded them, and their only hope lay in immediate and rapid flight.

Sunrise came.  The soldiers had recovered somewhat from the fatigue of the day before.  Setting fire to what baggage remained in their hands, they began a retreat fighting as they went, for the implacable enemy disputed every step.  The first part of their route lay through an open plain, where they marched in orderly ranks.  But there were mountains still to pass, and they quickly found themselves in a wooded and pathless valley, in whose rugged depths defence was almost impossible.  Here they fell in thousands before the weapons of their foes.  It was but a small body of survivors that at length escaped from that deadly defile and threw up intrenchments for the night in a more open spot.

With the dawn of the next day they resumed their progress, and were at no great distance from their stronghold of Aliso when they found their progress arrested by fresh tribes, who assailed them with murderous fury.  On they struggled, fighting, dying, marking every step of the route with their dead.  Varus, now reduced to despair, and seeing only slaughter or captivity before him, threw himself on his sword, and died in the midst of those whom his blind confidence had led to destruction.  Of the whole army only a feeble remnant reached Aliso, which fort they soon after abandoned and fought their way to the Rhine.  While this was going on, the detachments which Varus had sent out in various directions were similarly assailed, and met the same fate as had overtaken the main body of the troops.

[Illustration:  Return of Hermann after his victory over the Romans.]

No more frightful disaster had ever befallen the Roman arms.  Many prisoners had been taken, among them certain judges and lawyers, who were the chief objects of Hermann’s hate, and whom he devoted to a painful death.  He then offered sacrifices to the gods, to whom he consecrated the booty, the slain, and the leading prisoners, numbers of them being slain on the altars of his deities.  These religious ceremonies completed, the prisoners who still remained were distributed among the tribes as slaves.  The effort of Varus to force Roman customs and laws upon the Germans had led to a fearful retribution.