Book VII

I.--Gaul being tranquil, Caesar, as he had determined, sets out for
Italy to hold the provincial assizes. There he receives intelligence of
the death of Clodius; and, being informed of the decree of the senate
[to the effect] that all the youth of Italy should take the military
oath, he determined to hold a levy throughout the entire province.
Report of these events is rapidly borne into Transalpine Gaul. The Gauls
themselves add to the report, and invent what the case seemed to
require, [namely] that Caesar was detained by commotions in the city,
and could not, amidst so violent dissensions, come to his army. Animated
by this opportunity, they who already, previously to this occurrence,
were indignant that they were reduced beneath the dominion of Rome,
begin to organize their plans for war more openly and daringly. The
leading men of Gaul, having convened councils among themselves in the
woods, and retired places, complain of the death of Acco: they point out
that this fate may fall in turn on themselves: they bewail the unhappy
fate of Gaul; and by every sort of promises and rewards, they earnestly
solicit some to begin the war, and assert the freedom of Gaul at the
hazard of their lives. They say that special care should be paid to
this, that Caesar should be cut off from his army, before their secret
plans should be divulged. That this was easy, because neither would the
legions, in the absence of their general, dare to leave their winter
quarters, nor could the general reach his army without a guard: finally,
that it was better to be slain in battle than not to recover their
ancient glory in war, and that freedom which they had received from
their forefathers.

II.--Whilst these things are in agitation, the Carnutes declare "that
they would decline no danger for the sake of the general safety," and
promise that they would be the first of all to begin the war; and since
they cannot at present take precautions, by giving and receiving
hostages, that the affair shall not be divulged they require that a
solemn assurance be given them by oath and plighted honour, their
military standards being brought together (in which manner their most
sacred obligations are made binding), that they should not be deserted
by the rest of the Gauls on commencing the war.

III.--When the appointed day came, the Carnutes, under the command of
Cotuatus and Conetodunus, desperate men, meet together at Genabum, and
slay the Roman citizens who had settled there for the purpose of trading
(among the rest, Caius Fusius Cita, a distinguished Roman knight, who by
Caesar's orders had presided over the provision department), and plunder
their property. The report is quickly spread among all the states of
Gaul; for,