1So, after praising the soldiers' eagerness, Vitellius assigns to Roman knights the offices of the principate usually performed by freedmen, pays the centurions their exemption fees from the imperial treasury, more often approves the savagery of the soldiers who demanded many men for punishment, and rarely cheats it by pretending to imprison them. 1Pompeius Propinquus, procurator of Belgica, was killed at once; 1Julius Burdo, prefect of the German fleet, he rescued by a ruse. 1The army's anger had blazed up against him on the ground that he had framed charges and then a plot against Fonteius Capito. 1The memory of Capito was dear, and among men in a fury it was possible to kill openly, but to pardon only by deceit: so he was held in custody and released only after the victory, when the soldiers' hatred had at last died down.
1Meanwhile the centurion Crispinus is offered up as a scapegoat. 1He had stained himself with Capito's blood, and so was both more obviously guilty to those demanding him and of less account to the man punishing him.