10. And because the weather, being damp and misty, prevented even what was near from being seen, the enemy, availing themselves of their knowledge of the country, came by an oblique road upon the Cæsar's rear, and attacked two legions while they were piling their arms; and they would almost have destroyed them if the uproar which suddenly arose had not brought the auxiliary troops of the allies to their support.
11. From this time forth Julian, thinking it impossible to find any roads or any rivers free from ambuscades, proceeded with consummate prudence and caution; qualities which above all others in great generals usually bring safety and success to armies.
12. Hearing therefore that Strasburg, Brumat, Saverne, Spiers, Worms, and Mayence, were all in the hands of the barbarians, who were established in their suburbs, for the barbarians shunned fixing themselves in the towns themselves, looking upon them like graves surrounded with nets, he first of all entered Brumat, and just as he reached that place he was encountered by a body of Germans prepared for battle.
13. Having arranged his own army in the form of a crescent, the engagement began, and the enemy were speedily surrounded and utterly defeated. Some were taken prisoners, others were slain in the heat of the battle, the rest sought safety by rapid flight.
III.
§ 1. After this, meeting with no resistance, he determined to proceed to recover Cologne, which had been destroyed before his arrival in Gaul. In that district there is no city or fortress to be seen except that near Confluentes;[60] a place so named because there the river Moselle becomes mingled with the Rhine; there is also the village of Rheinmagen, and likewise a single tower near Cologne.
2. After having taken possession of Cologne he did not leave it till the Frank kings began, through fear of him, to abate of their fury, when he contracted a peace with them likely to be of future advantage to the republic. In the mean time he put the whole city into a state of complete defence.
3. Then, auguring well from these first-fruits of victory, he departed, passing through the district of Treves, with the intention of wintering at Sens, which was a town very suitable for that purpose. When bearing, so to say, the weight of a world of wars upon his shoulders, he was occupied by perplexities of various kinds, and among them how to provide for establishing in places most exposed to danger the soldiers who had quitted their former posts; how to defeat the enemies who had conspired together to injure the Roman cause; and further, how to provide supplies for the army while employed in so many different quarters.
IV.
§ 1. While he was anxiously revolving these things in his mind, he was attacked by a numerous force of the enemy, who had conceived a hope of being able to take the town. And they were the more confident of success because, from the information of deserters, they had learnt that he neither had with him his Scutarii nor his Gentiles, both of which bodies of troops had been distributed among the different municipal towns in order that they might be the more easily supplied with provisions.