Accordingly, crossing with his army, and welcoming the tribunes of the commons, who had come to him after being driven from Rome, he harangued the soldiers with tears, and rending his robe from his breast besought their faithful service. It is even thought that he promised every man a knight’s estate, but that came of a misunderstanding; for since he often pointed to the finger of his left hand as he addressed them and urged them on, declaring that to satisfy all those who helped him to defend his honour he would gladly tear his very ring from his hand, those on the edge of the assembly, who could see him better than they could hear his words, assumed that he said what his gesture seemed to mean; and so the report went about that he had promised them the right of the ring and four hundred thousand sesterces as well.1
Atque ita traiecto exercitu, adhibitis tribunis plebis, qui pulsi supervenerant, pro contione fidem militum flens ac veste a pectore discissa invocavit. Existimatur etiam equestres census pollicitus singulis; quod accidit opinione falsa. Nam cum in adloquendo adhortandoque saepius digitum laevae manus ostentans adfirmaret se ad satis faciendum omnibus, per quos dignitatem suam defensurus esset, anulum quoque aequo animo detracturum sibi, extrema contio, cui facilius erat videre contionantem quam audire, pro dicto accepit, quod visu suspicabatur; promissumque ius anulorum cum milibus quadringenis fama distulit.