XXVII.
Haud proinde id damnum Vitellianos in metum compulit quam (haud proinde …quam: proinde is the correlative of quam in a comparative sentence, where proinde introduces the dependent clause, or standard of comparison, and quam the main clause; ‘hardly in the same way as …’. ) ad modestiam composuit: nec solum apud Caecinam, qui culpam in militem conferebat seditioni magis quam proelio paratum: Fabii quoque Valentis copiae (iam enim Ticinum venerat) posito hostium contemptu et reciperandi decoris cupidine (reciperandi decoris cupidine: genitive gerundive after nouns and adjectives that require a complement) reverentius et aequalius duci parebant. gravis alioquin (alioquin: ‘at another time’) seditio exarserat, quam altiore initio (altiore initio: ‘from its earlier beginning’; Tacitus resumes here the narrative from Book 1, ch. 66.) (neque enim rerum a Caecina gestarum ordinem interrumpi oportuerat) (neque enim rerum a Caecina gestarum ordinem interrumpi oportuerat: ‘for it was not convenient that the order of Caecina’s operations be interrupted’) repetam. cohortes Batavorum, quas bello Neronis a quarta decima legione digressas, cum Britanniam peterent, audito Vitellii motu in civitate Lingonum Fabio Valenti adiunctas rettulimus, (civitate Lingonum Fabio Valenti adiunctas rettulimus: actually, in Book 1, ch. 59, we are told of the cohorts being among the Lingones, but not of their crossing over to Vitellius. ) superbe agebant, ut cuiusque legionis tentoria accessissent, (ut cuiusque legionis tentoria accessissent: ‘whenever they had approached the tents of any legion’; temporal ut, like ubi, requires subjunctive when the particle has the frequentative sense of ‘whenever’, i.e. ut = utcumque and ubi = ubicumque.) coercitos a se quartadecimanos, ablatam Neroni Italiam atque omnem belli fortunam in ipsorum manu sitam iactantes. contumeliosum id militibus, acerbum duci; corrupta iurgiis aut rixis disciplina; ad postremum Valens e petulantia etiam perfidiam suspectabat.