They also have an admirable method of encouraging the young soldiers to face danger.
After a battle in which some of them have distinguished themselves, the general calls an assembly of the troops, and bringing forward those whom he considers to have displayed conspicuous valour, first of all speaks in laudatory terms of the courageous deeds of each and of anything else in their previous conduct which deserves commendation, and afterwards distributes the following rewards.
To the man who has wounded an enemy, a spear; to him who has slain and stripped an enemy, a cup if he be in the infantry and horse trappings if in the cavalry, although the gift here was originally only a spear.
These gifts are not made to men who have wounded or stripped an enemy in a regular battle or at the storming of a city, but to those who during skirmishes or in similar circumstances, where there is no necessity for engaging in single combat, have voluntarily and deliberately thrown themselves into the danger.
To the first man to mount the wall at the assault on a city, he gives a crown of gold.
So also those who have shielded and saved any of the citizens or allies receive honorary gifts from the consul, and the men they saved crown their preservers, if not under their own free will under compulsion from the tribunes who judge the case.
The man thus preserved also reverences his preserver as a father all through his life, and must treat him in every way like a parent.
By such incentives they excite to emulation and rivalry in the field not only the men who are present and listen to their words, but those who remain at home also.
For the recipients of such gifts, quite apart from becoming famous in the army and famous too for the time at their homes, are especially distinguished in religious processions after their return, as no one is allowed to wear decorations except those on whom these honours for bravery have been conferred by the consul;
and in their houses they hand up the spoils they won in the most conspicuous places, looking upon them as tokens and evidences of their valour.
Considering all this attention given to the matter of punishments and rewards in the army and the importance attached to both, no wonder that the wars in which the Romans engage end so successfully and brilliantly.
As pay the foot-soldier receives two obols a day, a centurion twice as much, and a cavalry-soldier a drachma.
The allowance of corn to a foot-soldier is about two-thirds of an Attic medimnus a month, a cavalry-soldier receive seven medimni of barley and two of wheat.
Of the allies the infantry receive the same, the cavalry one and one-third medimnus of wheat and five of barley, these rations being a free gift to the allies; but in the case of the Romans the quaestor deducts from their pay the price fixed for their corn and clothes and any additional arm they require.
Walbank Commentary