1. This battle was fought on the 27th. While it was in progress Decimus made a sortie from Mutina and completed the victory. This is mentioned in a letter of Cicero ( Ad Fam. xi. 14). Also in a letter from Marcus Brutus to Cicero ( Ad Brutum, 4). Antony fled from the field toward the Alps with a very small force of infantry and those without arms, but by opening the workhouses and impressing all sorts of people on the road, he collected a considerable number of men. So Decimus Brutus reported to Cicero, May 5. ( Ad farm. xi. 10.)

2. It is plain from what has gone before that Antony aimed at the supreme power which Caesar had held, and that Octavius was, in his eyes, an impertinence and an inconvenience. It is evident also that Octavius aimed not to destroy Antony, but to cripple and humble him, and so convince him that he (Octavius) was a person to be reckoned with. A perception of this truth was forced upon Antony before he was dislodged from Mutina, for he wrote a letter to Hirtius and Octavius appealing to them as Caesarians, and pretending that he was solely concerned in taking vengeance on Decimus as one of the murderers. Hirtius sent it to Cicero, who read it, with a running comment, in the Senate ( Phil. xiii. 10-21). It shows that Antony was not destitute of literary ability. A translation of it will be found in the appendix to Book III.

3. From the letters of Decimus Brutus to Cicero, we learn that this entire section 73 is at variance with the facts. Immediately after Antony’s flight Decimus urged Octavius to cross the Apennines, in order to intercept Ventidius, who was leading three legions to Antony’s assistance, in which case, he says, I should have driven Antony to such straits that he would have succumbed to want rather than the sword. But I cannot command Octavius, nor can he command his own army, which is doubly unfortunate. ( Ad Fam. xi. 10.) In another letter written from Pollentia, Decimus gives an account in detail of his movements after Antony’s flight. I was not able to pursue immediately, he says, because I had neither cavalry nor pack animals. I did not know that Hirtius was dead. I could not trust Octavius, until I had met and conversed with him. So that day passed. Early the next day I was summoned by Pansa to Bononia. While I was on the road thither news was brought to me that he was dead. So I returned to my little band, for so I can truly call it, reduced as it is to extremity by the want of everything. Thus Antony got two days the start of me. ( Ad Fam. xi. 13.)

4. The decree of the Senate here referred to was passed after the first victory over Antony, and while both consuls were still alive. It forms the conclusion of the fourteenth and last Philippic. It awarded praise in equal measure to Pansa, to Hirtius, and to Octavius; it provided for a thanksgiving of fifty days, and for paying to the soldiers who had been engaged, or their surviving relatives, all the rewards previously promised them, and for the erection of a magnificent monument to the memory of those who fell in the battle.

5. This is one of the rare cases in ancient history where it is possible to prove a negative. The letter of Decimus Brutus to Cicero from Pollentia, already referred to, disposes of all the time between the death of Hirtius and that of Pansa, so that no such interview as this could possibly have taken place. Hirtius was killed in the last engagement, the one in which Antony was put to flight. The next day Decimus had a meeting and conversation with Octavius at Mutina. Early on the following day he was summoned to Bononia to confer with Pansa, and while on the road thither received news of his death. Moreover, all that we know of the character of Pansa contradicts this tale of treachery. Pansa was a Caesarian, but he was not false to the cause he publicly served. The simultaneous deaths of Hirtius and Pansa put so much power in the hands of Octavius that a story became current that he had killed the former with his own hand, and had bribed the physician of the latter to poison his wound. The physician was a Greek named Glyco. He was arrested and put in prison. There is a letter from Marcus Brutus to Cicero, complaining bitterly of the injustice done to Glyco, who, it appears, had married a sister of one of Brutus’ Greek friends named Achilleus. The accusation, says Brutus, has not the least foundation. Who has suffered more than he from Pansa’s death? Moreover, he is a man of sobriety and character, whom not even self-interest could impel to such a crime. I ask you, I ardently beseech you (for our Achilleus is deeply pained) to have him released from custody, and take care of him. ( Ad Brutum, 6.) Combes-Dounous thinks that the story of the death-bed interview with Pansa may have been invented during the reign of Augustus, to avert the suspicion of foul play against Pansa.