The struggle was an unsuccessful one.  After many victories and many overthrows, Civilis was left alone.  The Gallic tribes fell off, and sued for peace.  Vespasian, victorious over Vitellius, proved too powerful for his old comrade.  Even the Batavians became weary of the hopeless contest, while fortune, after much capricious hovering, settled at last upon the Roman side.  The imperial commander Cerialis seized the moment when the cause of the Batavian hero was most desperate to send emissaries among his tribe, and even to tamper with the mysterious woman whose prophecies had so inflamed his imagination.  These intrigues had their effect.  The fidelity of the people was sapped; the prophetess fell away from her worshipper, and foretold ruin to his cause.  The Batavians murmured that their destruction was inevitable, that one nation could not arrest the slavery which was destined for the whole world.  How large a part of the human race were the Batavians?  What were they in a contest with the whole Roman empire?  Moreover, they were not oppressed with tribute.  They were only expected to furnish men and valor to their proud allies.  It was the next thing to liberty.  If they were to have rulers, it was better to serve a Roman emperor than a German witch.

Thus murmured the people.  Had Civilis been successful, he would have been deified; but his misfortunes, at last, made him odious in spite of his heroism.  But the Batavian was not a man to be crushed, nor had he lived so long in the Roman service to be outmatched in politics by the barbarous Germans.  He was not to be sacrificed as a peace-offering to revengeful Rome.  Watching from beyond the Rhine the progress of defection and the decay of national enthusiasm, he determined to be beforehand with those who were now his enemies.  He accepted the offer of negotiation from Cerialis.  The Roman general was eager to grant a full pardon, and to re-enlist so brave a soldier in the service of the empire.

A colloquy was agreed upon.  The bridge across the Nabalia was broken asunder in the middle, and Cerialis and Civilis met upon the severed sides.  The placid stream by which Roman enterprise had connected the waters of the Rhine with the lake of Flevo, flowed between the imperial commander and the rebel chieftain.

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Here the story abruptly terminates.  The remainder of the Roman’s narrative is lost, and upon that broken bridge the form of the Batavian hero disappears forever.  His name fades from history:  not a syllable is known of his subsequent career; every thing is buried in the profound oblivion which now steals over the scene where he was the most imposing actor.