Note 441 — Chapter VIII · (Year of Rome 700.) (Book V. of the “Commentaries.”) MARCH AGAINST THE TREVIRI—SECOND DESCENT IN BRITAIN.

From Amiens to Charleroi it is 170 kilomètres. Cæsar must have arrived on the territory of the Nervii, towards Cambrai, the morning of the third day, counting from his departure from Amiens, after marching ninety kilomètres. He immediately sends the Gaulish horseman to Cicero. This horseman has to perform eighty kilomètres. He can only take eight to nine hours, and arrive at the camp in the afternoon of the third day. He throws his javelin, which remains where it was fixed the third and the fourth day. The fifth day it was discovered, and the smoke of the fires is then seen. Cæsar, then, arrived on the fifth day (reckoning thirty kilomètres for a day’s march) at Binche, twenty kilomètres from Charleroi. That town is on a sufficiently elevated knoll to allow the smoke to be seen. The siege lasted about fifteen days.