By this means neither husbandry nor the theory and practice of war is interrupted. The remainder, who have stayed at home, support themselves and the absent warriors and again, in turn, are under arms the following year, while the others remain at home. It is said that they have a hundred cantons, from each of which they draw one thousand armed men yearly for the purpose of war outside their borders. The Suebi are by far the largest and the most warlike nation among the Germans. The reason for their crossing was that for several years they had been much harassed by the Suebi, who pressed on them by force of arms and prevented them from husbandry. In the following winter - the year in which Gnaeus Pompeius and Marcus Crassus were consuls 1 - the Usipetes from Germany, and likewise the Tencteri, crossed the Rhine with a large host of men, not far from the sea into which it flows.
