The Annals and the Histories · Hist. 3.84

The most arduous struggle was the storming of the camp, which the bravest of the enemy still held as a last hope. It was, therefore, with peculiar energy that the conquerors, among whom the veteran cohorts were especially forward, brought to bear upon it at once all the appliances which have been discovered in reducing the strongest cities, the testudo, the catapult, the earth-work, and the firebrand. They repeatedly shouted "that all the toil and danger they had endured in so many conflicts would be crowned by this achievement. The capital has been restored to the Senate and people of Rome, and their temples to the Gods; but the soldier's peculiar distinction is in the camp; this is his country, and this his home; unless this be recovered forthwith, the night must be passed under arms." On the other hand the Vitellianists, though unequal in numbers and doomed to defeat, could yet…

Cornelius Tacitus · trans. Church & Brodribb, 1876
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