A court-martial composed of all the tribunes at once meets to try him, and if he is found guilty he is punished by the bastinado ().
This is inflicted as follows: The tribune takes a cudgel and just touches the condemned man with it,
after which all in the camp beat or stone him, in most cases dispatching him in the camp itself.
But even those who manage to escape are not saved thereby: impossible! for they are not allowed to return to their homes, and none of the family would dare to receive such a man in his house. So that those who have of course fallen into this misfortune are utterly ruined.
The same punishment is inflicted on the optio and on the praefect of the squadron, if they do not give the proper orders at the right time to the patrols and the praefect of the next squadron.
Thus, owing to the extreme severity and inevitableness of the penalty, the night watches of the Roman army are most scrupulously kept.
While the soldiers are subject to the tribune, the latter are subject to the consuls.
A tribune, and in the case of the allies a praefect, has the right of inflicting fines, of demanding sureties, and of punishing by flogging.
The bastinado is also inflicted on those who steal anything from the camp; on those who give false evidence; on young men who have abused their persons; and finally on anyone who has been punished thrice for the same fault.
Those are the offences which are punished as crimes, the following being treated as unmanly acts and disgraceful in a soldier — when a man boasts falsely to the tribune of his valour in the field in order to gain distinction;
when any men who have been placed in a covering force leave the station assigned to them from fear; likewise when anyone throws away from fear any of his arms in the actual battle.
Therefore the men in covering forces often face certain death, refusing to leave their ranks even when vastly outnumbered, owing to dread of the punishment they would meet with;
and again in the battle men who have lost a shield or sword or any other arm often throw themselves into the midst of the enemy, hoping either to recover the lost object or to escape by death from inevitable disgrace and the taunts of their relations.
Walbank Commentary