An audeant, qui sciant te adsedisse ferocissimis populis, eo ipso tempore quod amicissimum illis difficillimum nobis, cum Danubius ripas gelu iungit, duratusque glacie ingentia tergo bella transportat, cum ferae gentes non telis magis quam suo caelo, suo sidere armantur? Sed ubi in proximo tu, non secus ac si mutatae temporum vices essent, illi quidem latibulis suis clausi tenebantur, nostra agmina percursare ripas et aliena occasione si permitteres uti, ultroque hiemem suam barbaris inferre gaudebant.
how could they, when they know how you encamped confronting a dangerous enemy at the very time which was best for them and least favourable to us: when the Danube is bridged by ice from bank to bank and can carry vast preparations for war across its frozen surface, so that its savage peoples can enjoy the double protection of their own arms and the winter weather of their native climate? Once you were on the spot, the seasons might have been reversed; the enemy were stopped up inside their lairs, while our armies were eager to cross the river and, if you permitted, adopt the enemys tactics and launch a winter campaign on them unprovoked.
final_alignments\Pliny_Younger_Panegyricus.json