Mallius Maximus and the Proconsul Cn. Servilius Caepio, consisting of 80,000 men, were completely annihilated by the barbarians: only two men are said to have escaped the slaughter. These repeated disasters hushed all party quarrels. Every one at Rome felt that Marius was the only man capable of saving the state, and he was accordingly elected Consul by the unanimous votes of all parties while he was still absent in Africa. He entered Rome in triumph, as we have already said, on the 1st of January, B.C. 104, which was the first day of his second Consulship. Meantime the threatened danger was for a while averted. Instead of crossing the Alps and pouring down upon Italy, as had been expected, the Cimbri marched into Spain, which they ravaged for the next two or three years. This interval was advantageously employed by Marius in training the new troops, and accustoming them to hardships and toil. It was probably during this time that he introduced the various changes into the organization of the Roman army which are usually attributed to him. Notwithstanding the sternness and severity with which he punished the least breach of discipline, he was a favorite with his new soldiers, who learned to place implicit confidence in their general, and were delighted with the strict impartiality with which he visited the offenses of the officers as well as of the privates. As the enemy still continued in Spain, Marius was elected Consul a third time for the year B.C. 103, and also a fourth time for the following year, with Q. Lutatius Catulus as his colleague. It was in this year (B.C. 102) that the long-expected barbarians arrived. The Cimbri, who had returned from Spain, united their forces with the Teutones. Marius first took up his position in a fortified camp upon the Rhone, probably in the vicinity of the modern Arles; and as the entrance of the river was nearly blocked up by mud and sand, he employed his soldiers in digging a canal from the Rhone to the Mediterranean, that he might the more easily obtain his supplies from the sea.[65] Meantime the barbarians had divided their forces. The Cimbri marched round the northern foot of the Alps, in order to enter Italy by the northeast, crossing the Tyrolese Alps by the defiles of Tridentum (_Trent_). The Teutones and Ambrones, on the other hand, marched against Marius, intending, as it seems, to penetrate into Italy by Nice and the Riviera of Genoa. Marius, anxious to accustom his soldiers to the savage and strange appearance of the barbarians, would not give them battle at first. The latter resolved to attack the Roman camp; but as they were repulsed in this attempt, they pressed on at once for Italy. So great were their numbers, that they are said to have been six days in marching by the Roman camp. As soon as they had advanced a little way, Marius followed them; and thus the armies continued to march for a few days, the barbarians in the front