Slowly, slowly, the Caesarian legionaries advanced over the plain. Drusus knew that one of the most crucial hours of his life was before him, yet he was very calm. He saw some wild roses growing on a bush by the way, and thought how pretty they would look in a wreath on Cornelia's hair. He exchanged jokes with his fellow-officers; scolded a soldier who had come away without his sword in his sheath; asked Antonius, when he came across him, if he did not envy Achilles for his country-seat. It was as if he were going on the same tedious march of days and days gone by. Yet, with it all he felt himself far more intensely excited than ever before. He knew that his calm was so unnatural that he wished to cry aloud, to run, weep, to do anything to break it. This was to be the end of the great drama that had begun the day Lentulus and Marcellus first sat down as consuls! Slowly, slowly, that long snake, the marching army, dragged out of the camp. The sun was high in the sky; the last cloud had vanished; the blue above was as clear and translucent as it is conceivable anything may be and yet retain its colour--not become clear light. The head of the column was six hundred paces from the silent Pompeian lines which awaited them. Then cohort after cohort filed off to the right and left, and the line of battle was ready. On the right was the tenth legion, on the left the weak ninth, reenforced by the eighth. There were eighty cohorts in all, to oppose one hundred and ten. But the ranks of Caesar's cohorts were thin. The numbers were scarce half as many as in those of the foe. And to confront Labienus and his cavalry Caesar had but one thousand horse. His army stood in three lines, facing the enemy's infantry; but, though it weakened his own legions dangerously, there was but one thing to do, unless Labienus was to force around the flank, and sweep all before him. Six cohorts Caesar stationed at the rear of his right wing, a defence against the hostile cavalry. The third line of the legions the Imperator commanded to hold back until he ordered them otherwise, for on them lay the turning of the battle. Antonius commanded the left, Publius Sulla the right, Calvinus the centre. Caesar himself took post on his own right wing opposite Pompeius. Then, when the lines were formed, he rode down before his men, and addressed them; not in gaudy eloquence, as if to stir a flagging courage, but a manly request that they quit themselves as became his soldiers. Ever had he sought reconciliation, he said, ever peace; unwillingly had he exposed his own soldiers, and unwillingly attacked his enemies. And to the six chosen cohorts in the fourth line he gave a special word, for he bade them remember that doubtless on their firmness would depend the fate of the battle.