Cæsar insisted on the arguments he had already advanced: “It was not one of the principles of the Republic to abandon its allies; he did not consider that Gaul belonged to Ariovistus any more than to the Roman people. When formerly Q. Fabius Maximus vanquished the Arverni and the Ruteni, Rome pardoned them, and neither reduced them to provinces nor imposed tribute upon them. If, then, priority of conquest be invoked, the claims of the Romans to the empire of Gaul are the most just; and if it be thought preferable to refer to the Senate, Gaul ought to be free, since, after victory, the Senate had willed that she should preserve her own laws.” During this conversation, information was brought to Cæsar that the cavalry of Ariovistus were approaching the knoll, and were throwing stones and darts at the Romans. Cæsar immediately broke up the conference, withdrew to his escort, and forbade them to return the attack, not from fear of an engagement with his favourite legion, but in order to avoid, in case he should defeat his enemies, the suspicion that he might have taken advantage of their good faith to surprise them in an interview. Nevertheless, the arrogance of Ariovistus, the disloyal attack of his cavalry, and the rupture of the conference, were soon known, and excited the ardour and impatience of the Roman troops. Two days afterwards, Ariovistus made a proposal for a renewal of the conference, or for the sending to him of one of Cæsar’s lieutenants. Cæsar refused, the more so because, the day before, the Germans had again advanced and thrown their missiles at the Romans, and that thus his lieutenant would not have been safe from the attacks of the barbarians. He thought it more prudent to send as his deputy Valerius Procillus, the son of a Gaul who had become a Roman citizen, who spoke the Celtic language, and who was on familiar terms with Ariovistus, and M. Mettius, with whom the German king was bound by the rights of hospitality. They had hardly entered the camp of Ariovistus, when he ordered them to be thrown into fetters, under pretence that they were spies.[222] [Sidenote: Movements of the two Armies.]