Servile War

When the servile war was in progress, which was called the war of Spartacus, Gellius was commander, while Cato took part in his campaign as a volunteer, for the sake of his brother;

but Cato would not take them nor allow them, declaring that he had done nothing worthy of honours.

Whereas Crassus, though he was all the while eager for military command, did not succeed in getting it except in the servile war, and then of necessity, because Pompey and Metellus and both the Luculli were away.

I do not, indeed, commend Crassus, in the war with Spartacus, for pressing forward into action with greater speed than safety, although it was natural for a man of his ambition to fear that Pompey would come and rob him of his glory, just as Mummius had robbed Metellus of Corinth;

Even in this success, however, fortune somehow or other included Pompey, since five thousand fugitives from the battle fell in his way, all of whom he slew, and then stole a march on Crassus by writing to the senate that Crassus had conquered the gladiators in a pitched battle, but that he himself had extirpated the war entirely.

For this reason, too, Crassus, who had the command in that war, precipitated the battle at great hazard, and was successful, killing twelve thousand three hundred of the enemy.