It was midwinter. The camp at Tongres was isolated. The nearest
support was seventy miles distant. If one Roman camp was taken,
Induciomarus calculated that the country would rise; the others could be
separately surrounded, and Gaul would be free. The plot was well laid. An
entrenched camp being difficult to storm, the confederates decided to
begin by treachery. Ambiorix was personally known to many of the Roman
officers. He sent to Sabiuus to say that he wished to communicate with him
on a matter of the greatest consequence. An interview being granted, he
stated that a general conspiracy had been formed through the whole of Gaul
to surprise and destroy the legions. Each station was to be attacked on
the same day, that they might be unable to support each other. He
pretended himself to have remonstrated; but his tribe, he said, had been
carried away by the general enthusiasm for liberty, and he could not keep
them back. Vast bodies of Germans had crossed the Rhine to join in the
war. In two days at the furthest they would arrive. He was under private
obligations to Caesar, who had rescued his son and nephew in the fight
with the Aduatuci, and out of gratitude he wished to save Sabinus from
destruction, which was otherwise inevitable. He urged him to escape while
there was still time, and to join either Labienus or Cicero, giving a
solemn promise that he should not be molested on the road.
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