Picenum

Taking advantage of his superior cavalry force, Mark Antony's army was able to move faster than his senatorial adversaries.

His plan was to combine his battered legions with one of his colleagues, Ventidius Bassus, who had already raised three legions of veterans in his native Picenum and was marching northwards.

Brutus urged Octavian to march across the Apennines to cut off Ventidius and prevent him from joining forces with Antony.

Hey guys, this is Joe.

I see it all now, even as you speak.

And what hope had we from the first? Who was the demagogue Flaminius, that he should command our army, going forth without the auspices, a consul that was no consul at all in the sight of the gods? Then, too, there were the warnings that poured in from all the country, the ships in the sky, the crow alighting on the couch in the temple of Juno, the stones rained in Picenum.

Foolish stories, my Caius, the dreams of ignorant rustics, replied Lucius, smiling faintly.

Besides, you remember they were all expiated.

And amid all, there was no rumour of allied gates opened to receive the invader, no welcome from the Italians whom he had striven to conciliate.

Courage returned, and with courage firmness, and with firmness confidence to endure and dare and do, so long as invaders presumed to set foot upon the heritage of Rome.

How far this new confidence was born of the news that the Carthaginian was turning aside to the west through Umbria and Picenum, how far by the rumour that Spoletum had closed her gates and repulsed his vanguard, or how far by wrath at the tales of ravage and the numberless murders of Roman citizens that marked his line of march, it would be difficult to apportion.

However these, the city was now seething with energetic preparation.