He halted his army, therefore, in a little gorge of the hills opening out upon a level plain, flanked on the left by the steep acclivities of the mountain, which towered in that direction, ridge above ridge, inaccessible, and on the right by a rugged and rocky spur, jutting out from the same ridge, by which his line of battle would be rendered entirely unassailable on the flanks and rear. In this wild spot, amid huge gray rocks, and hanging woods of ancient chesnuts and wild olive, as gray and hoary as the stones among which they grew, he had pitched his camp, and now lay awaiting in grim anticipation what the morrow should bring forth; while, opposite to his front, on a lower plateau of the same eminence, the great army of the consul might be descried, with its regular entrenchments and superb array of tents, its forests of gleaming spears, and its innumerable ensigns, glancing and waving in the cold wintry moonshine. The mind of the traitor was darker and more gloomy than its wont. He had supped with his officers, Manlius and a nobleman of Fæsulæ, whose name the historian has not recorded, who held the third rank in the rebel army, but their fare had been meagre and insipid, their wines the thin vintage of that hill country; a little attempt at festivity had been made, but it had failed altogether; the spirits of the men, although undaunted and prepared to dare the utmost, lacked all that fiery and enthusiastic ardor, which kindles patriot breasts with a flame so pure and pervading, on the eve of the most desperate encounters. Enemies of their country, enemies almost of mankind, these desperadoes were prepared to fight desperately, to fight unto the death, because to win was their only salvation, and, if defeated, death their only refuge. But for them there was no grand heart-elevating spur to action, no fame to be won, no deathless name to be purchased—their names deathless already, as they knew too well, through black infamy!—no grateful country’s praises, to be gained cheaply by a soldier’s death!—no! there were none of these things. All their excitements were temporal, sensual, earthy. The hope to conquer, the lust to bask in the sunshine of power, the desire to revel at ease in boundless luxury and riot. And against these, the rewards of victory, what were the penalties of defeat—death, infamy, the hatred and the scorn of ages. The wicked have no friends. Never, perhaps, was this fact exemplified more clearly than on that battle eve. Community of guilt, indeed, bound those vicious souls together—community of interests, of fears, of perils, held them in league—yet, feeling as they did feel that their sole chance of safety lay in the maintenance of that confederation, each looked with evil eyes upon his neighbor, each almost hated the others, accusing them internally of having drawn them into their present perilous peril, of having failed at need, or of being swayed by selfish motives only.