27.7
As Lucullus was about to cross the river, some of his officers advised him to beware of the day, which was one of the unlucky days—the Romans call them black days. For on that day Caepio and his army perished in a battle with the Cimbri.B.C. 105. Cf. Camillus, xix. 7. But Lucullus answered with the memorable words: Verily, I will make this day, too, a lucky one for the Romans. Now the day was the sixth of October.
28.1
Saying this, and bidding his men be of good courage, he crossed the river, and led the way in person against the enemy. He wore a steel breastplate of glittering scales, and a tasselled cloak, and at once let his sword flash forth from its scabbard, indicating that they must forthwith come to close quarters with men who fought with long range missiles, and eliminate, by the rapidity of their onset, the space in which archery would be effective.
28.2
But when he saw that the mail-clad horsemen, on whom the greatest reliance was placed, were stationed at the foot of a considerable hill which was crowned by a broad and level space, and that the approach to this was a matter of only four stadia, and neither rough nor steep, he ordered his Thracian and Gallic horsemen to attack the enemy in the flank, and to parry their long spears with their own short swords.
28.3
(Now the sole resource of the mail-clad horsemen is their long spear, and they have none other whatsoever, either in defending themselves or attacking their enemies, owing to the weight and rigidity of their armour; in this they are, as it were, immured.) Then he himself, with two cohorts, hastened eagerly towards the hill, his soldiers following with all their might, because they saw him ahead of them in armour, enduring all the fatigue of a foot-soldier, and pressing his way along. Arrived at the top, and standing in the most conspicuous spot, he cried with a loud voice, The day is ours, the day is ours, my fellow soldiers!
