XI. FIRST HALF OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR…

XI. FIRST HALF OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR

War was resolved upon and declared on both sides--a war which stands forth in the annals of the ancient world without a parallel. It was not a war about a disputed boundary, about the possession of a province, or some partial advantage; it was a struggle for existence, for supremacy or destruction. It was to decide whether the Greco-Roman civilisation of the West or the Semitic civilisation of the East was to be established in Europe, and to determine its history for all future time. The war was one of those in which Asia struggled with Europe, like the war of the Greeks and Persians, the conquests of Alexander the Great, the wars of the Arabs, the Huns and the Tatars. Whatever may be our admiration of Hannibal, and our sympathy with heroic and yet defeated Carthage, we shall nevertheless be obliged to acknowledge that the victory of Rome--the issue of this trial by battle--was the most essential condition for the healthy development of the human race.--IHNE.[b]

FIRST PERIOD (218-216 B.C.)

The war which began with the invasion of Italy by Hannibal lasted for seventeen years. The periods of the war are four. The first comprehends the victorious career of Hannibal, from the passage of the Alps to Capua. Each year is marked by a great battle--Trebia, Trasimene, Cannæ (218-215 B.C.). The second is of five years, in which the Romans succeed in recovering Capua, while they lose Tarentum (215-211 B.C.). The third, of four years, in which Hannibal, left without support from home, is obliged more and more to confine himself to the mountain regions of Calabria. It ends with the disastrous battle of the Metaurus (211-207 B.C.). The fourth, of four years, in which Hannibal stands at bay in the extremity of Italy, while the main scene of the war shifts to Spain, Sicily, and Africa. It terminates with the great battle of Zama, and peace (206-202 B.C.).

But during the former periods of the great war, the Roman arms were also engaged in Spain, in Sicily, and in Epirus. From the very beginning of the war they maintained the conflict in Spain. After 215 B.C. they were obliged to besiege Syracuse and reconquer Sicily, as well as Sardinia. In 212 B.C. they declared war against Philip of Macedon, in order to prevent him from sending aid to Hannibal in Italy.

The winter of 219 was passed by Hannibal in active preparation. His soldiers received leave of absence, with orders to be present at New Carthage at the very beginning of the next spring. He sent envoys into the south of Gaul and north of Italy, to inform the Celts on both sides of the Alps of his expedition to win the Transalpine Gauls with hopes of the plunder of Italy, to rouse the Cisalpine by promises of delivery from the Roman yoke.

Thus assured, Hannibal reviewed his troops at New Carthage. The army of invasion amounted to ninety thousand foot and twelve thousand horse, with some fifty elephants. The infantry were mostly Spanish, the veteran soldiers of Hamilcar and Hasdrubal, recruited by new levies of his own. The Spaniards, however, were kept in balance by a large body of Libyan mercenaries. The light infantry, slingers and archers, were from the Balearic Isles. Of the cavalry, the heavy troopers were Spanish, while the light horse were furnished by Numidia; and the whole of this arm was placed under the command of the fiery Maharbal.

Hasdrubal, the brother of Hannibal, was left at New Carthage, to rule the lately conquered province of Spain, and to raise an army of reserve for the Italian war. Mago, his youngest brother, accompanied the general.

Having left New Carthage about the end of May, Hannibal marched with no interruption to the Ebro; but as soon as he had crossed that river, the whole country up to the Pyrenees was hostile. By great rapidity of movement, though with the loss of many men, he reduced all the tribes to submission in a few weeks, and, leaving an officer, with eleven thousand men, in charge of this district, he pushed forwards to the Pyrenees. Here his Spanish soldiers first discovered that they were to be led into strange and unknown lands; discontent appeared in the camp; three thousand Carpetanians, a tribe which had not been long conquered, seized their arms and set off homewards. Upon this, Hannibal, with prudent frankness, called the troops together, told them his whole design, and gave all who were unwilling to go on, free leave to return. Nearly eight thousand more availed themselves of this permission.

He passed round the eastern end of the Pyrenees, where the mountains sink gently towards the sea, and halted his army for a few days at Ruscino (Roussillon). On a review, it appeared that the losses he had sustained, together with the twenty-two thousand men whom he had left in Catalonia or who had gone home, had reduced his foot to fifty thousand, and his horse to nine thousand. With this force he advanced almost unopposed to the banks of the Rhone.

It is now time to inquire what the Romans were doing to meet the coming danger. The senate had not been idle. But they had acted on the supposition that the Second Punic War, like the First, would be fought on foreign soil. It is almost amusing to contrast their expectations with the result. The plebeian consul, Ti. Sempronius Longus, was sent to Lilybæum with a large fleet, with orders to invade Africa: the other consul, P. Cornelius Scipio, was to land in Spain and take the field against Hannibal. And it is plain that the senate thought this service the least important of the two, because they detained Scipio’s army rather than that of Sempronius, to quell a rebellion which broke out in Cisalpine Gaul, in consequence of the proceedings of the triumviri, who had been sent to distribute the confiscated lands of the Boians and Insubrians among the colonists of Placentia and Cremona. Just at this time the envoys of Hannibal arrived, and the Gauls rushed to arms. To repress this outbreak, one of Scipio’s legions was sent off in all haste, and the consul could not set sail for Spain till he had raised a new legion. His troops met at Pisa, and he was just weighing anchor for Spain when he heard that Hannibal had already crossed the Pyrenees.

On receiving this news, he put in at the allied city of Massilia (Marseilles), and disembarked there, intending to arrest Hannibal’s march upon the Rhone. He did not expect him there for some time yet, and therefore he gave his army some days’ rest, while he despatched a reconnoitring party of three hundred picked horse up the left bank of the river, under the trusty guidance of the Massaliots.

But Hannibal had crossed the Rhone while these horsemen were on their way up the river. The point at which he reached it was not far above Avignon, about fifty miles from the coast. The river itself is large, and the rapidity of its stream proverbial. But, besides these natural difficulties, he found the left bank occupied by a large host of Gauls. Upon this, he immediately made preparations for forcing the passage. After two days spent in seizing boats and constructing rafts, he sent Hanno, son of Bomilcar, with a strong detachment of cavalry, to cross the river about twenty miles higher up, so as to come round upon the rear of the Gauls. On the morning of the third day after his departure, Hanno signalled his arrival to Hannibal by a column of smoke; and the Carthaginians immediately pushed their boats and rafts into the stream. The Gauls flocked down to the water’s edge, brandishing their arms and uttering wild yells of defiance. But while the boats were in midstream, a cry arose from the rear; and, looking round, the barbarians beheld their tents in flames. They hastened back, and were charged by Hanno with his cavalry. Meanwhile, the first divisions of the army, forming under the general’s eye, completed the defeat of the Gauls; and for the remainder of the day the Carthaginians lay encamped in the enemy’s late quarters. All the army, except the elephants, had effected the passage. It was on this very day that Scipio sent off his three hundred horse from Marseilles.

On the next morning (the sixth after his arrival on the Rhone) news reached Hannibal that the Romans had landed. Upon this he instantly despatched a body of five hundred Numidian horse to reconnoitre, while he himself spent the day in preparations for bringing over the elephants. At this moment, some Boian and Insubrian chieftains arrived from Italy to inform him of what their people were doing and had done against the Romans, and to describe in glowing colours the richness and beauty of the land which would welcome him after the toils of the Alpine pass. This news had a great effect upon the army, which was somewhat dispirited by the opposition offered by the Gauls upon the Rhone.

In the evening the Numidian horse galloped into camp in great disorder, having lost half their number. At some distance a body of cavalry appeared in pursuit, who reined in their horses on coming in view of the Carthaginian camp, and then turned about and rode off down the river. This was Scipio’s reconnoitring party, which had encountered the Numidians and defeated them.

Hannibal, finding the enemy so near at hand, sent off the whole of his infantry next morning to march up the left bank of the Rhone. He himself only stayed till he saw his elephants, now about thirty in number, safely across the stream; and then, with the elephants and cavalry, he followed the army.

Scipio, on his part, so soon as he heard that the Carthaginians had already crossed the Rhone, proceeded by forced marches up the river. But it was three or four days after Hannibal’s departure that he arrived at the point where the Carthaginians had crossed. It was in vain to pursue the enemy into unknown regions, peopled by barbarous tribes; and Scipio had the mortification to reflect that, if he had marched at once from Marseilles, he might have come in time to assist the Gauls in barring Hannibal’s passage. Not able to undo the past, he provided wisely for the future. He despatched his brother Cneius to Spain with the fleet and the consular army, deeming it of high importance to cut off communication between Hannibal and that country; and himself returned to Pisa, to take command of the army which had been left to suppress the Gallic insurrection. He expected to meet Hannibal’s army shattered by the passage of the Alps, and to gain an easy victory.

Meanwhile, Hannibal continued his march up the Rhone, and crossing the Isère found himself in the plains of Dauphiné, then inhabited by the Allobrogian Gauls. He marched thus far north, about one hundred miles beyond the place where he had crossed the Rhone, at the invitation of a chieftain who was contending for the dominion of the tribe with his younger brother. Hannibal’s veterans put the elder brother in possession; and the grateful chief furnished the army with arms and clothing, entertained them hospitably for some days, and guided them to the verge of his own dominions. This must have brought them to the point at which the Isère issues from the lower range of the Alps into the plain, near the present fortress of Grenoble. To this point there is little doubt as to the route taken by Hannibal; but after this all is doubtful.[c]

Besides the fact that no modern historian can offer any better authority than Polybius for this portion of history, no more brilliant and dramatic account of the crossing of the Alps exists than his. We may then quote it at length.[a]

POLYBIUS’ ACCOUNT OF THE CROSSING OF THE ALPS

Some Authors, who have writ of Hannibal’s passage over the Alpes, entertain us with astonishing and incredible Tales of that Voyage, without heeding that they have thereby committed two Errors, which History of all things will not permit, for they are constrain’d thereby to coin Falsehoods of their own, and often become liable to contradict themselves. For as they give to Hannibal all the Encomiums of a great and valiant Leader; so at the same time they make him act with the greatest Imprudence imaginable. Then when they are taken in their own fabulous Snares, they are forc’d to bring down the Gods and Demi-Gods to their Aid, who should not be nam’d but in matters of Truth. Furthermore, they feign that the Alpes are so desart and inaccessible, that far from being passable by Armies, Horses, and Elephants, Men cannot without unspeakable travel pass them on foot. They tell us farther, that some parts thereof are so waste and destitute of all Succour, that without the Aid of some Divinity, who led Hannibal, as it were by the Hand, through those wild labyrinths, he and his Army had inevitably perish’d; these, I say, are two Faults in an Historian, which Men of common Sense easily discover and dislike. For these Authors make Hannibal in the spring of his Hopes at the head of a flourishing victorious Army, perform such things as are not likely would be acted by a People already vanquish’d and undone, and reduc’d to the last extremity; namely, to ingage their Troops in Countries and Places totally unknown. For while they tell us all was waste and desart, and the Country no where passable, do they not plainly accuse their own Forgeries? But they knew not that the Gauls, who inhabit about the Rhosne, had often pass’d the Alpes with numerous Armies, long before Hannibal’s time; and not only heretofore, but of late days, they had march’d to the relief of those Gauls who dwell about the Po, during their Wars with the Romans. Furthermore, they were to learn that even the Alpes themselves are inhabited by numerous Nations; but it was their Ignorance indeed that brought the Demi-God down to show Hannibal his way. Wherein they follow the Poets, who in their Tragedies, having for the most part nothing but Fiction and extravagant Adventures for the subject of their Plays, are able to bring nothing handsomely to pass without a God or a Machine.

Most certain it is that Hannibal did not conduct his Affairs at the rate these Authors would persuade, but like a wise and able Captain. And there is no doubt, but he well knew that the Country, into which he was leading his Army, was fertile and abounding in all things, and the Inhabitants alien’d in their Inclinations to the Romans; that he had with him for Guides the very People of the Country, who had engag’d to partake with him in all his Fortunes. For my own particular, I speak of these things with so much the more assurance, by how much I have not only been instructed therein by those who liv’d in those Days, but that I might be less liable to errour, I made my self a Journey into the Alpes for my better information.

Hannibal having march’d near an hundred Miles in ten days along the River Rhosne, met with mighty difficulties after his Army had enter’d on the Mountains; and in truth the Allobroges had no purpose to attack them, while they held their March in the Plains, fearing both their Horse, and the Gauls that accompany’d the Army. But these were no sooner gone, and that Hannibal began to ascend the Mountains, when they drew together in great numbers, and possess’d themselves of the Posts where Hannibal must unavoidably March; and most assuredly, had they but kept themselves longer conceal’d, the Carthaginian Army had run a mighty hazard; but being discover’d by Hannibal, tho’ they did him some Mischief, they were requited with equal loss. For Hannibal was no sooner inform’d, that the Barbarians were Masters of the Passes, when he made his Army halt, and take their Quarters that night among the Rocks and Fastnesses. In the mean while, he dispatch’d a Party of Gauls, who serv’d him for Guides, to discover the Posture of the Enemy, and learn what they could of their purpose. And having understood that they kept Guard in those Places only by day, but that in the night they retir’d to a Town not far off; he found this Expedient to obviate the present Inconvenience: He decamp’d in broad day, and by slow motions advanc’d with his Army; till arriving not far from the Streights, he then encamp’d not far from the Enemy; and causing Fires to be made in the Camp about the first Watch of the Night, where he left the greatest part of his Troops, himself, in the mean while, with a Detachment of his best Men, pass’d the Streights in the Night; and while the Enemy was retir’d to the Town according to their Custom, took possession of those Posts, where they were wont before to keep their Guard.

When day discover’d to the Enemy what had pass’d, they did not presently determine what to do; but when they observ’d the great quantity of Baggage that appear’d, and perceiv’d that the Horse could afford them no succour, which by reason of the narrow, stony, and broken ways, could not march but in defiles, they then resolv’d on the Attack. And now as the Barbarians thus fell on them from all Quarters at once, the Way it self being almost as terrible as the Enemy, the Carthaginians receiv’d great loss, especially in their Horses and Beasts of Carriage; for the Way being streight, stony, and broken, the Beasts of Burden were easily thrown down, and disorder’d, falling into Precipices. But the Horses that were wounded gave them the greatest trouble; for falling by their Wounds among the other Beasts, and labouring to rise and recover their feet in so narrow a way, so crowded, they cast down others by their striving to save themselves; which was the occasion of great labour and tumult.

This being observ’d and consider’d by Hannibal, who well knew the Army could not subsist without their Beasts of Burthen which carry’d their Necessaries, he immediately left the Posts he had taken, and came to the relief of those who were thus hard press’d in their passage; when falling on the Enemy from higher ground, he did not fail of doing them great damage: But the evil was, that his own People were thereby equal Sufferers; for the fear encreasing everywhere by this new Tumult, many miscarry’d and were lost in the Crowd; but, in the end, most of the Allobroges were slain on the place, and the rest sav’d themselves by flight. And now their Horses and other Beasts, after some time of rest, were led with great trouble and difficulty through the Streight; but Hannibal, after he had escap’d this Danger, march’d himself with a good Detachment against the Town, that had harbour’d the Enemy, which he took without resistance, finding it almost quite deserted, the Inhabitants being all gone out in hopes of Booty. This adventure prov’d very useful to his Affairs, both with respect to the present and the future: For he here recover’d many, both Men and Horses and other Beasts, which had fallen into the Enemy’s hands, and Cattel and Corn sufficient to sustain the Army for three Days.

But, above all, the terrour he had given by this success to the circumjacent places was such, that none of the Gauls inhabiting the Towns near which he was to pass, gave him the least molestation in his passage. In this Town Hannibal took up his Quarters, where he remain’d a Day to rest and refresh his Army, and then prosecuted his Journey. For three days together he march’d without trouble or alarm; but the fourth he fell into much danger. The People inhabiting in the Towns on the way he was to pass having secretly conspir’d against him, met him however, with Olive-branches and Garlands of Flowers, Signs among the Barbarians of Peace and Friendship, as the Caduceus is among the Greeks. Hannibal, who had now learn’d how far he was to trust these People, endeavour’d by Questions to inform himself of their Purposes.

They told him, That they had receiv’d notice of his success against the Town, and of the loss and defeat of those who had attack’d him in his march; but as to themselves, they came to give him assurance, That they were resolv’d to do him no injury, nor suffer any to be done to him by others: And that they were ready to give him Hostages for their Fidelity. Hannibal remain’d long undetermin’d what to do, having no great Opinion of their Sincerity; but, in the end, weighing that to make a show of believing them, might work on their Good-nature, and by degrees win them to his Friendship, if he seem’d to accept their Tenders, and that in case of refusal, they might presently become his Enemies, he feign’d to consent to their proposal, and seem’d, as they did, dispos’d to enter into terms of Friendship with them. In short, after these Barbarians had given him security for their peaceable Behaviour, supply’d his Army with Provisions, and that they convers’d among the Carthaginians with all manner of freedom and Confidence, Hannibal began to have a better Opinion of their Sincerity, and accepted their Service for his Guides through the many remaining difficult ways by which they were to pass. Howbeit, after they had thus conducted the Army for two Days together, they assembled at length all into one Body, and attack’d the Rear at a Defile, or streight Passage, as they were marching in a Valley full of Rocks and broken Ground.

Great likelihood there was that the Carthaginian Army had here run the hazard of being entirely destroy’d, had not their General, who reserv’d a secret doubt of the well-meaning of this People, obviated the mischief of this treasonable Purpose of theirs, by ordering his Horse and Baggage to march in the Van of the Army, and his choicest Foot to sustain the Reer. But having dispos’d matters after this manner, his loss became less grievous; for his Foot in the Arreer-guard prov’d sufficient to put a stop to the violence of the Attempt. Nevertheless, they were not without great loss both of Men and Horses; and the Enemy, who was possess’d of the Ground above them, brought such terrour into the Army, by rowling down mighty Stones and Rocks from the Precipices upon them, and showring Vollies of Stones on their heads, that Hannibal was compell’d to take up his Quarters for that Night on the top of an Eminence, expos’d to the open Sky, with that part of the Army that was with him, remote from the Horse, and the rest of the Troops, and the Baggage, the better to cover and defend them from danger; who were hardly able, in all that Night, with great labour to compass their passage through the Valley.

In the morning, the Enemy being now retir’d, Hannibal join’d his Army and Baggage, and advanc’d towards the top of the Alpes. After this the Gauls attempted no more to attack them in Bodies, but in smaller Parties, and with less ardour than before; nevertheless, falling sometimes on the Van, sometimes on the Reer of the Army, they seldom fail’d of making some spoil of the Baggage. The Elephants happen’d to be of great use to the Carthaginians in these Conflicts; for wheresoever they chanc’d to appear, they so terrify’d the Enemy, that the Army march’d by that means with much less molestation. In nine Days after this, Hannibal gain’d the top of the Mountains, where he halted two Days, being willing to give some repose to such of his Army as were come thus far without wound or sickness, and to attend the coming of the rest of his Troops that were yet behind. During this stay, many Horses and Beasts of Carriage, which had fallen and stray’d out of the way, came in of their own accord, following the Track of the Army to the great wonder of the Beholders.

But whereas the Snows were yet great in the Mountains (Winter not being there quite over), Hannibal perceiving his Souldiers to be somewhat discourag’d by reason of the Sufferings they had already felt, and out of apprehension of what yet threatned them, caus’d the Army to be assembled, to the end he might speak to them, and inspire them with new Resolution; which he could no way better effect, than by giving them a view and prospect of Italy; which, in a word, lies so fairly to the eye, spreading and extending it self at the foot of those Mountains, that Nature seems to have design’d them as a Rampart to cover and defend it. So he gave them a survey of the Champaign Country that spreads it self all about the River Po; and gave them to understand how welcome they should be to the People that inhabited it. He pointed out likewise to them whereabout the City of Rome stood; and by this Artifice animated his harass’d Army.

The Day following he decamp’d, and began to descend the Mountains; and now saw no more of the Enemy to molest them in their march, saving some small scatter’d Parties, who rather awaited occasions how to steal than to fight. Howbeit, Hannibal’s Losses were not lessen’d, by reason of the great Snows and the exceeding bad march they had had, which much weaken’d the Army. Nor was their passage much better in the descent; for what with the streight, steep, and slippery ways, and the depth of the Snow, the Soldier knew not where to set his foot with safety; for whenever they slipp’d, they were in danger of being lost and swallow’d up in the depths and precipices which lay hid and cover’d by the Snow. Nevertheless, the long practice in those Hardships and Dangers, taught them to suffer all with constancy: But at length coming to a place where neither their Elephants nor Horses could pass, the Way, which was very steep before, being now, by the falling away of some of the Earth, become more difficult, renew’d their Fears; which was manifest over the whole Army. Upon this accident, Hannibal took a resolution to attempt another way, by taking a compass about those Mountains, tho’ there was no appearance of any passage; but forasmuch as the great Snows render’d that Resolution too hazardous, all places being cover’d and hid from the view, he therefore chang’d his purpose.

In the interim, there having fallen much new Snow on that which remain’d of the Winter before; this last being loose, and not yet deep, yielded firm footing enough to the Soldiers; but this was no sooner trampled on, but it dissolv’d into dirt and mire; whereby the Snow of last Year being frozen under it, it became impossible to march thereon any more than on Ice it self, none being able to keep their Feet; and when they endeavour’d to sustain themselves on their Hands and Knees, they often slid and were lost in Pits and Precipices. When their Horses at any time slip’d, they by their weight and labouring broke the Ice under them, and so became buried and frozen to death.

Whereupon Hannibal now desperate of obtaining his passage that way, encamp’d his Army at the entrance of this Pass, after he had first order’d the Snow to be remov’d which cover’d all the ground; and then by the labour of his Soldiers he wrought into the Hill it self, and by unspeakable pains made his passage at length through it: So in one Day he made way for his Horses and other Beasts to pass, which immediately march’d on. And now decamping the Army, he sent his Horse and other Beasts to forrage and recruit themselves, as they could come at Pasture, where the Ground was not cover’d with Snow. In the mean time he order’d the Numidians to make a passage for the Elephants, which cost them three Days labour with great difficulty to effect; but at length they made way for those Animals, which had suffer’d much, and were almost dead with hunger. For there was neither Forrage nor Tree to be found on that part of the Alpes, nor in the neighbourhood; the Ground lying ever cover’d with Snow Winter and Summer, but the lower Grounds on all sides produce Woods and Covert, and there is no place thereabout that is not habitable.

After Hannibal had united his Troops, he prosecuted his march, and in the space of three Days got past these difficult and incommodius Places, whereof we have given an account, and recover’d the Plains, howbeit with the loss of great numbers of his People; for many fell by the Enemy, many were drown’d in passing the Rivers, and many of Sickness and the Hardships of their march to and over the Alpes. And as he lost many Men, so his loss of Horses and other Beasts of burthen, was yet much greater.

In a word, after a march of five Months from his departure from New-Carthage, and fifteen Days passage over the Alpes, he boldly advanc’d into the Champaign Country, lying about the River Po, and the Frontiers of the Insubrians. Of the Troops that march’d out with him, there now remain’d; of Africans about twelve thousand; eight thousand Spaniards, and six thousand Horse, according to his own Register, left by him, engrav’d on the Column at Lacinium, which specify’d that number. About this time Publius Cornelius, who had left his Troops with Cneius his Brother, to prosecute the War against Asdrubal in Spain, embark’d for Pisa.[d]

HANNIBAL IN ITALY

[Sidenote: [218-217 B.C.]]

Hannibal descended among the mountains of the Salassians, and pushed on into the friendly country of the Insubrians (Milanese), where he rested his troops for some time, and procured fresh horses for many of his cavalry. He rewarded the services of the Insubrians by marching against the hostile tribe of the Taurini, whose capital city (Turin) he took by assault.

It was now December. He was moving down the left bank of the Po, above its junction with the Ticinus, on the Piedmontese side of the latter river, when his cavalry came in conflict with the Roman horse, commanded by the consul Scipio himself.

Scipio had returned to Pisa, whence he moved northward to encounter Hannibal on his descent from the Alps. He crossed the Po near Pavia, made a bridge over the Ticinus to secure his retreat, and, crossing the latter river, he began to march up the left bank of the Po, just as Hannibal was coming down it. Both generals were in advance with their cavalry, and came unexpectedly in sight of each other. A smart action followed, in which the Romans had the worst. The consul was severely wounded, his life being saved by the devotion of a Ligurian slave, or, as others said, by his son Publius, afterwards the great Africanus, then a youth only seventeen years old. He fell back upon his main body and recrossed the Ticinus so rapidly that, in breaking up the bridge, he left six hundred men behind, who fell into the hands of Hannibal. This was the skirmish of the Ticinus, which proved Hannibal’s superiority in cavalry. It had the effect of making the Boian Gauls on the south of the Po declare in his favour.

Hannibal, continuing his march down the Po, crossed somewhere below Placentia; and Scipio, not finding his position near that town secure, fell back westward so as to place the Trebia between himself and Hannibal. On the left bank of this river he fortified a strong camp, with the purpose of awaiting the arrival of his colleague Sempronius, whom the senate had ordered to hasten from Sicily into the north of Italy. Hannibal followed the Romans, and encamped in view of them on the right bank of the Trebia. Here he received offers from a Brundusian, who was in charge of the Roman magazine at Clastidium, a town in Scipio’s rear, to betray the place; and it must have been while he was absent in this quarter that Sempronius joined Scipio. Sempronius, not daring to sail direct from Sicily to Pisa at that time of year, had sent his army over the Straits of Messana, with orders to rendezvous at Ariminum; and so expeditious were they that they performed the whole march from Lilybæum to Scipio’s camp in forty days. Scipio endeavoured to dissuade Sempronius from venturing a general action, but in vain; and being still confined by the consequences of his wound, he was obliged to leave the whole army under the direction of his colleague. Hannibal, for his part, was anxious for a battle. The Gauls began to complain of the burden of two armies in their country, and victory was necessary to secure them in his interest.

The Trebia is a mountain stream, which in summer runs babbling over a broad gravelly bed, so shallow that the foot-traveller walks over it unheeding; but in winter, or after heavy rains, it rises to a deep and rapid torrent. It was now nearly the end of December, and Hannibal resolved that he would not cross the water to attack the Romans, but would make them cross it to attack him. He executed his purpose with great skill. On his left there was a sort of gully, thickly grown with reeds and brushwood, in which he concealed his brother Mago with one thousand foot and as many horse. Then, early in the morning, he sent his Numidian riders across the river, and ordered the whole army to prepare for the cold of the day by rubbing themselves with oil and making a hearty meal.

As soon as Sempronius saw the Numidians cross the water, he sent his cavalry, about four thousand strong, to meet them, and then drew out his whole army, amounting to about thirty-six thousand men, to support the attack. The Numidians feigned to be beaten and fled across the river. The Romans pursued, but the water was running breast high and was deadly cold; sleet was falling, which was driven in their faces by the east wind; and when they reached the other side, they were half dead with cold and wet and hunger. Their treacherous foes now opened on both sides and displayed Hannibal’s infantry in battle order with the rest of the cavalry and the elephants on either wing. The Roman cavalry, which was also on the wings, was greatly outnumbered and soon put to flight; but the legions and allies kept their ground bravely under all disadvantages till Mago rose from ambush and attacked them in rear. Then the rout became general. A body of ten thousand men, however, cut their way through the Carthaginian lines to Placentia; the rest were driven back with great slaughter to the Trebia, in which many were drowned, but a large number, with the consul Sempronius himself, recrossed in safety.

The battle of the Trebia ended Hannibal’s first campaign. The two consuls, with the relics of their armies, contrived to throw themselves into Placentia and Cremona, and afterwards made good their retreat to Ariminum. Sempronius had sent home a varnished account of the battle, but the fatal truth soon betrayed itself. Two consular armies had been defeated; Cisalpine Gaul was abandoned to the Carthaginians.

The senate, 217 B.C., made great preparations for the next campaign. Sicily, Sardinia, and Tarentum were garrisoned against the Carthaginian fleets; the new consuls were to keep Hannibal out of Roman Italy. The patrician consul for the year was Cn. Servilius; C. Flaminius was the plebeian. Flaminius, it will be remembered, had held this high office in 223 B.C., and had won a great battle over the Insubrian Gauls, in contempt of the orders of the senate. As censor, he still dwells in memory for having made the Flaminian way, the great high road from Rome through the Sabine country to Ariminum. He had won extraordinary popularity by a sweeping agrarian law to divide the coast lands of Umbria and Picenum among a number of poor citizens. This was the man elected by popular favour to oppose Hannibal--brave and generous, but adventurous and reckless. Fearing that the senate might even yet bar his consulship by an appeal to the omens, he left the city before the ides of March,[51] which was at that time the day for the consuls to enter upon office. But no such attempt was made. Servilius was sent to Ariminum to guard the Flaminian road; Flaminius himself took post at Arretium to watch the passes of the Apennines.

As the spring approached, Hannibal was anxious to leave Cisalpine Gaul. His friends the Insubrians and Boians, however much they wished to be relieved from the Roman yoke, did not relish entertaining a large army. They were proverbially fickle; and so much did Hannibal mistrust them, that, to prevent attempts upon his life, he continually wore disguises, and assumed false hair. Leaving the Roman colonies of Placentia and Cremona unassailed, he passed the Apennines early in the year by an unfrequented route, which brought him down into the neighbourhood of Pistoria and Lucca. From this point eastward he had to march through the Val d’Arno, which was at that time an unwholesome swamp. Here his men and horses suffered much; he himself, being attacked by ophthalmia, lost the sight of one eye, and was obliged to have recourse to the single elephant which survived the cold of the Alps and a winter in the north of Italy. In the neighbourhood of Fæsulæ he rested his army, now much increased by Gallic recruits, and rewarded his men with the plunder of Etruria. Flaminius now found that his dexterous enemy had stolen a march upon him, and Hannibal, on his part, heard with delight the rash and adventurous character of the new consul. Trusting to this, he led his army past Arretium, where Flaminius lay encamped, and leaving Cortona on the left, passed on towards Perusia along the northern side of Lake Trasimene. As soon as Flaminius found that the Carthaginian had passed him in this disdainful way, he immediately marched in pursuit.

As the traveller comes upon the northwestern corner of Lake Trasimene, the road ascends a low ridge, now called Monte Gualandro. The broad lake lies to his right and the road descends into a crescent-shaped plain, skirted on the left by hills of some height, while between the road and the lake the ground undulates considerably. After traversing this open space the road passes the modern village of Passignano, and ascends a hill. This was the ground Hannibal chose for awaiting Flaminius. He placed his Balearians and light troops in ambush along the hills on the left; he himself, with his infantry, lay in front somewhere near Passignano, while his cavalry were ensconced in the uneven ground next the lake, ready to close upon the rear of the Romans so soon as they were fairly in the plain. While the Carthaginians were thus disposed, Flaminius was encamping for the night on the Tuscan side of Monte Gualandro. In the morning a thick mist hung over the lake and low lands, so that, as the consul advanced, he could see nothing. Hannibal suffered the Roman vanguard, consisting of six thousand men, to pass Passignano before he gave the signal for attack. Hearing the cries of battle behind, the vanguard halted anxiously on the hill which they were then ascending, but could see nothing for the mist.

Meantime the consul, with the main army, was assailed on all sides. Charged in front by the Spanish and African infantry, on his right and rear by the Gauls and cavalry, exposed on his left flank to the ceaseless fires of the slingers and javelin-men, Flaminius and his men did all that brave men could. They fought valiantly and died fighting. Not less than fifteen thousand Italians fell on that fatal field. Such was the scene disclosed to the soldiers of the vanguard when the mist cleared off. Hannibal now sent Maharbal to pursue this division, which surrendered at discretion. Such of them as were Romans or Latins were all thrown into chains; the Italian allies were dismissed without ransom. Thus did Hannibal’s plan for the conquest of Rome begin to show itself; he had no hope of subduing Rome and Italy with a handful of Spanish and African veterans. These were to be the core of a great army, to be made up of Italians, who (as he hoped) would join his victorious standard, as the Gauls had already done. He had come, he said, “into Italy, not to fight against the Italians, but to fight for the liberty of the Italians against Rome.”

Such was the battle of Lake Trasimene. So hot was the conflict that the combatants did not feel the shock of an earthquake, which overthrew many cities of Italy.

Stragglers escaping from the slaughter carried the evil tidings to Rome, and the prætor, unable to extenuate the loss, came into the Forum, where the people were assembled, and ascending the rostra uttered the brief but significant words: “We have been defeated in a great battle.” Dreadful was the terror. The gates were thronged with mothers and children, eagerly questioning the fugitives about the fate of their sons, and fathers, and kinsfolk. Every hour Hannibal was expected. Three days passed and he came not; but the news of a fresh disaster came. Cn. Servilius, the other consul, as soon as he heard of Hannibal’s presence in Etruria, resolved to join his colleague immediately, and sent on his horse, four thousand strong, as an earnest of his own arrival. Hannibal, informed of their approach, detached Maharbal with a division of cavalry and some light-armed troops to intercept them, and half of the Romans were cut in pieces.

Amid the terror which prevailed the senate alone maintained their calmness. They sat, without adjournment, to receive intelligence and deliberate on measures of safety. It was resolved (an extraordinary measure) to call upon the people to elect a dictator, the person recommended being Q. Fabius Maximus, a man of known discretion; M. Minucius Rufus was also elected as his master of the horse. Fabius consulted the Sibylline books, and advised the senate to decree a “sacred spring,” according to the ancient custom of the Sabines. Then, collecting the troops that had escaped, and filling up their ranks by a new levy, he sent for the army of Servilius, and thus with four legions and their auxiliary troops he prepared to take the field.

Meanwhile the movements of Hannibal had relieved the Romans of all immediate fear. It seems that he had little hopes of the Etruscans, for he straightway passed northwards by the Flaminian road into Picenum, collecting plunder from all the Roman settlements as he went. Here he lay quiet during the heat of summer. As the weather became cooler, he advanced along the coast of the Adriatic into Apulia, still plundering as he went. The soldiers revelled in the abundance of Italy: it is said they bathed their horses in wine. But the colonies of Luceria and Venusia, as of old, refused entrance to the invader, and Hannibal passed the Apennines again into lower Samnium, where Beneventum, also a colony, defied him like the rest.

By this time Fabius had taken the field. He had made up his mind not to risk a battle. His plan of campaign was to move along the heights, so as to keep Hannibal in view, cutting off his supplies, intercepting his communications, and harassing him in all ways without a general action. This was not for Hannibal’s interest. He wished to fight another great battle and win another great victory (the things were synonymous with him), in order that the Samnites and Italians lately conquered might rise and join him. It was no doubt with the purpose of provoking Fabius to a battle, or of showing the Italians that the Romans dared not fight him, that Hannibal descended from Beneventum down the Vulturnus into the rich Falernian plain.[52]

Here dwelt Roman citizens; this was the garden of Italy: would not the dictator fight to defend them and their country from the spoiler? No: Fabius persisted in his cautious policy. He closed all the passes leading from the plain, where Hannibal’s soldiers were now luxuriating, and waited patiently, thinking he had caught the invader in a trap. But the wily Carthaginian eluded him by a simple stratagem. Collecting the oxen of this favoured region, he ordered fagots to be tied to their horns and lighted as soon as it was night; and thus the animals were driven, tossing their heads with fright and waving the flames, up the pass which leads from Teanum to Allifæ. The troops who guarded this pass fled panic-stricken to the heights of Mount Callicula, and left free passage for the Carthaginian army. When morning broke Hannibal was lying safely encamped near Allifæ. Thence he pursued his devastating course through the Pelignian and Frentanian lands, till he again reached Apulia, and there fixed on a strong position near Geronium for his winter quarters. The place was warm and sunny; corn and provisions were abundant.

Fabius, however discomfited by Hannibal’s escape from Campania, persisted in earning his name of “The lingerer”; and following Hannibal as before, took post at Larinum, within five or six miles of the enemy’s camp.

He was now recalled to Rome, ostensibly to preside over certain sacred offices, but really to give an account of his conduct. He found the people much discontented. He had been in command of two consular armies for several months, and had done worse than nothing; he had allowed the lands of the Roman colonists in Apulia and Samnium, the lands of Roman citizens in Campania, to be wasted and spoiled before his eyes.

These discontents were fomented by Minucius, the master of the horse, who had been left in command at Larinum. Though charged by the dictator not to risk an action, he pushed his camp forward within two miles of Hannibal, gained some advantages in skirmishing with the Carthaginian foraging parties, and sent home highly coloured despatches describing his successes. Popular feeling rose to its height, and Terentius Varro became its mouthpiece. This man was a petty merchant by trade, the son of a butcher; but he had been prætor the year before, and was now candidate for the consulship. His eloquence was great; and he forced the senate to consent to a law which gave Minucius an equal command with the dictator. Fabius quietly gave up half the army to his late subordinate, and was soon repaid for his moderation. Hannibal discovered the rash character of the new commander, and drew him out to battle. Minucius would have been defeated as utterly as Flaminius at Lake Trasimene, had not the watchful Fabius come up; upon which Hannibal drew off his men and Minucius, acknowledging Fabius as his deliverer, craved his pardon and resumed his post of master of the horse. The whole army returned to its old quarters at Larinum.

[Sidenote: [217-216 B.C.]]

Thus ended the second campaign, not greatly to the satisfaction of either party. Hannibal had hoped that ere this all southern Italy would have risen like one man against Rome. He had shown himself her master in the field; wherever her soldiers had dared to meet his, they had been grievously defeated. He had shown all indulgence for Italian prisoners, though he had put to the sword all Roman citizens. But not one city had yet opened its gates to receive him. The Gauls of the north were the only people who had joined him since he crossed the Alps. The Romans, indeed, continued to suffer cruelly, and their ordinary revenues were grievously curtailed. It was agreed that a great effort must be made in the ensuing campaign; an overpowering force was to be brought against Hannibal; he was to be crushed, if not by skill, by numbers.

When the day of electing the consuls came, out of six candidates C. Terentius Varro alone obtained a sufficient number of votes in any tribe to be returned. It is difficult to ascertain the true character of this man. His vigorous eloquence had won the confidence of the people; but so much is plain, that he was no general, and his election was esteemed a public misfortune by the senate. Varro himself presided at the election of his colleague, and the senate, anxious to provide an able general, put forward L. Æmilius Paulus as a candidate. Paulus had shown his ability in his former consulship, when he concluded the Illyrian War in a single campaign. His manners were unpopular; but so earnestly did the senate represent the necessity of the case, that he was returned without opposition.

These were the consuls elected to fight Hannibal. Their four legions were to be added to the four which Fabius commanded just before; and these eight legions were raised to more than their usual complement, so that the whole army to be commanded by the consuls must, with the allied force, have amounted to at least eighty thousand foot and more than six thousand horse.

In 216, the late consuls (Atilius had succeeded Flaminius), now serving as proconsuls, moving from Larinum southwards towards Venusia, had busied themselves with forming magazines at Canusium and Cannæ; and on the plain near the latter place their camp was formed. Hannibal, as the spring advanced, exhausted his supplies; and having by this time received recruits from Cisalpine Gaul, he made a rapid movement and seized the Roman magazine at Cannæ, encamping not far from that place, on the left bank of the Aufidus. The proconsuls sent home word of this disaster, but received strict orders to continue on the defensive till the consuls arrived to take the command. Yet it was some time before this took place, certainly not till near the end of July, for the great battle, which is now to be described, was fought on the second of August,[53] and it was fought soon after the arrival of the consuls.

The consuls immediately moved the army to the neighbourhood of Hannibal, with the intention of offering battle. But when Paulus observed the open plain, he was desirous to put off an engagement, and manœuvre so as to draw the enemy into ground less favourable for the action of cavalry. Varro, however, thought otherwise; and now appeared the evil of both consuls being joined in command of the same army. It was a repetition of the arrangement which had answered so ill in the last years with Fabius and Minucius; with this additional evil, that the consuls, instead of dividing the army between them, took the command of the whole on alternate days. The consuls were, by the constitution, equal, and Varro was far too confident of success to give way to his more experienced colleague. Æmilius felt bitterly the truth of Fabius’ parting injunction: “Remember that you will have to oppose not only Hannibal, but also Varro.”

On the first day of his sole command, Varro moved the whole army to the right bank of the Aufidus, between Cannæ and the sea, so that only the river separated the Roman camp from that of the Carthaginians. Next day Æmilius fortified a smaller camp on the left side of the river, fronting Hannibal, so as to secure the passage of the river, but resolutely declined battle. On the third day, however, when morning broke, the red standard, which was the Roman signal for battle, was seen flying from Varro’s tent. The men rejoiced at this; they were weary of their long inactivity; they were confident in their numbers, and the resolution of their favourite Varro was highly applauded.

When Æmilius found that a battle must be fought on the plain of Cannæ, he did his best to support his colleague. The whole army was drawn up facing nearly south, with the right resting on the river Aufidus. The Roman cavalry, only twenty-four hundred strong, were on this right flank; the left was covered in like manner by the cavalry of the allies. Æmilius commanded on the right, Varro on the left; the centre was under the orders of Servilius and Atilius, the proconsuls. It must be especially observed that the legionaries and allied infantry were not drawn up, as usual, in an open line, but with the ranks made deep and closed up almost like the phalanx. It has been above observed how serviceable the phalanx was on plain ground; and probably the consuls imagined that by these compact masses of infantry they might offer a more complete resistance to the formidable cavalry of Hannibal.

But Hannibal skilfully availed himself of this close array, and formed his line accordingly. He had crossed the river early, as soon as he saw the Romans in motion. The Spanish and Gallic infantry, much inferior in number to the Romans, he drew out in an extended line, equal in length to that of the enemy, but much less deep and massive. This line advanced in a convex form, and at each end he placed his Africans, so as to form two flanking columns of narrow front but great depth. He himself, with his brother Mago, commanded the infantry. On his left flank, next the river, were the heavy cavalry of Spain and Gaul, commanded by an officer named Hasdrubal, not the brother of the general. On the right were the Numidian light horse, under the orders of Maharbal.

After some indecisive skirmishing between the light troops, the real battle began with a conflict on the river side between the Roman cavalry and the horse of Hasdrubal. The latter were greatly superior in force, and charged with such effect as to drive the Roman horse across the river.

Meantime the Roman legions, and their allied infantry, advanced steadily against Hannibal’s centre. The long crescent-shaped line above described was unable to withstand the shock. Nor had the general expected it. On the contrary, he had instructed the centre so to fall back as to form a concave figure, and then the whole line retired slowly, so as to draw on the Roman masses between the African flanking columns. The Romans pressed eagerly on the retiring foe; but as they advanced, the Africans attacked the Romans on both flanks. The latter, jammed together, and assailed on both sides, fell into great disorder, very few of their vast army being able to use their weapons. But the consul, Æmilius, who had been wounded by a sling in an early part of the action, contrived to restore some sort of order, and it seemed as if the battle was not lost; when Hasdrubal fell upon the rear of the legions and the rout became complete.

This able officer, after destroying the Roman cavalry, had led his heavy horse round to the other wing, where he found the Numidians engaged with the allied cavalry. The latter fled in confusion; and Hasdrubal, leaving Maharbal to pursue them, made that decisive charge upon the rear of the legions which completed the defeat of the Roman army.

Then the battle became a mere massacre. The Romans and allies, mingled in a disorderly mass, were cut down on all sides. The consul, Æmilius, fell. Varro, with but seventy horsemen, escaped to Venusia. Other parties of fugitives made good their retreat to Canusium; some thousands took refuge in the camps. But on the bloody field that evening, there lay dead, at the lowest computation, more than forty thousand Roman foot and three thousand horse. The loss in the cavalry involved the death of some of the wealthiest and most distinguished men at Rome. With them had fallen one consul, two proconsuls, two quæstors, one-and-twenty out of eight-and-forty tribunes, and not less than eighty senators. All who had taken refuge in the camp surrendered at discretion next day. Hannibal’s loss is variously stated at from six to eight thousand.

This, then, was the battle of Cannæ. History does not record any defeat more complete, and very few more murderous. The great army levied to conquer Hannibal had been annihilated. The feverish anxiety with which all men at Rome followed the consuls in thought may be imagined; those who stayed behind in horrible suspense, flocked to the temples, offered vows, consulted the auguries, raked up omens and prophecies, left no means untried to divine the issue of the coming battle. What must have been the dismay, what the amazement, with which they received the first uncertain tidings of defeat! What the despair, what the stupor, which the dreadful reality produced!

Among the fugitives who came in with the tidings, was a tribune of the legions, Cn. Lentulus by name. As he rode off the field he had seen Æmilius the consul sitting on a stone, mortally wounded. He had dismounted and offered him his horse. But the consul replied, “No, my hours are numbered: go thou to Rome, seek out Q. Fabius, and bid him prepare to defend the city; tell him that Æmilius dies, as he lived, mindful of his precepts and example.” To Fabius, indeed, all eyes were now turned. The senate instantly met; and at his motion each senator was invested with the power of a magistrate; they were to prevent all public lamentations; to hinder the people from meeting in the Forum, lest they should pass resolutions in favour of peace; to keep the gates well guarded, suffering no one to pass in or out without a special order. Every one feared to see the army of Hannibal defiling through the Apennines upon the plain of Latium.

What the Romans feared the Carthaginians desired. “Only send me on,” said Maharbal to the general, “with the cavalry, and within five days thou shalt sup in the Capitol.” But Hannibal thought otherwise. His army was small; he was totally unprovided with materials for a siege; Rome was strongly fortified. He felt that the mere appearance of his army before the walls would rather rouse to action than terrify into submission; and meanwhile the golden time for raising the Samnites and other nations of Italy might be lost. Already he was in negotiation with the leading men at Capua, a city second only to Rome in point of size, superior in wealth. To this place he resolved to march as soon as his men were rested. When their allies had deserted, Rome must agree to his terms, without giving him the trouble of a siege.

He resolved, however, to try the temper of the Romans, and accordingly sent ten of the chief men among his prisoners, with offers to hold all whom he had taken to ransom. The senate, on the motion of T. Manlius Torquatus, a man who had inherited the stern decision of his ancestor, refused to admit the messengers to an audience, and ordered all to return, as they had bound themselves, to Hannibal’s camp. Hannibal, greatly provoked at this almost contemptuous reply to his advances, sold the greater part of his prisoners into slavery. This was but the common custom of the times. But besides this, he reserved the bravest and noblest youths to fight as gladiators for the amusement of his army; and on their refusal he put them to death by torture. The fact shows that in moments of passion Hannibal was too justly liable to the accusation of barbarous cruelty.

The senate were now busily occupied in taking all steps possible for the safety of Rome. The public horror was increased by a discovery that two vestal virgins had been guilty of unchastity. One was, as the law directed, buried alive; the other put herself to death. To avert the wrath of the gods, Fabius Pictor was sent to consult the Greek oracle at Delphi; and by the orders of the Sibylline books, a Greek man and woman and a Gallic man and woman were buried alive in the Forum, according to the same horrid practice used in the last Gallic War. But to these superstitious rites were added wiser precautions. Fabius, with the coolness of age and experience, continued to direct their measures. M. Claudius Marcellus, now prætor, was sent to take the command of the fugitives in Apulia; for despatches had arrived from Varro, stating that he had been joined by about four thousand men at Venusia, and that about the same number had assembled at Canusium under Appius Claudius, young P. Scipio (now about nineteen years of age), and other tribunes. It was added that some of the young nobles at Canusium, headed by a Metellus, had formed a plan to fly from Italy and offer their services to some foreign prince, despairing of the republic; that young Scipio had gone instantly to the lodgings of Metellus, and standing over him with a drawn sword, had made him swear that neither would he desert the republic, nor allow others to do so; that, to support the noble conduct of Scipio, Varro had himself transferred his headquarters to Canusium, and was using all his efforts to collect the remains of the defeated army.

Having given up his command to Marcellus, Varro set out for Rome. With what feelings he approached the city may be imagined. But as he drew near, the senate and people went out to meet him, and publicly thanked him, “for that he had not despaired of the republic.” History presents no nobler spectacle than this. Had he been a Carthaginian general, he would have been crucified.

The dictator ordered levies in Rome and Latium. But the immense losses sustained in the three past years had thinned the ranks of those who were on the military list. From the action on the Ticinus to Cannæ, the loss of the Romans and their allies, in battle alone, could not have been less than eighty thousand men. The dictator, therefore, proposed to buy eight thousand slaves to serve as light troops; and also to enrol debtors, prisoners, and other persons by law incapable of serving in the Roman legions. Marcellus, with the remains of the army of Cannæ, took his post at Casilinum. All commanders were instructed to keep to the defensive system of Fabius, and on no account to risk another battle.

Meanwhile Hannibal had advanced through Samnium to Capua, where he found all prepared to receive him. The senate, being in the interest of Rome, was dismissed, and the chief power committed to a popular leader, named Pacuvius Calavius. His first act was to seize on Roman residents and put them to death; he then made an agreement with Hannibal that no Carthaginian officer should exercise authority in Capua; and demanded that three hundred Roman prisoners should be put into his hands as hostages for the safety of three hundred Capuan knights who were serving in the Roman army in Sicily. Hannibal agreed to these demands, and entered Capua in triumph. One man only, by name Decius Magius, ventured to oppose these measures. Hannibal treated him with magnanimous clemency, and contented himself with sending him off to Africa.

All southern Italy had by this time declared in Hannibal’s favour. Most of the Apulians, the Hirpinian and Caudinian Samnites, the Surrentines, most of the Lucanians, the Bruttians, and all the Greek cities of the south which were not held by Roman garrisons, welcomed him as their deliverer. It seemed as if he were now about to realise his great project of raising Italy in insurrection against Rome.

He was obliged to send detachments of his army into these several districts; and he employed what small force he still retained in attempting to gain possession of the cities in the plains of Campania. Nuceria, Acerræ, and others submitted, as Capua had done. But Neapolis and Cumæ closed their gates; and the senate of Nola, fearing that the people might rise against them, as at Capua, sent for Marcellus to Casilinum. This bold officer threw himself into the city, and by a successful sally repulsed Hannibal from the gates. He then seized and executed seventy persons who were suspected of treason, and entrenched himself strongly in a fixed camp near the city. Hannibal, thus repulsed from Nola, determined to invest Casilinum, which from its proximity to Capua was likely to prove a troublesome neighbour.[54] The garrison held out obstinately, but were at length obliged to yield. This was almost the only town in Italy which Hannibal took by a regular siege.

Hannibal now went into winter quarters at Capua, in expectation of receiving succours from home. Soon after the battle he had sent off his brother Mago to carry home the tidings of his great success. For three years he had pursued a career of victory unassisted by the government; Rome was at his feet; he only wanted force enough to crush her. In proof of the greatness of the victory of Cannæ, Mago poured out on the floor of the senate-house a bushel of gold rings, which had been worn by Roman knights who had fallen on that fatal field. But the jealous government, headed by a Hanno, the mortal enemy of the Barcine family, listened coldly to Mago’s words; they asked “whether one Roman or Latin citizen had joined Hannibal? He wanted men and money; what more could he want, had he lost the battle instead of winning it?” At length, however, it was agreed that Mago should carry reinforcements to Hannibal. But the war in Spain assumed so threatening an aspect, that these succours were diverted to this nearer danger, and Mago was ordered to the support of his brother Hasdrubal in that country. All that reached Hannibal was a paltry force of four thousand Numidian horse, with about forty elephants, and a stinted supply of money.

[Sidenote: [216-215 B.C.]]

Perhaps the general had not expected much from this quarter. No doubt the person to whom he looked for chief support was his brother Hasdrubal in Spain. But here he was doomed to disappointment. It will be remembered that P. Scipio, the consul of the year 218, when he returned from Marseilles to Pisa, had sent on his brother Cneius into Spain, according to the original orders of the senate. The wisdom of this step was proved by the event. Cn. Scipio landed at Emporiæ (Ampurias), an old Greek colony. Within the year he had driven Hanno across the Ebro. In the next year, the year of Trasimene, he defeated Hasdrubal by sea, ravaged the coast up to the suburbs of New Carthage, and made large booty in one of the Balearic Isles. P. Scipio joined his brother towards the close of the same year; and when the battle of Cannæ made Hannibal master of southern Italy, the two brothers had subdued all northern Spain.

Hannibal’s hopes, therefore, of reinforcements for the next campaign rested with his new Italian allies. The additional cavalry and elephants from Carthage would still give him the command of the open country. But the Romans had learned wisdom by sore experience, and Hannibal could not expect to win great victories, such as had marked his first three campaigns. What he wanted was a good engineer corps and siege apparatus, to take the Latin colonies and other free towns, which even in the districts that had joined him still maintained the cause of Rome. Why he did not employ his winter at Capua in organising a force of this nature we know not. But, whatever was the cause, he was never able to take towns by force; and the Romans never gave him an opportunity of winning another great battle. Consequently all the Latin colonies and free towns remained faithful to Rome, and Hannibal was only half master even of southern Italy.

The Romans, for their part, passed the winter[55] in the most active preparations. The first step necessary was to fill up the numerous vacancies caused in the senate by the late disastrous battles. It appeared, on calling over the list, that not fewer than 177 members were missing. Sp. Carvilius proposed to recruit the ranks of the senate by admitting the chief citizens of the Latin towns. But this liberal proposal was not listened to, and it was resolved to commit the whole business to the care of a dictator, specially appointed for the purpose. The person chosen was M. Fabius Buteo, the same who had been sent as chief ambassador to Carthage in the year 219 B.C. He was an old man, universally respected, and the way he discharged the duty laid upon him gave great satisfaction. The bravest and the worthiest men were named as the new members. The consuls elected for the ensuing year were Ti. Sempronius Gracchus, and L. Postumius, now prætor commanding in Cisalpine Gaul. But before the ides of March came the sad intelligence that Postumius, with all his army, had been cut off by the Gauls. Fabius Maximus himself was elected consul for the third time, to supply his place. Marcellus and Varro were to remain in command as proconsuls.

To add to the difficulties of the Romans, means were scanty to support the vast expenses of the war; for the revenues of the whole of southern Italy were cut off.

It must have been a further discouragement to find that Hannibal had entered into negotiations with Philip, king of Macedon. The messengers of the king were taken on their way to Capua. For the present, therefore, the danger to be expected from this quarter was averted; but for the future the prospect was made more gloomy.

Few things, probably, could mark the public feeling more than a law which was passed in the next year at the instance of the tribune, Oppius, by which it was forbidden that any woman should wear a gay-coloured dress, or have more than half an ounce of gold to ornament her person, and that none should approach within a mile of any city or town in a car drawn by horses. Public need must be very urgent before it is possible to restrain private expense by enactments so rigid as those of the Oppian law.

SECOND PUNIC WAR: SECOND PERIOD (215-211 B.C.)

[Sidenote: [215 B.C.]]

The first period of this great war closed with the revolt of Capua. That which now claims our attention ends with the recovery of that important city by the Romans.

After the battle of Cannæ, Q. Fabius Maximus, great-grandson of that Q. Fabius who won so high a name in the Second Samnite War, became for some years the virtual chief of senate and people. He was already an old man; more than seventy summers had passed over his head. His disposition was so mild or so apathetic that he was known by the popular name of Ovicula, or the lamb. His abilities seem not to have been great. His merit was that he had the hardihood to avow that the Roman militia were no match for Hannibal’s veterans, and the courage to act on his belief. The cautious system which he had practised after the battle of Lake Trasimene had excited discontent; but the great defeat of Cannæ had most unhappily vindicated it. For some years it was rigorously carried out by commanders more skilful in war than Fabius himself.

Of these coadjutors the ablest was unquestionably M. Claudius Marcellus, who was called the Sword of Rome, as Fabius was called the Shield. He also was past the middle age, being at this time more than fifty. In his first consulship he had distinguished himself by a brilliant victory over the Insubrian Gauls; and his name now stood very high, for having given the first check to Hannibal in his career of victory. Marcellus was a true Roman soldier--prompt and bold in action, resolute in adversity, stern and unyielding in disposition, blunt and illiterate, yet not without touches of finer feeling, as was proved at the siege of Syracuse. With him must be mentioned Ti. Sempronius Gracchus, a man of humane and kindly temper, and possessing high talents for command. Had he not been cut off so early, he might have rivalled the fame of Marcellus.

Q. Fulvius Flaccus, who, like Marcellus, had already been twice consul, disdained not for the two following years to act as prætor of the city. He enjoyed the confidence of Fabius and the senate, and this office gave him, in the continued absence of the consuls, the whole management of the home government. He was not less than sixty years of age, discreet and cautious as Fabius himself, but more active, energetic, and relentless.

To carry out the defensive system of war now adopted, the two consuls and a proconsul were stationed in Campania, each with two legions and their auxiliary cohorts. In the present year Fabius took post on the Latin road, between Cales and Casilinum; Gracchus occupied the entrenched camp, which had been formed by Marcellus near Sinuessa; and Marcellus himself occupied a similar camp near Nola. Thus these commanders were always ready to harass Capua, and were also able to make forays into Samnium, Apulia, and Lucania whenever Hannibal was absent. Their connection with the sea was maintained by the great seaports of Naples and Cumæ.

Hannibal, on the other hand, formed a strong camp on the ridge of Mount Tifata above Capua. But he was often obliged to move his forces into the south, leaving the Capuans to defend themselves. We have no means of estimating the amount of Hannibal’s army, but it may be inferred that it was small; we never find him able to act in force both in Campania and in the south.

He soon came in collision with the consul Gracchus. This general was in his camp at Sinuessa, busily employed in training two legions of slaves, who, by the name of volones or volunteers, served under his command. Here he received information from the people of Cumæ that the Capuans were coming to hold a festival near their city, and he was enabled to fall upon the Capuans by night, and slaughter a great number. The news soon reached Hannibal, who descended from his camp, only to find Gracchus safe behind the walls of Cumæ.

While Gracchus was thus engaged at Cumæ, Fabius had occupied his camp at Sinuessa, and Marcellus was making forays in the Samnite country. The sufferers sent earnest appeals for defence to Hannibal, who now appeared a second time before the walls of Nola, being induced by some of the popular party, which in all the cities was hostile to Rome, to hope that the place might be betrayed. But Marcellus made a well-timed sally, in which he cut off a large body of the Carthaginian army; and Hannibal, again retiring in disappointment, went into winter quarters at Arpi in Apulia.

[Sidenote: [214-212 B.C.]]

Returning spring (214 B.C.) found Hannibal again in his camp on Tifata, and the same Roman commanders opposed to him. Fabius was still consul, with Marcellus for his colleague; while Gracchus had taken the place of the latter as proconsul. The circumstance of the election of these consuls deserves noting, because it shows that the people had completely surrendered their right of free choice into the hands of Fabius. The old consul purposely halted in the Campus Martius, and held the election without having entered the city, by which means he retained his imperium. The prerogative century, which happened to be the juniors of the Aniene tribe, gave their vote for M. Æmilius Regillus and T. Otacilius Crassus. Otacilius was a nephew of Fabius, and had served as prætor in command of the fleet during the current year, but without much credit. Upon this vote being given, the old consul stopped the proceedings. “The republic,” he said, “was struggling for existence; she was maintaining nearly twenty legions; and that with revenues diminished and citizens thinned: what was the use of all her exertions if she committed her armies to untried men? Therefore,” he concluded, “go, lictor, call back the juniors of the Aniene tribe to give their vote anew.” All men felt that the old man had not only power, but reason on his side. The same century, which had voted for other men, now gave their voices for Fabius himself and Marcellus.

At the same time the senate gave an earnest of their stern determination by passing a decree that the soldiers of Cannæ should be sent to serve in Sicily, without hope of honour and glory, till the end of the war. And the censors, in the course of this year, summoned before them Metellus and the others who had wished to desert the republic after the defeat of Cannæ, and deprived them of their civic rights.

Early in this campaign, Hannibal was enticed from Campania by a message sent from certain friends whom he had made within the walls of Tarentum, and left Hanno to cover Samnium and Campania. Hanno seems to have had hopes of surprising the Roman colony of Beneventum. But the proconsul Gracchus threw himself into the town; “And now,” he told his slave-soldiers, “now the time was come when they might win their liberty. Every one who brought in an enemy’s head should be made free.” In the battle which followed, victory was long undetermined; till Gracchus proclaimed that without victory none should be enfranchised, but if they conquered, none should remain a slave. Thus the desperate conflict was determined in favour of the Romans, and Hanno, after great loss, made good his retreat back into the Bruttian territory. Then Gracchus fulfilled the promise made to his volones, and celebrated their enfranchisement by a public festival, in which they all appeared wearing white caps in token of liberty. So pleased was their commander with the scene, that he had a picture painted to commemorate it on the walls of the temple of Liberty on the Aventine Hill.

Hannibal, therefore, had the mortification to hear of this reverse, without the satisfaction of succeeding in his own expedition. For M. Valerius Lævinus, the Roman prætor stationed at Brundusium, being informed of the plot to betray Tarentum, threw a strong garrison into the place under the command of M. Livius, and the conspirators could not fulfil their promises.

The next year (213 B.C.) was still less fruitful in decisive events than the two foregoing. That is, it was favourable to the Romans; for to Hannibal’s cause inaction was fatal. And there are not wanting indications to show that the Italians who had joined him began even now to falter in their resolution, and to look with fearful eyes on the little progress he had made since the battle of Cannæ, and on the tenacity with which the Romans kept hold of every city. Arpi in Apulia, Hannibal’s late winter quarters, was betrayed to Fabius the Younger, who was now consul, assisted by his father as legate. The three hundred Capuan knights, who were in the service of Rome at the time when their city threw itself into Hannibal’s arms, had shown their disapprobation of this step by enrolling themselves as citizens of Rome; and about this time one hundred and twelve more of the same order came in to the Roman camp at Suessula. But out of Italy, Hannibal’s skilful negotiations had raised up enemies to Rome wherever his envoys could find an opening--in Macedonia, in Sardinia, in Sicily.

It has been mentioned that the first letters of Philip of Macedon to Hannibal had been intercepted by the Romans; and through fear of an attack from this quarter they had stationed Lævinus with a fleet at Brundusium. A second embassy was more successful, and an alliance was concluded by Hannibal with the king, by which the latter bound himself to send an auxiliary force to support the Carthaginians in Italy. But Lævinus and his successors carried the war into Epirus, and Philip was unable to send the promised succours.

In Sardinia an insurrection broke out in the year after Cannæ. Q. Fulvius, the city prætor, was ordered to provide for its suppression, with leave to appoint any commander whom he thought fit. He straightway made choice of T. Manlius Torquatus, a man as stern and uncompromising as himself, who in his consulship twenty years before had first conquered the island. The old general landed with little delay, and in one decisive battle completely restored Sardinia to subjection.

Affairs in Sicily gave much more trouble. Indeed in the years 211 and 212 this island became the chief seat of the war. Hiero, the old king of Syracuse, who for fifty years had never faltered in his alliance with Rome, died soon after the fatal day of Cannæ. He was succeeded by his grandson Hieronymus, a youth of fifteen years of age, whose imagination was captivated by the brilliant career of Hannibal. The able Carthaginian soon availed himself of the opportunity which thus presented itself to send over agents, into whose hands the young prince completely surrendered himself. These were two brothers named Hippocrates and Epicydes, Syracusan Greeks by descent, but natives of Carthage. The young king, however, after little more than a year’s reign, was assassinated by a gang of obscure conspirators; a republic was proclaimed at Syracuse; and shortly after, all the remaining members of the royal family were massacred with circumstances of singular atrocity. The question now was whether the new government should side with Rome or Carthage. The brothers, Hippocrates and Epicydes, at first resolved to return to Hannibal; but they changed their plan, and pretending to fall in with the views of the conspirators, were elected generals-in-chief with several others. Yet the popular feeling seems to have inclined towards Rome, and Hippocrates, unable to control it, contrived to leave Syracuse with a body of troops, and repaired to Leontini, where he was joined by his brother Epicydes. They then threw off the mask, and the Leontines declared themselves independent of Syracuse.

This was probably late in the year 214 B.C. And about that time the consul Marcellus arrived to take the command of the army in Sicily.

Marcellus, without delay, laid siege to Leontini, and took the town by assault. He did what he could to spare the inhabitants; but he was guilty of a piece of most imprudent severity in scourging and putting to death as deserters two thousand of the garrison, who had once been in the service of Rome. It appears that there were many soldiers of like condition now in the Syracusan army. When they heard of the cruel death of their comrades at Leontini, they lent a ready ear to the persuasion of Hippocrates and Epicydes, who had escaped from Leontini, and turned the severity of Marcellus to good account. These two adventurers were elected sole generals, and Syracuse closed her gates against Rome. Marcellus made some fruitless attempts at negotiation and finally commenced the siege of Syracuse.

The city of Syracuse had been greatly enlarged since the Athenian expedition. The island of Ortygia had become the citadel, and the suburb along the seacoast, called Achradina, was now part of the town. The rugged triangular surface called Epipolæ was well fortified, and its northern approaches, especially, were strongly defended by a fort called Hexapylum.

Marcellus at first attempted to take the city by assault. He himself attacked the sea wall of Achradina, while his officers attempted to force Hexapylum. The Romans were always famous for their skill in the attack and defence of fortifications, and Marcellus was well provided with engines of all kinds. But within the walls was an engineer more skilful than any the Romans possessed. Archimedes, the most celebrated mathematician of ancient times, was now seventy-five years old, but age had not quenched the inventive vigour of his mind. He was so devoted to abstruse calculations that sometimes he forgot even to take his meals; yet speculation had not unfitted him for practical pursuits. Marvellous are the stories told of the engines which he invented to thwart the assaults of the Romans, both by sea and land. The whole wall was armed with ballists and catapults of immense power, so that the ships dared not come within shot. If they ventured to get close under the walls, favoured by the darkness of night, they were galled by a fire from myriads of loopholes, and nearly crushed by enormous stones let drop from the battlements; or one end of the ship was grasped by an “iron hand” let down from a projecting crane, which suddenly lifted it up, and as suddenly let it go, so that first one end and then the other was plunged in the water. It is said also that burning-glasses of great power were so placed as to set on fire ships which approached within their reach. This is probably a fiction. But this much is certain, that Marcellus was compelled to desist from his assault, and began to blockade it by regular lines of circumvallation. After many months the Romans were as far from taking Syracuse as ever.

Meantime, the Roman cause was daily losing ground in Sicily. Even Morgantium, the headquarters of the fleet, surrendered to Carthage; and Enna, a strong fortress, was only saved by the prompt cruelty of the commandant, who massacred the whole of its inhabitants. But this barbarous act, though efficacious on the spot, served still more to alienate the Sicilians from Rome. Agrigentum surrendered, and numerous other towns threw off the yoke.

[Sidenote: [212 B.C.]]

But there was treason within the walls of Syracuse. Marcellus at length succeeded in scaling the walls of Hexapylum by night, when by reason of a festival they were left unguarded. He soon gained possession of the whole upper city; and as he gazed from the heights of Epipolæ on the fair view beneath him, even his rude nature was so affected by the beauty of the scene and the greatness of his success, that he burst into a flood of tears. The southern quarters of the town surrendered; but Epicydes, within Achradina, prepared for a desperate defence; and Hippocrates, who had gone to obtain succours from Carthage, soon returned with a considerable force. But Marcellus lay safe within the upper city, and the army of Hippocrates, encamped on the marshy ground at the mouth of the Anapus, was thinned by disease as the hot weather came on: among the dead was Hippocrates himself. Still the sea was open, and a fleet was daily expected from Carthage. At length it came in view; but the Roman squadron put out to meet it, and great was the disappointment of Epicydes, when he saw the Carthaginians bear away towards Italy. He left the city secretly and fled to Agrigentum.

Many of the garrison were deserters from the Romans, who could expect little mercy from the severe Marcellus. But the rest, when they found themselves deserted by their general, slew their officers, and admitted Marcellus by night within the walls of Achradina. Next morning, the city was given up to plunder; and in the massacre which followed, Archimedes was slain by a soldier, whose question he did not answer, being absorbed in a geometrical problem. For the honour of Marcellus, it should be recorded that he was deeply grieved by this mischance, that he gave honourable burial to the corpse of the philosopher, and showed great kindness to his relations. The royal treasure was reserved for the state; and the exquisite works of the Grecian chisel which adorned the splendid city were sent to Rome--a beginning of that system of plunder which enriched Rome at the expense of Greece.

Thus fell Syracuse, in the summer of 212 B.C., after a siege of nearly two years. But though Syracuse was taken, Sicily was not conquered. It will be well to anticipate events a little, so as to finish our narrative of this war in this place.

[Sidenote: [212-210 B.C.]]

Epicydes, who had escaped to Agrigentum, continued his ceaseless activity, and persuaded the Carthaginian government to send out another large force to his aid. Hannibal also sent over an officer named Mutin or Mutton, who henceforth became the soul of the war in Sicily. This man was a half-bred Carthaginian; and the African blood in his veins degraded him as much in the eyes of pure Carthaginians, as the taint of black blood degrades a man in the United States. But his abilities as a soldier made Hannibal overlook vain distinctions, and Mutin took the command of the Numidian horse in the army of Hanno and Epicydes. With such skill did he use this formidable cavalry, that Marcellus rather lost ground than gained it. But the Carthaginian officers, jealous of the upstart commander, took occasion to give battle to the Romans during his absence. Marcellus accepted the challenge, and gained a signal victory (211 B.C.).

In the next year (210 B.C.) Valerius Lævinus took the command in Sicily, where Mutin still continued to defy the Romans. But the jealousy of the Carthaginians so provoked the hot-blooded African, that he put himself at the head of his faithful Numidians, and threw open the gates of Agrigentum to the Roman consul. Epicydes escaped to Carthage, leaving the army an easy prey to the Roman legions. The town was sacked and plundered, and the inhabitants reduced to slavery. And in a short time Lævinus was able to send despatches to the senate, reporting the entire submission of all Sicily. Mutin was made a Roman citizen, and received five hundred jugera of state land. His Numidian horse took service with Rome.

It is now time to return to Italy, where also the war had resumed a more active form. Early in 212 B.C. Hannibal once more marched southward to Tarentum, and this time with better success than before. He encamped at a distance of about three miles, and was constantly visited by two young Greeks, who left the city under pretence of hunting. It was by the landward side that the conspirators proposed to admit Hannibal; and the time they chose was a night on which it was well known that M. Livius, the commandant, would be engaged in a drinking bout. The Romans went to bed in drunken security, and at daybreak found the city in the hands of the Carthaginians. A great part of the garrison were put to the sword, but Livius made good his escape to the citadel. Hannibal immediately took measures for besieging it; and the Tarentines, having dragged their ships overland from the harbour into the open sea, blockaded it both by sea and land.

Meanwhile the consuls--Appius Claudius and old Q. Fulvius Flaccus--were preparing to besiege Capua. Gracchus, with his volones, was stationed in Lucania; one prætor, Claudius Nero, occupied the old camp at Suessula; another, Cn. Fulvius, brother of the consul, lay in Apulia. The Capuans, fearing they should be cut off from all supplies, sent a hasty message to Hannibal at Tarentum: and he straightway sent orders to provision the town, in case it should be besieged. Hanno executed his difficult task with success; but near Beneventum, the consuls fell upon him, and captured the supplies. He was obliged to retire into Bruttium, and leave Capua to its fate.

The Roman armies now began to close round that devoted city. But they were destined to suffer heavy losses before they were able to invest it. First, Gracchus, who was coming northwards from Lucania, to reinforce the consuls, was slain in an ambuscade, and his volones, so long faithful to their favourite leader, dispersed and fled, each man to his own home. Next, Hannibal himself once more appeared in Campania. He had already sent Mago with a division of cavalry to encourage the Capuans; and now he entered the city in person without the knowledge of the consuls. He was in high spirits at his successes in the south. Not only Tarentum, but also Metapontum and Thurii, had joined him; and though Syracuse had fallen, the war was raging fiercely in Sicily. But the Roman commanders were cautious; and Hannibal, finding he could not bring on a battle, was anxious to return to press the siege of the citadel of Tarentum. He went by way of Lucania, and on his route met a Roman army, commanded by M. Centenius, an old centurion, who had collected an army, and with equal courage and folly attempted to bar Hannibal’s march. He fell as a valiant soldier should fall; and many thousand brave men paid the penalty of trusting to his promises. Hannibal now passed the mountains into Apulia; and here, near Herdonea, he surprised the prætor, Cn. Fulvius. He was like Centenius in rashness, but unlike him in being a profligate and a coward. In this action also many thousand Romans were cut to pieces.

But notwithstanding these thick-coming losses, the consuls held to their resolution of blockading Capua. No sooner was Hannibal’s back turned than they again appeared before the city; and before the expiration of the year the lines of circumvallation were completed. The armies of Rome always contained good workmen; their common agricultural habits accustomed them to the use of the spade; the great works that had for some time been going on, roads and aqueducts, had trained a number of men for military work. Yet the rapidity with which the vast extent of lines necessary to enclose a great city like Capua was completed, cannot but surprise us. These lines were secured by a double wall, and care was taken to supply the besiegers with provisions.

The consuls for the next year (211 B.C.) were not allowed to supersede Appius and Fulvius: to them was left the glory of completing well what they had well begun.

When the Capuans found themselves blockaded, their spirits fell, and they again sent an urgent message to Hannibal. In an assault upon the Roman lines, he was beaten off with loss. And now only one hope remained. It was possible that, if he threatened Rome itself, the besieging army might be recalled to defend the capital. Accordingly, he sent the Capuans notice of his purpose by means of a pretended deserter, and the next morning the proconsuls saw his camp on Mount Tifata empty. They thought, probably, that he had returned to the south. But they soon discovered the truth from country people, who came in full of horror to tell that Hannibal’s wild Numidians and monstrous elephants were in full route for Rome. Fulvius sent word to the senate of this fearful visitation; and the opinion of Fabius was unanimously adopted, that one of the proconsuls should be recalled to defend the city with part of his army and the city legions, while the other was left to maintain the blockade of Capua. Accordingly, Fulvius marched straight to Rome by the Appian road, while Hannibal took a circuitous route by the north, to avoid the thick-studded cities which might have barred his passage. Fulvius, therefore, arrived at Rome before Hannibal, and encamped within a mile or two of the city. The consternation at Rome was in some measure quelled by the arrival of Fulvius; and still more, when Hannibal himself, after riding up to the Colline gate, and then skirting the walls, was attacked by the old proconsul, and obliged to fall back upon his camp. It is said that, while he lay there, the land occupied by his camp was put up to sale and bought at a price not at all below its value. Hannibal laughed, and bade an auctioneer put up the silversmiths’ shops in the Forum for sale. But though he put a bold face upon the matter, he felt in his heart that he had failed. Rome was able to defend herself, and yet had left a sufficient force at Capua to continue the blockade.

The line of his retreat is as uncertain as that of his advance. It is known, however, that he conducted his army through Apulia into Bruttium, which became thenceforth his headquarters in Italy.

Meanwhile, Fulvius had returned to the lines round Capua, full of exultation. Time wore on, and famine began to oppress the wretched inhabitants. How long the desperate resistance was prolonged we know not. But at length it appeared manifest that surrender must ensue within a few hours; upon which Vibius Virrius, one of the insurgent chiefs, gave a splendid banquet to all senators who would partake of it. Twenty-seven came, and when the feast was over, a poisoned cup went round, in which the guests pledged their host. They went home to die; and next morning the city was surrendered. The savage old Fulvius determined to wreak a bloody vengeance upon the leaders of the insurgents. Five-and-twenty were sent to Cales, to Teanum eight-and-twenty, there to await their doom. In vain Appius pleaded for milder measures. Fulvius heeded no intercession. On the morning after the capture, he rode in person to Teanum, and saw all the prisoners beheaded. He then galloped off to Cales; but when the prisoners there were being bound, a messenger from Rome brought him letters from the senate. He put them into his bosom, and ordered the executions to proceed; nor till all the heads had fallen, did he open the letters, which contained orders to reserve the prisoners for the judgment of the senate. Others of the chief men were imprisoned, and all the commoner sort were sold into slavery. The city itself was confiscated to Rome.

The fall of Syracuse and Capua had given a decided superiority to the Roman arms. Yet, though Hannibal was at present so weak that he could not leave the south, nor give effectual succour to his Campanian allies, there were many causes to give him hopes of retrieving his fortunes. The diversions made by Mutin in Sicily had proved most successful, and it was not till a year later that the cause of Carthage in that island was betrayed. Though the citadel of Tarentum still held out, that great city itself, with all Magna Græcia, except Rhegium, had joined Hannibal: and he lived in hope that at length Philip of Macedon would come over to oppose the common enemy.

Now also he looked with confidence to Spain. For a long time the successes of the Scipios had cut off all hope of succour from his brother Hasdrubal. The successes continued, notwithstanding the arrival of Mago with reinforcements from Carthage; many of the Celtiberian tribes enlisted under their banners, eager to try a change of masters; Syphax, a prince of the Numidians, formed an alliance with them, and they seemed thus early to have formed the design of carrying the war into Africa. In the year 212 B.C., the same which witnessed the fall of Syracuse and the investment of Capua, the two brothers entertained high hopes of a successful campaign. Cn. Scipio marched against Hasdrubal, the brother of Hannibal; Publius directed his course against a second Carthaginian army, under Mago. But the Celtiberians in the army of Cneius deserted: and the Roman proconsul was in full retreat, when he heard that his brother Publius had been surprised and slain with a great portion of his army. The united Carthaginian armies now threw themselves on the retreating army of Cn. Scipio. He fell fighting bravely, with most of his officers. The remains of the Roman armies were collected by a brave knight, by name L. Marcius. But for the time the defeat and death of the two Scipios gave back to the Carthaginians all that they had lost in Spain since the departure of Hannibal.

The road now lay open for Hasdrubal to lead a large force to the assistance of his brother in Italy. Notwithstanding his losses, no Roman general had dared to meet him in a fair field of battle since Cannæ. What might he not hope when largely reinforced? It belongs to the history of the next period to show how irremediably these hopes were blighted.[c]

FOOTNOTES

[51] From the year 223 to 153 B.C., the consuls entered office on the ides of March; after the latter date, on the calends of January.

[52] This is the statement of Polybius.[d] The story in Livy,[c] that Hannibal told the guides to lead him to Casinum, and that they by a mistake took him to Casilinum in Campania, is not noticed by the graver historian.

[53] It is probable, however, that the Roman Calendar was in error, and that the battle was really fought earlier in the year.

[54] Casilinum is the modern Capua. It lies on the river. The site of the ancient Capua is about two miles eastward, on an eminence.

[55] [“During this winter, at Rome, and in its vicinity, many prodigies either happened, or, as is not unusual when people’s minds have once taken a turn towards superstition, many were reported and credulously admitted. Among others, it was said, that an infant of a reputable family, and only six months old, had, in the herb-market, called out, ‘Io Triumphe’; that, in the cattle-market, an ox had, of his own accord, mounted up to the third story of an house, whence, being affrighted by the noise and bustle of the inhabitants, he threw himself down; that a light had appeared in the sky in the form of ships; that the temple of Hope, in the herb-market, was struck by lightning; that, at Lanuvium the spear of Juno had shaken of itself; and that a crow had flown into the temple of Juno and pitched on the very couch; that, in the district of Amiternum, in many places, apparitions of men in white garments had been seen at a distance, but had not come close to anybody; that in Picenum, a shower of stones had fallen; at Cære, the divining tickets were diminished in size; in Gaul, a wolf snatched the sword of a soldier on guard out of the scabbard, and ran away with it.”--Livy.[e]]

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XII. CLOSE OF THE SECOND PUNIC WAR

THIRD PERIOD (210-207 B.C.)

[Sidenote: [210-209 B.C.]]

The last year’s campaign was full of heavy discouragement to the Romans. Syracuse had been taken; but Sicily remained in full revolt. Capua had fallen; but Tarentum, all except the citadel, was lost. The unmolested march of Hannibal to the walls of Rome showed that no part of Italy save the fortified towns and entrenched camps could be called their own, so long as the Carthaginian general could lead his wild and lawless mercenaries whithersoever he pleased. The loss of Spain had placed before them the dreadful possibility that their great enemy might soon be reinforced by numbers so large as to make him stronger than he had been since he crossed the Alps.

It is evident that mutterings of discontent were beginning to arise against Fabius and his friends. The bitter lesson of Cannæ had taught the Romans the necessity of caution, and proved that, to act with success against Hannibal, they must act on the defensive. But was this system to last forever? Were they never to meet Hannibal in the field? Thoughts like these, no doubt, suggested the experiment of electing a popular consul for the year 210 B.C. When the votes of the prerogative century were taken, it appeared that the men of their choice were old T. Manlius Torquatus, the conqueror of Sardinia, and that same T. Otacilius who had been ousted from his consulship five years before by his uncle Fabius. But Manlius immediately rose and declined the consulship; he was, he said, “old and nearly blind: a general should be able to use his own eyes. They must choose other and better men.” The century, after some hesitation, obeyed, and gave one of their votes for Marcellus, as no doubt Fabius and the senate wished, while they bestowed the other upon M. Valerius Lævinus, who had served the state well in Epirus.

Valerius probably owed his choice to the fact that he was not disposed to submit to Fabius and Fulvius. An opportunity soon arose for showing this. As he passed through Capua on his way to Rome, the Campanians, smarting under the rule of Fulvius, besought him to let them follow in his train, that they might lay their grievances before the senate; and when he arrived at Rome, he was greeted by a deputation of Sicilians, who had heard with alarm that the imperious Marcellus was about to return to their island with consular authority. The affairs of both peoples were brought before the senate. As to the Campanians, the fathers confirmed in all respects the stern edicts of Fulvius; and not unjustly, for of all cities Capua had been most generously treated by Rome: her rebellion had been prompted, not by love of liberty (for she was already free) but by lust for power. Capua, therefore, now became a prefecture. On the other hand, Marcellus at once gave up his Sicilian province to his colleague Lævinus, and agreed to take the command in Italy against Hannibal; and the senate, though they ratified the previous measures of Marcellus, now recommended the Sicilians to the special care of Lævinus. Upon this, the Sicilian envoys, fearing the future anger of Marcellus, fell at his feet and entreated him to take them as his clients. For many years the Marcelli, his descendants, are found as patrons and protectors of the island.

Before the consuls took the field, they were called upon to meet the financial difficulties under which the state was labouring. The force which had been maintained by Rome now for many years was very large, and the cost enormous. The number of legions kept on foot since the battle of Cannæ had averaged about twenty; so that the number of soldiers, legionaries and allies, amounted to nearly two hundred thousand men. While the expenditure was thus prodigiously increased, the revenues were greatly diminished; and it is a recorded fact that about this time corn had risen to many times its ordinary price. Although the imposts had been doubled early in the war, the state was obliged to contract loans in various ways. An extraordinary measure was now taken for manning the fleets. All citizens, except the poor, were required to furnish one or more seamen, with six months’ pay and their full accoutrements. Senators were called upon to equip eight, and the rest in proportion to their rated property. Such was the Roman “ship-money.”

The necessities of the present year (210 B.C.) were greater than ever. Every resource seemed to be exhausted. Among other means, the coinage had been gradually lowered in value. The as, which had originally been a pound weight of copper, had now been diminished to one-sixth of that weight; and all payments for the treasury were no doubt made in this depreciated coinage. The usual results of such measures had followed. A temporary relief was gained. But the prices of all articles were raised to meet the change, and public credit was shaken.

In these difficulties, the senate proposed again to levy ship-money. But the people were in no mood to bear it. They had been much impoverished in the last four years--continued increase of taxation had drained their resources; continued service in the army had prevented the proper cultivation of their lands; the marauding march of Hannibal in the year before had ruined many. The ferment caused by this new impost assumed a formidable appearance. The senate met to deliberate, and the consul Lævinus proposed that the great council should set an example of patriotic devotion. “Let us,” said he, “contribute all our treasure for the service of the state. Let us reserve--of gold, only our rings, the bullæ worn by our sons, and for the ornaments of our wives and daughters one ounce apiece: of silver, the trappings of our horses, the family salt-cellar, and a small vessel, for the service of the gods, of copper, five thousand pounds for the necessities of each family.” The proposal was carried by acclamation, and the noble example followed emulously by all the people. So eager was the throng which pressed to the treasury that the clerks were unable to make a full register of the names. This patriotic loan (for it was intended that it should be repaid hereafter) saved the state; and it was even more valuable in the spirit which it called forth, than for the actual relief which it afforded to the treasury.

The consuls now took the field. Marcellus arrived in Samnium only to hear that Cn. Fulvius Centumalus, the last year’s consul, had shared the fate of his namesake and predecessor, Cn. Fulvius Flaccus, and had been cut off with the greater part of his army. The relics of this force were sent to be added to the remains of the army of Cannæ, which the relentless senate still kept in banishment in Sicily. Marcellus cautiously advanced to Venusia, and so dogged Hannibal’s footsteps that he was unable to strike another blow. The town of Salapia in Apulia--where lived a lady whom Hannibal loved too well and who is said to have more than once detained him from the field--was betrayed to Marcellus, as Arpi had been to Fulvius, and was another example of the altered feeling of the Italians.

Lævinus, as has above been mentioned, was enabled by a stroke of good luck to finish the war in Sicily with ease and credit; and he returned to Rome accompanied by the redoubtable Mutin. Before he left Sicily he had sent over his fleet to examine the coasts of Africa. The officer despatched on this service learnt that the Carthaginian government were actively engaged in collecting troops to be placed under Hasdrubal’s command for a second invasion of Italy from the north; he immediately forwarded this intelligence to the consul at Rome. The senate in alarm ordered Lævinus to return instantly to his province without waiting to preside at the comitia. He was to name a dictator for that purpose, and the person submitted to him for nomination was old Q. Fulvius, the governor of Capua. Lævinus, however, refused to name his personal enemy, upon which the ruling party referred the matter to the people, who peremptorily ordered the consul to name Fulvius, and no one else. But Lævinus, to avoid this necessity, had already left Rome, and the fathers were obliged to send for Marcellus to execute their orders. When the old dictator held the comitia, the prerogative tribe gave its vote for Fulvius himself and Fabius. An objection was taken by two of the tribunes, that a presiding magistrate could not allow himself to be elected. But this, like many other ordinances was overruled at this critical season by the senate, and the election proceeded. The next year was to see Hannibal confronted with the three men reputed to be the ablest commanders in Rome--Fabius and Fulvius the consuls, and Marcellus as proconsul. It was hoped that by their united efforts the enemy might be crushed before the arrival of Hasdrubal and his Spaniards.

But the result was not equal to expectation. In the very outset of this year (209 B.C.) the levies were delayed by a circumstance which looked even more threatening than the financial difficulties of the previous year. The Latin colonies, now thirty in number, have been mentioned as the chief stays of Roman power in the subject districts of Italy. They had hitherto borne the toils and expenses of the war unrepiningly. What then was the alarm of the consuls and the senate, when twelve of the thirty openly declined to comply with the requisition to furnish their contingents for the armies of this year. The refusal was due in part no doubt to exhaustion and poverty; but it was partly caused by anger at the fact that most of the defeated soldiers of Centumalus lately banished to Sicily were citizens of their towns. The consuls endeavoured to reason with them, but in vain; and when the deputies of the other eighteen colonies, which comprised all the largest and most important places, declared their steadfast and unaltered allegiance, they determined to pass the matter over for the present, saying that they would not deign to ask assistance from those who would not give it willingly.

[Sidenote: [209-208 B.C.]]

To provide for the current expenses a large treasure of gold, which had been reserved for the emergency of another Gallic war, was now first invaded.

Fulvius resumed his station at Capua, Marcellus was to engage Hannibal’s attention in Apulia, while old Fabius made an attempt to recover Tarentum. Marcellus found his enemy at Canusium, and a series of indecisive actions followed, in which (although the Roman annalists claim the advantage for their hero) it is plain that he must have suffered greatly, for he remained inactive during the rest of the campaign. But fortunately for Fabius’ attempt upon Tarentum, Hannibal’s presence was required in Bruttium to defend his allies from a band of free mercenaries, who, formerly in the service of the Carthaginians in Sicily, had now been engaged by Lævinus, and sent to Rhegium to harass their old masters. The appearance of the great general was enough to scare these marauders into submission, but scarcely was this done, than he heard the news that Fabius had invested Tarentum. Instantly he put his army in motion, and marched day and night to relieve this important city. But he was too late. By treachery he had won the place, and by treachery he lost it. The officer in command at Tarentum was a Bruttian. This man had a mistress, sister to an Italian serving in the army of Fabius; she it was who persuaded him to open the gates to the consul, and Hannibal, while yet upon his march, heard this disastrous news. The old consul gave up the despised city of the Greeks to be plundered by his soldiers, reserving the public treasure for the service of the state. But when he was asked whether he would have the statues and works of art taken to Rome, after the example set by Marcellus at Syracuse, “No,” he said, “let the Tarentines keep their angry gods.” The capture of Tarentum was the greatest exploit of Fabius, and it was his last--an honourable close to an honourable career.

Besides the recovery of Tarentum, the Samnites and Lucanians, long wavering, again returned to their allegiance, and were restored by Fulvius to their position as allies, without any notice being taken of their revolt.

Notwithstanding this, men were dissatisfied with the result of the campaign. Three consular armies had not sufficed to defeat Hannibal; Marcellus, reputed their best general, had done nothing. But the party who murmured against Fabius and his friends were as yet feeble. Very lately Lævinus had been compelled to relinquish his opposition; and when Marcellus appeared to give a narrative of his services, all men’s hearts were turned, and not only was he forgiven freely, but was even elected consul for the ensuing year (208 B.C.). His colleague was T. Quinctius Crispinus, who had served under him in Sicily.

The defection of the Italians had no doubt weakened Hannibal, and the two consuls determined to throw themselves upon him with their conjoint force. They found him near Venusia, and every day they drew out their forces before his camp and offered him battle. But the odds were too great even for Hannibal, and he kept close within his entrenchments. It happened that between his camp and that of the consuls there was a hill, which Marcellus thought it desirable to occupy. Accordingly he rode up to the top, accompanied by his colleague and a small detachment of cavalry, unconscious that a large body of Numidian horse were lurking in the woods below. In a moment the consuls were surrounded. Marcellus was run through by the spear of one of these wild horsemen, and fell dead from his horse; Crispinus escaped mortally wounded to his camp. As soon as Hannibal heard of this great stroke of good luck he hastened to the scene of conflict, and saw with his own eyes his ablest antagonist lying dead before him. His conduct proved the true nobility of his nature. He showed no triumph; but simply drew the gold ring from the dead man’s finger, saying: “There lies a good soldier, but a bad general.” He then ordered the corpse to receive a soldier’s burial. Like his father Hamilcar, he warred not with the dead, but with the living.

Great was the consternation at Rome when intelligence of this untoward event arrived. The consul Crispinus lived just long enough to be carried in a litter to Capua, where he was on Roman ground, and could therefore execute the command of the senate to name a dictator. He named old Manlius Torquatus. But no attempt was made to molest Hannibal again this year. Torquatus only exercised his office in holding comitia for the election of new consuls. The occasion was a grave one. Never before, since the beginning of the republic, had she been bereft of both her consuls at one blow. But in order to understand the full importance of the choice now to be made, it must be mentioned that Hasdrubal, the brother of Hannibal, had already set out upon his march from Spain, and in a short time might be expected to arrive in Italy.

[Sidenote: [211-208 B.C.]]

All notice of the Spanish War since the death of the two Scipios has purposely been deferred. Here it will be enough to say, that soon after that event, the senate, well understanding the importance of maintaining the war in Spain, had endeavoured to retrieve their losses in that quarter; and in 211 B.C. young P. Scipio, the hero of the latter part of the war, had accepted the dangerous command left vacant by his father and uncle. In the next chapter notice will be taken of his splendid successes during the three years which had passed. But these successes had not served to divert Hasdrubal from his purpose. This general had collected an army of tried soldiers, which he skilfully carried through the heart of Spain, and, crossing the Pyrenees near Bayonne, entered Gaul by the pass which is now threaded by the high-road from Paris to Madrid. By this dexterous movement he eluded the vigilance of the Romans, who knew not whither he was gone. But towards the close of the present year news came from the friendly people of Marseilles, to the effect that Hasdrubal had arrived in Aquitania, and intended wintering in Gaul, as the season was too far advanced for the safe passage of the Alps.

[Sidenote: [208-207 B.C.]]

Such were the grave circumstances under which Torquatus summoned the people to elect consuls for the year 207 B.C.

It might have been thought that the ablest patrician to be found was M. Valerius Lævinus, who was still in Sicily. Not only had he restored that province to order, but had laid in large stores of provisions for the Italian armies, and had assisted in other ways in lightening the expenses of the war. But the senate distrusted him: they had not forgotten the contumacious way in which he had quitted Rome, rather than name a dictator at their bidding. They therefore turned their eyes on C. Claudius Nero, a man of known energy, who had served now for many years under Fulvius and Marcellus. He had been sent to Spain at the first news of the disasters there, and remained in command till the appointment of young Scipio. All men agreed that Nero should be the patrician consul. But who was to be his plebeian colleague? Marcellus was dead, and Gracchus was dead; and Fulvius was nearly as old as Fabius.

At length it was resolved to choose M. Livius Salinator, a man who was also well stricken in years, for he had been consul with Æmilius Paulus in the year before Hannibal’s invasion, and had triumphed with him over the Illyrians. But he had been accused of unfair division of the spoil taken in that Illyrian War, and had been condemned to pay a fine by the vote of all the tribes save one. Indignant at an unjust sentence, he had withdrawn to his estate in the country, and had only lately reappeared in the senate at the command of the censors, but when there, he sat in moody silence, till at length he started up to speak in defence of his kinsman Livius, the commandant of Tarentum, who was accused of having lost that city. On this occasion Fabius’ conduct had not been conciliatory. For when it was urged in defence of the accused that he had mainly assisted in recovering the city, Fabius dryly remarked that he did not wish to condemn Livius: certainly he had assisted in recovering Tarentum, for if he had not lost it, it would not have been recovered at all. These recollections rankled in the heart of the old senator; and he refused the proffered consulship. Here, however, he yielded to the command, rather than the entreaty of the Fathers. But one difficulty remained. The cross-grained old man was at feud with his colleague Nero; and when friends tried to reconcile them, he replied that he saw no occasion for it: if they remained enemies, they would keep a keener watch for each other’s faults. At last he gave way, and before they took the field the consuls were in perfect agreement.

They hastened early in the year to their respective stations, Nero to take the command in southern Italy, against the feeble army of Hannibal; Livius to Ariminum on the frontier of Cisalpine Gaul, to await the arrival of Hasdrubal.

As soon as the season permitted, Hasdrubal advanced from his winter quarters to the passage of the Alps. He avoided the coast-road taken by his brother, and passed through the country of the Arvernians (who have left their name in French Auvergne), and thus came straight to the point where the Rhone and Isère meet, so as to take the same route over the mountains which had been pursued by his brother eleven years before. The time of year was favourable: in the period which had elapsed the Gauls had become better acquainted with the Carthaginians; and Hasdrubal achieved his passage into Italy with little loss or difficulty. He straightway marched through the plains of Cisalpine Gaul to the banks of the Po, where the Roman colony of Placentia, one of the eighteen lately found faithful, had before defied the arms of Hannibal. Hannibal had not wasted time in assailing this town; but Hasdrubal probably wished to oblige the Gauls, whom he expected to swell the numbers of his army. For hitherto they had not given Hannibal much assistance. In the eventful year of Cannæ they had cut off the consul-elect Postumius, and still drank mead out of his skull. But since then they had remained quiet; and Varro, with a single legion at Ariminum, had sufficed to watch them. And now they seem to have given Hasdrubal indifferent support, so that the time he spent at Placentia must have been nearly thrown away.

Before he left his lines at Placentia, he sent off six couriers, four Gauls and two Numidians, to inform his brother of his intended route. Hannibal, meantime, had been constantly on the move--marching from Bruttium into Lucania, from Lucania into Apulia, from Apulia again into Bruttium, and then once more back into Apulia. We cannot but admire the skill with which he eluded Nero, who pursued him with a double army of four legions. Yet it was one of these marches that accidentally proved the ruin of his cause. The couriers despatched by Hasdrubal from Placentia made their way into Apulia, but unfortunately arrived just when Hannibal was absent in Bruttium. They attempted to follow him, but missed their way, and fell into the hands of the prætor stationed on the Tarentine frontier. That officer immediately sent off the despatches found upon them to Nero at Canusium. An interpreter was procured, and the whole plan of the enemy’s campaign was revealed to the consul. Hasdrubal told his brother that he intended to advance along the Adriatic, by way of Ariminum, and proposed that they should join forces in Umbria, in order to march upon Rome. Nero’s determination was soon taken. Legally, he had no power to quit his district in southern Italy, but in this emergency he resolved to set all forms at defiance.

He picked out six thousand foot and one thousand horse, the flower of his army, and gave out that he would march at nightfall on a secret expedition into Lucania. As soon as it was dark, he set out; but the soldiers soon discovered that Lucania was not their destination. They were marching northwards towards Picenum, and they found that provisions and beasts of burden were ready for them all along the road, by the consul’s orders. As soon as he was well advanced upon his march, he addressed his men, and told them that in a few days they would join their countrymen under Livius in his camp at Sena Gallica in Umbria; that combined they would intercept Hasdrubal and his invading army; that victory was certain; that the chief share of the glory would be theirs. The men answered such an address as soldiers should; and everywhere, as they passed, the inhabitants came out to meet them, pressing upon them clothes, victuals, horses--all, and more than all, that they could want. In a week’s time they accomplished a distance of about 250 miles, and found themselves within a short distance of Sena. Nero halted till it was dark, that he might enter his colleague’s camp unperceived by Hasdrubal.

Nero had previously written to the senate, informing them of his march, and urging them to throw forward a strong force to defend the defile through which the Flaminian road passes at Narnia, in case the consuls should be beaten by Hasdrubal. Answers had reached him, fully approving his bold design, and promising all support. It was, therefore, with full confidence that he entered his colleague’s camp, and beheld the watch-fires of Hasdrubal at not more than half a mile’s distance in front. His men were warmly greeted by their comrades, and received within the camp of Livius, that Hasdrubal might not observe the increase of the army. After one day’s rest, Nero urged immediate action, lest his absence from Apulia might be discovered by Hannibal, or his presence in Umbria by Hasdrubal. Accordingly, the two legions of Livius, the two commanded by the prætor Porcius, together with Nero’s troops, drew out before Hasdrubal’s camp and offered battle. The experienced eye of the Carthaginian was struck by an apparent increase of numbers; and his suspicions were confirmed, when he heard the trumpet sound twice in the consuls’ lines. This convinced him that Nero had joined his colleague, and full of anxious fear as to the fate of his brother, he determined to retreat under cover of night; and when the next day broke, they found Hasdrubal’s camp deserted. Orders were given to pursue. The Romans came up with the Carthaginian army on the banks of the Metaurus, about twelve or fourteen miles north of their former position. The river was swollen by rains, so that the Carthaginians could not pass it except at certain places; and, their guides having deserted them, they could not find the fords. Hasdrubal, therefore, was obliged to give battle with the river in his rear.[b]

THE DEATH OF HASDRUBAL DESCRIBED BY POLYBIUS

[Sidenote: [207 B.C.]]

Hasdrubal was in all respects dissatisfied with the state in which things appeared. But as it was now too late to take other measures, because the Romans were already formed, and beginning to advance towards him, he was constrained to draw up the Spaniards, and the Gauls that were with him, in order of battle. He placed the elephants, which were ten in number, in front; increased the depth of his files; and ranged his whole army upon a very narrow ground. He then took his post in the centre of the line, behind the elephants; and moved to attack the left of the enemy; having before determined that in this battle he would either conquer or die.

Livius, leading on his troops with a slow and haughty pace, began the combat with great vigour. But Claudius [Nero] who commanded on the right, was unable to advance so as to surround the enemy; being utterly obstructed by those difficulties of the ground which have before been mentioned, and which had determined Hasdrubal to make his whole attack upon the left. Anxious therefore, and not willing to remain inactive, he had recourse to the measure which the occasion itself suggested to him. For having drawn away his troops from the right, he led them round the field of battle; and, passing beyond the left of the Roman army, attacked the Carthaginians in flank behind the elephants. To this moment the success of the battle had remained doubtful. For both the Carthaginians and the Romans, well knowing that they had no hopes of safety but in victory, maintained the fight with equal bravery. The service also, which the elephants performed, had been the same to both. For these beasts, being enclosed between the two armies, and wounded by the darts, spread no less disorder among the ranks of the Spaniards, than among those of the Romans.

But when Claudius [Nero] fell upon the enemy from behind, the engagement was no longer equal. The Spaniards, pressed at once both in front and rear, were almost all slaughtered in their ranks. Six of the elephants were killed, together with the men that conducted them; and four, which had forced their way through the disordered ranks, were afterwards taken, but without their leaders. Hasdrubal, who had so often distinguished himself upon former occasions, displayed no less courage in this last action, and fell in the battle.

The Romans, as soon as they had gained the victory, pillaged the camp of the enemy. Finding many of the Gauls drunk, and sleeping upon their straw, they slaughtered them as victims without resistance. The prisoners were then collected together; and from this part of the booty more than three hundred talents were brought into the public treasury. Not fewer than ten thousand Gauls and Carthaginians fell in the engagement; and about two thousand of the Romans. Some of the Carthaginians that were of eminent rank were taken alive; the rest were destroyed in the action.[c]

REJOICING AT ROME. NERO’S INHUMANITY AND TRIUMPH

At Rome, as may be well imagined, the news of Nero’s march had filled all hearts with hope and fear. And now, after some ten days of intense anxiety, vague rumours came that a battle had been fought and won. Still, men feared to believe what they wished; and the anxiety rose higher and higher, till the officer in command at Narnia sent home despatches to say that two horsemen had arrived at that place from the field of battle with certain news of a great victory. So eager were the people, that the prætor had great difficulty in preventing the despatches from being seized and torn open before they had been read in the senate. And when he brought them out from the senate house, and read them publicly from the rostra, a burst of exultation broke from every tongue; and men, women, and children thronged to the temples to bless the gods for their great deliverance. Thanks were decreed to the consuls and their armies; three days were appointed for a public thanksgiving to the gods. Never was public joy and gratitude more deserved. The battle of the Metaurus was the salvation of Italy; and Horace spoke with as much historic truth as poetic fervour when he said that “then, by the death of Hasdrubal, then fell all the hope and fortune of Carthage.”

The news was conveyed to Hannibal in a barbarous fashion. Nero had returned to his camp at Canusium as speedily as possible, and his lieutenants had kept the secret so well that Hannibal had remained ignorant of his absence; when one morning a grisly head was thrown into his camp, and Hannibal knew the features of his brother. Two prisoners sent in, and a large body paraded before the Roman camp, confirmed the dismal forebodings of the general, and he said with a heavy heart that “the doom of Carthage was spoken.” This treatment of his brother’s remains was an ill return for the generosity shown by Hannibal to the corpses of his opponents; and Nero, by this act, forfeited all claim to admiration, except such as must be bestowed on a skilful general and a resolute man.

Hannibal now retreated into Bruttium. The people of this wild country, still nearly as wild as it was then, clung to his fallen fortunes with unshaken fidelity. Here he maintained himself for four years longer, almost more admirable in adversity than in prosperity. Even now no Roman general was able to gain a victory over him; even now every veteran soldier remained faithful to his great leader. But he was driven into a corner, and stood like a lion at bay--still terrible, but without hope. The war in Italy may now be considered at an end.

The victory of the Metaurus was held to be an occasion for allowing a triumph to the victorious generals. No triumphal procession had passed down the Sacred Way and ascended to the Capitol since Æmilius Paulus and Livius Salinator had led up the captive Illyrians in the year before Hannibal’s invasion. All former successes in the war had been but the recoveries of losses, all except the capture of Syracuse; and Marcellus was refused a full triumph then, because he left the Sicilian War unfinished. But now there was no drawback. The two consuls met at Præneste, and advanced with the army of Livius and the captives in long procession to the temple of Bellona, in the Campus Martius. Here they were received by the senate and people in festal array. Livius appeared in the triumphal car drawn by four white horses, attended by his army; Nero rode on horseback beside him unattended: for the battle had been fought in Livius’ district. Yet all men turned their eyes on the patrician consul, and the acclamations of the crowd showed to whom belonged the true honours of the triumph.

Notwithstanding these honours, Nero (strange to say) was never again employed during the war; and it was not till the Neros became heirs of the empire of Augustus that poets sang of the debt which Rome owed to that name. A star was appearing in the west which soon eclipsed the brightness of Nero’s fame. The remaining period of the war will be little more than a history of the deeds of Scipio.

THE FOURTH AND LAST PERIOD OF THE WAR

[Sidenote: [210-207 B.C.]]

The history of the war in Spain has been left almost unnoticed, since the death of the two Scipios in 212 or 211 B.C. It is now time to return to that country; for the issue of the war between Rome and Hannibal was in reality determined on Spanish soil.

After the disasters of that campaign, the senate determined to despatch reinforcements without delay; and the officer appointed to take the temporary command was C. Claudius Nero, the future hero of the Metaurus. But the senate resolved to take the unusual course of calling upon the people to elect a proconsul for Spain at the great comitia. The policy of continuing the Spanish War was manifest; but the risk of failure was so great, that the senate thought fit to throw the responsibility upon the people. But when the day came that candidates for the proconsulate should present themselves in the Campus Martius, no candidate appeared. Men looked at one another in blank dismay. It seemed that none of the soldiers of the republic dared to undertake so great and hazardous an enterprise; when, to the surprise and admiration of all, P. Cornelius Scipio, son and nephew of the slain proconsuls, arose and offered himself to the suffrages of the people. He was barely twenty-six years of age; but his name and character were well known, and though he had hitherto held no office higher than that of ædile, he was elected by acclamation.

THE CHARACTER OF SCIPIO

Scipio presents in almost all respects a striking contrast to the men who had hitherto conducted the affairs of Rome in the Second Punic War. They were far advanced in years, cautious and distrustful; he was in the prime of youth, enterprising and self-confident. They had been trained in the severity of the old Roman discipline; he is said to have been dissolute in early years, and was still thought to affect too much the easy laxity of Grecian manners. They were strictly obedient to the letter of the law; he was accustomed from his very youth to put himself above the laws and customs of Rome. They always acted as the faithful ministers of the senate; he very soon showed that the senate must be content to follow his policy, rather than guide it. They, however, gentle to their countrymen, were to foreigners harsh, arrogant, and cruel; he treated foreigners with a humanity and courteousness that made his name better loved in Spain than in Italy. Yet in some respects he was a true Roman. Notwithstanding the excesses charged upon his youth, he had long learned to control his passions absolutely, and to submit every desire to his own views of duty. Notwithstanding the grace and affability of his manner, he preserved a loftiness of deportment which kept men at a certain distance from him. Few shared his intimacy; but where he gave his confidence, as to his friend C. Lælius, that confidence was complete and unreserved.

One point in his character calls for particular attention--the religiousness of his life. Never, from his first appearance in public, had he been known to undertake any enterprise without first resorting to the great temple on the Capitol, and remaining there for hours absorbed in devotion. The religion of Scipio might not be consistent; yet, on the whole, it would be unjust to doubt that he acted in reliance on the support of higher powers. In this lies the secret of his character. That self-confidence, which prompted him to shrink from no responsibility, led him also to neglect the laws, when they seemed to oppose what he thought necessary. Every incident in his youth shows this confidence. Not to insist on the doubtful story of his saving his father’s life, when he was yet a boy, we have seen him a tribune of the legions at the age of twenty, assisting to rally the broken remains of the army of Cannæ, and barring the secession of the young nobles after that disastrous day. Three years after, we find him offering himself as candidate for the curule ædileship; and, when it was objected that he was yet too young for the office, promptly answering, “If the people vote for me, that will make me old enough.” And now, after the death of his father and uncle in Spain, we see him modestly waiting till it was clear that no experienced commander would claim the dangerous honour of succeeding them, and then bravely offering himself to the acceptance of the people.

SCIPIO IN SPAIN

[Sidenote: [210-209 B.C.]]

Scipio arrived in Spain late in the summer of 210, or perhaps not till the spring of 209 B.C. He landed at Emporiæ, with his friend Lælius and his elder brother Lucius, who accompanied him as legates. He found that the three generals commanding the Carthaginians in Spain--Hasdrubal and Mago, brothers of Hannibal, and Hasdrubal, son of Gisco--were at discord one with another. Their forces lay scattered over a wide extent of country from Gades to Celtiberia; and there seems to have been no disposition to act on the offensive against the Romans. Scipio, taking advantage of these circumstances, determined to strike a blow which would confirm the enthusiastic feelings of the Roman people towards him, and would mark that a general had arisen who would not rest content with the timid discretion of the Fabian policy. By a bold stroke it might be possible to surprise New Carthage itself. His purpose was revealed to none save Lælius, who sailed in command of the fleet, while Scipio himself led his army across the Ebro, and arrived in an incredibly short time under the walls of the city.

New Carthage lay on a hilly peninsula jutting out into a fine bay, which forms the harbour. On the land side its walls were covered by a marsh or lagoon, which was overflowed by the sea, so that the place was only approachable by a narrow neck of land between the lagoon and the harbour. On this neck of land Scipio took up his position, entrenching himself in rear, but leaving the front of his camp open towards the city. No time was to be lost; and next morning he gave orders to assault the walls. He addressed his soldiers and assured them of success; Neptune, he said, had appeared to him in a dream, and promised to fight with the Romans. The men advanced gallantly to the escalade, confident in their young general. But the walls were high and strong; the garrison made a stout defence; and before noon Scipio called off his soldiers. But he did not give up his enterprise. In the afternoon, he was informed, the water in the lagoon would be very low, in consequence of a fall in the tide assisted by a strong wind. He therefore picked out five hundred men, who were ordered to take a number of scaling-ladders and dash through the water so as to mount the walls unobserved, while the main body of the army made a feigned attack by the neck of land. Thus Neptune would fulfil his promise.

The device succeeded completely. The garrison had retired to their noonday’s sleep, and while they were hurrying to repel the feigned attack, the five hundred got into the town unopposed, and rushing to the main entrance threw open the gates. Scipio, with a chosen detachment, pushed on to the citadel, into which the garrison had fled; and the commandant surrendered at discretion. All pillaging and slaughter were now stopped; and at the close of the day the young general found himself master of this important city, with a very large treasure and an immense supply of stores.

The Carthaginian rule was no longer beloved in Spain, and Scipio turned this disposition to his own advantage with admirable dexterity. He set free all the hostages retained by the Carthaginians, as well as all of Spanish blood who had been taken prisoners in the city. Among these hostages was the wife of Mandonius, brother of Indibilis, a powerful chief who had formerly been the friend of Carthage, and the daughters of Indibilis himself. He sent them home with as much care as if they had been his own kinswomen, although Indibilis and Mandonius had been actively engaged against his unfortunate father and uncle. Then the soldiers brought him a beautiful girl, whom they had reserved as a special gift for their youthful commander. But Scipio observing her tears, inquired into her condition; and finding she was the betrothed of Allucius, a young Celtiberian chief, he sent for the youth, and restored his bride unharmed, without ransom or condition. This generous conduct was not without its reward. The Spaniards, quick in feeling and romantic in disposition, regarded the young conqueror as a hero sent to deliver them from the yoke of Carthage. His noble bearing, his personal beauty, confirmed the favourable impressions caused by his conduct to the hostages; and when he advanced next year into Celtiberia, he was welcomed by Indibilis and Mandonius at the head of their vassals. Soon after, a deputation of Spaniards came to him with entreaties to become their king. But Scipio courteously declined the offer, informing them that he was but the general of the Roman people, in whose ears the name of king was a by-word and a reproach.

[Sidenote: [209-206 B.C.]]

The Carthaginian generals were quite unable to make head against the well-earned popularity of the youthful Roman. Hasdrubal Barca attempted to retake New Carthage by surprise, but in vain; and the year 208 B.C. found him too busily engaged in preparing for his Italian expedition to act with energy against the Romans. All Spain north of the Bætis (Guadalquivir) was relinquished; but at length Hasdrubal found himself obliged to give battle at a place called Bæcula, near that river. The Romans won the day; but the Carthaginian commander made a skilful retreat, leaving his camp and baggage in the hands of the enemy. Hasdrubal now drew back into Lusitania, leaving his brother Mago and Hasdrubal, son of Gisco, to cover the borders of that district, which with the province now called Andalusia were the only parts of Spain left to the Carthaginians. Meanwhile he himself crossed the Tagus, and marching northwards (as we have seen) by ways unknown to the Romans, crossed the Pyrenees near the shores of the Bay of Biscay. Scipio was informed of his intentions to pass into Italy, and had expected him to follow the course of his brother Hannibal. But in the beginning of 207 B.C., while he was lying upon the Ebro, he heard that his able opponent had eluded him, and was already in the heart of Gaul.

In that year the Carthaginians made great efforts to retrieve their falling fortunes. Fresh forces were sent from Africa, and young Masinissa, son of Gala, a powerful Numidian chief, also took the field with a large body of his formidable horsemen. Scipio himself did not appear in the south till late in the season, when he found that his brother Lucius, with his legate Silanus, had kept the Carthaginians in check. But the news of the Metaurus had reached him, and he burned with eagerness to eclipse the glory of Nero.

Late in this year, therefore, or early in 206, Scipio with his whole force prepared to pass the Bætis and bring the enemy to action. The Carthaginians, confident in their numbers, were equally ready, and their united forces boldly faced the enemy. The place of the battle is unknown; its name is variously given as Silpia or Elinga. But the result is certain. Scipio’s victory was complete; the whole Carthaginian army was broken and destroyed; its scattered remains took refuge behind the walls of Gades, with Hasdrubal Gisco and Mago; while the wily Masinissa entered into secret negotiations with the Romans. The senate, therefore, at the commencement of the year 206, had to congratulate the people not only on seeing Italy almost delivered from the army of Hannibal, but also on the important fact that all Spain, except the town of Gades, was in the hands of the Roman armies.

But Scipio regarded Spain as a mere stepping-stone to Africa. Here, and here only, he felt convinced, could the war be concluded. Already Valerius Lævinus had made descents upon the African coast, and found the country nearly as defenceless as in the days of Agathocles and of Regulus. Scipio determined not to return to Rome till he had laid the train for an invasion of Africa; and then, with the confidence that marked his whole career, he would offer himself for the consulship, and force the senate to allow him his own way.

At that time the country to the west of the Carthaginian territory, from Bona to Oran, was known by the name of Numidia; and the Numidians themselves were divided into two great tribes, the eastern Numidians or Masæsylians, and the western or Massylians. Of the Masæsylians, Syphax was king; his capital being Cirta, now well known under the name of Constantine as the chief fortress of Algeria. Gala, father of Masinissa, was ruler of the Massylians; and Scipio had already entered into negotiations with Masinissa. But Masinissa had not yet any power of his own; while the position of Syphax on the Carthaginian frontier necessarily made him the most dangerous enemy of Carthage. It was therefore of the greatest importance to secure the friendship of this powerful but unstable chieftain. Scipio resolved, with a boldness almost romantic, to pay a visit to the Numidian capital; and, to show his confidence in Syphax, he sailed from New Carthage to Africa with two ships only. It happened that Hasdrubal Gisco, who had before this left Spain in despair, appeared at the court of Syphax at the self-same time, with the self-same purposes. Both the rivals were entertained by the Numidian; but the winning manners and personal grace of Scipio prevailed for the present, and Syphax formed an alliance with the Romans.

When Scipio returned to Spain, he found that his short absence had produced a serious change. Three important cities in the vale of the Bætis, Illiturgi, Castulo, and Astapa, had closed their gates and declared their independence. Without delay, he laid siege to Illiturgi. The town was taken after an obstinate defence, and given up to massacre and pillage. This dreadful fate of their countrymen produced immediate, but opposite, effects on Castulo and Astapa. The men of Castulo, stricken with fear, surrendered at discretion. The men of Astapa collected all their property into a huge funeral pile in the market-place, and placed their wives and daughters under a guard, who had orders to slay them and fire the pile as soon as the gates should be forced. The rest of the citizens fell fighting bravely, and the Romans were left masters of a heap of ashes.

Another circumstance showed that the Roman power in Spain rested on a precarious tenure. Scipio fell ill at New Carthage, and a report was spread that he was dead. Upon this, Indibilis and Mandonius, believed to be his most faithful friends, raised the standard of revolt and advanced into Celtiberia. A division of Italian troops, eight thousand strong, stationed upon the Sucro, broke into open mutiny, driving away their Roman officers, and choosing two Italians as their chiefs. The prompt and decisive way in which Scipio quelled this dangerous mutiny recalls the conduct of Clive in Bengal on a similar occasion. He sent messengers to the mutineers, desiring them to come to New Carthage and state their grievances; and as they approached the town, he ordered the division of the army in that place to prepare for marching against the revolted Spaniards. The Italians, therefore, met the army leaving New Carthage as they entered it, and fondly deemed that the general would now be completely at their mercy. But when they appeared next morning before Scipio, they found that thirty-five persons, the ringleaders of the mutiny, had been arrested during the night; and the clash of arms in the streets leading to the Forum apprised them that the army had returned from its pretended march. Scipio reproved the mutineers with much severity. He ordered the ringleaders for execution, and pardoned the rest on their taking the oath of allegiance anew. Indibilis and Mandonius hastened to make full submission. But no sooner had Scipio left Spain, than these discontented chiefs again took arms. Indibilis fell in battle; Mandonius was taken prisoner and put to death.

It was now apparent that the Carthaginians had no longer any hope of recovering their ground in Spain. Hasdrubal Gisco had returned to Africa. Masinissa obtained an interview with Scipio, and renewed his promises of friendship. Mago, the last remaining brother of Hannibal, after a vain attempt to surprise New Carthage, returned to Gades, and found that the inhabitants shut their gates against him. He enticed the chief magistrates, called suffets (as at Carthage), into a negotiation, and seizing their persons, crucified them in sight of the town. This brutal and treacherous act forfeited his last claim on the sympathies of the people of Gades. They surrendered to the Romans, while Mago sailed off to the Balearic Isles, and occupied himself in preparing a descent upon the coast of Italy, as a last chance of relieving his illustrious brother.

The soil of the Spanish peninsula was now completely cleared of the Carthaginians, and Scipio prepared to return to Rome. Three years before, he had left his country amid the hopes and expectations of all men. He now returned, having more than fulfilled those hopes and expectations. His friend Lælius had been sent home to announce his first great success; his brother Lucius had lately arrived to prepare the senate and people for the speedy arrival of the hero; and no one doubted that at the approaching elections Scipio would be raised to the consulship by the unanimous voice of the people.

SCIPIO RETURNS TO ROME

[Sidenote: [206-204 B.C.]]

It was towards the close of the year 206 B.C. that he returned. The senate met him at the temple of Bellona; but refused him a triumph on the ground that he had not held any regular magistracy during his absence. He therefore entered the city, and offered himself candidate for the consulship. Every tribe united in giving him their suffrages, though he was not yet thirty years old. But the common rules of election had been neglected throughout the war, and no difficulty seems to have been raised on the score of age. His colleague was P. Licinius Crassus, who was pontifex maximus, and therefore unable to leave Italy. Whatever foreign enterprise was undertaken must fall to the lot of Scipio. He himself was at no pains to conceal his intention of carrying the war into Africa; and it was generally understood that, if the senate refused leave, he would bring a special bill for the purpose before the people. Fabius, with Fulvius and the old senatorial party, vehemently opposed these bold projects. But the time was gone by when they could use the votes of the people against an enterprising consul, as they had done some years before against Lævinus. The senate was fain to compromise the matter by naming Sicily as his province, with permission to cross over into Africa if he deemed it expedient. They refused him, however, the additional levies and supplies which he required. But the Etruscans and other Italians enthusiastically volunteered to give all he wanted. Yet he was unable during the year of his consulate to make any attempt on Africa, and was continued in his command as proconsul.

The enemies of Scipio made one more attempt to thwart his African enterprise. Hearing that the citadel of Locri had been taken by Q. Pleminius, who commanded as proprætor in Bruttium, but that Hannibal had come to the relief of the place, he left his province without hesitation, and sailing into the harbour of Locri obliged the Carthaginian to retire. Pleminius was no sooner left in command there than he indulged in gross and brutal outrages, not only against the people of Locri, but against such Romans as ventured to oppose his will. Scipio was appealed to, but declined to interfere, desiring the Locrians to lay their complaints before the senate at Rome. These complaints arrived early in the year 204 B.C., and old Fabius again loudly inveighed against the presumptuous audacity of his young rival. He ended his speech by proposing that he should be deprived of his command. Other complaints were made against Scipio--that by going to Locri he had transgressed the limits of his province, as he had done before by visiting Syphax in Numidia; moreover, that he spent his time in pursuits unfit for a Roman soldier, frequenting the schools and gymnasia of the Greek cities, and wearing a Greek dress; while his men were daily becoming corrupted by licentious living and want of discipline. The senate ventured not to act on these vague accusations without previous inquiry; and it was therefore resolved to send a commission into Sicily to examine into the truth of the charges. The result was highly favourable to the general. It was reported that he was guiltless of the excesses of Pleminius, who was arrested, and left to die in prison; that his troops, instead of being neglected or undisciplined, were in the highest order; and that arms, engines, and supplies of every kind were provided for the invasion of Africa. It was universally resolved that Scipio should retain his command till he should bring the war to a close.

The confidence which the senate felt in the altered state of affairs is fully shown by two decrees passed in this same year. The first respected the twelve Latin colonies, which five years before had refused to furnish soldiers. At the time, it had been thought prudent to pass over this contumacious conduct. But now they were required to furnish twice their proper contingent till the end of the war. They murmured, but submitted. The other decree was moved by Lævinus for the repayment of the patriotic loan advanced during his consulship in the year 210 B.C. It was apparent, therefore, that the battle of the Metaurus, backed by the great successes of Scipio in Spain, had raised the republic above all fear of disaffection in her colonies, or of bankruptcy at home. Other signs of confidence appear. A huge stone, supposed to represent the Great Mother of the gods, was brought in state to Rome from Pessinus in Sicily. The Sibylline books directed that the care of this precious relic should be given to “the best man” at Rome; and the senate adjudged the title to P. Scipio Nasica, son of Cn. Scipio, who had died in Spain, and first cousin to the great man who was now making the name illustrious.

SCIPIO INVADES AFRICA

[Sidenote: [204-203 B.C.]]

All obstacles being now removed, Scipio prepared to cross over into Africa. His army and fleet were assembled at Lilybæum under his own eye. His brother Lucius and his friend Lælius still attended him as legates; and his quæstor was a young man destined hereafter to become famous, M. Porcius Cato. It was towards the close of 204 B.C. that he set sail. His army was not so numerous as it was well appointed and well disciplined, composed of men who had grown old in service, skilful in sieges, prepared for all dangers; for the greater part knew that in the successful termination of the war lay their only chance of returning home to end their days in peace. As the ships left the harbour at daybreak, Scipio prayed aloud to all the gods, that his enterprise might be blessed by their favour; that the evils which Carthage had wrought against Rome might now be visited upon her own head. When the second morning broke, they were in sight of land; and Scipio, when he heard that they were off the Fair Promontory, said that the omen was good, and there should be their landing-place.

Masinissa joined him with only two hundred of his Numidian horse; but his knowledge of the country, and his ceaseless activity, would have made him welcome, even if he had come alone.

Scipio immediately laid siege to Utica. Terror at Carthage rose to its highest pitch. For a time he was left to carry on his operations unmolested. But as winter advanced, Hasdrubal Gisco succeeded in collecting a considerable force, and persuaded Syphax, his son-in-law, to lend his aid in relieving Utica. Scipio was encamped on a headland to the eastward of this town, on a spot which long retained the name of “the Cornelian camp,” where the ruins of his entrenchments are still to be traced; and the Carthaginians hoped that they might blockade him here both by land and sea. Scipio remained quiet the whole winter, except that he amused Syphax by entering into negotiations for peace. But these negotiations were carried on to mask a design, which, as spring came on, he was enabled to put in practice. He observed that Hasdrubal occupied one camp, and Syphax another. The huts occupied by the Numidians were formed of stakes wattled and thatched with reeds; and the quarters of the Carthaginians, though somewhat more substantial, consisted solely of timber. Scipio contrived to obtain an accurate knowledge of the plan and disposition of these camps; and when the time for the execution of his design was arrived, he suddenly broke off the negotiations, and told Syphax that all thoughts of peace must be deferred till a later time.

On the first dark night that followed, he sent Lælius and Masinissa against the camp of Syphax, while he moved himself towards that of Hasdrubal. Masinissa obtained an easy entrance into the lines of his countrymen, and straightway set fire to their inflammable habitations. The unfortunate men rose from their beds or from their wine-cups, and endeavoured to extinguish the flames. But the work had been too well done; and as they attempted to escape, they found that every avenue of the camp was beset by enemies. Fire was behind them, death by the sword before; and though Syphax escaped, his army was destroyed. The same fate befell Hasdrubal. On the first alarm, he conjectured the truth, and made off, leaving his men a prey to Scipio. When morning broke, the Romans pursued the fugitives; and it is not too much to say that the whole force on which Carthage depended for safety was cut off in this horrible way. The recital makes the blood run cold. Yet neither the act itself, nor the duplicity by which it was carried into execution, were ever thought to cast any slur on the fair fame of Scipio.

The Carthaginian senate were ready to give up matters as lost. But at this juncture ten thousand Celtiberians landed in Africa and offered their services to Syphax; and this prince was persuaded by the entreaties of his wife Sophonisba, daughter of Hasdrubal Gisco, to renew the struggle. Hasdrubal also exerted himself to collect a new army; and in the course of thirty days the two allied generals appeared on the great plains, which lie about seventy or eighty miles to the southwest of Utica and Carthage. Scipio, leaving his fleet and a division of his army to continue the blockade of Utica, advanced to give them battle without delay. The Celtiberians made a stout resistance; but, being deserted by the rest of the army, they were entirely cut to pieces. Hasdrubal fled to Carthage, Syphax to his own kingdom; so that the whole country was left to the mercy of the Romans. Scipio advanced towards Carthage, receiving the submission of the different towns by which he passed. Encamping at Tunis, within sight of the capital, he awaited the submission of the government.

Meanwhile Lælius and Masinissa, with the Italian and Numidian cavalry, pursued Syphax to Cirta. The unlucky king made a faint show of resistance; but he was defeated, and his capital surrendered at discretion. Masinissa now received his reward, and was proclaimed king of all Numidia. When he entered Cirta, he was met by Sophonisba, formerly his betrothed, and now the wife of his rival. Her charms melted his heart; and fearing lest Scipio might claim her as his captive, to lead her in triumph by the side of Syphax, he took the bold step of marrying her at once. Scipio sent for the young chief and rebuked him sternly for venturing to take possession of a Roman captive. Masinissa felt that he was unable to protect his unhappy bride; but, resolved that at least she should have the option of escaping from the degradation of a Roman triumph, he sent her a cup of poison, telling her that herein lay her only possible deliverance. She took the potion, saying that she accepted the nuptial gift, and drained it to the dregs. When the tragical fate of Sophonisba reached the ears of Scipio, he feared that he had dealt too harshly with his Numidian ally. He sent for him, and, gently reproving him for his haste, he publicly presented him with the most honourable testimonies to his bravery and fidelity which a Roman general could bestow. In the delights of satisfied ambition and the acquisition of a powerful sovereignty, Masinissa soon forgot the sorrows of Sophonisba.

While Scipio remained at Tunis, the Carthaginian fleet made an attack on the Roman ships in the harbour of Utica, and gained some advantage. Intelligence also reached the government that Mago, on landing in Italy, had been welcomed by the Ligurians and a portion of the Gauls, and had lately taken position on the Po with a considerable force. Here, however, he was encountered by a Roman army and defeated after a severe struggle. Mago, himself wounded, took refuge among the Ligurians, who still remained faithful to his cause.

Ambassadors were now despatched by the Carthaginians to Rome to treat for peace, while orders were sent to Hannibal and Mago to return with such forces as they could bring. Mago obeyed the orders immediately, but died of his wound upon the passage. Hannibal also with bitter feelings prepared to obey. For sixteen years had the indomitable man maintained himself on foreign ground; and even now the remains of his veteran army clung to him with desperate fidelity. He felt that, so far as he was concerned, he had been more than successful; if he had failed, it had been the fault of that ungrateful country, which had left him long years unsupported, and now was recalling him to defend her from the enemy. What Scipio was now to Carthage, that might Hannibal have been to Rome. Still he saw that no advantage could be gained by remaining longer in Italy: he therefore bade farewell to the foreign shores, so long his own, and set sail for that native land which had not seen him for nearly forty years.

[Sidenote: [203-202 B.C.]]

Great was the joy at Rome when the news came that their dire enemy had been at length compelled to leave the shores of Italy. A public thanksgiving was decreed; sacrifices offered to all the great gods of Rome, and the Roman games, which had been vowed by Marcellus in his last consulship, were now at length performed. It was at this moment of triumph that the Carthaginian ambassadors arrived. The senate received them (inauspicious omen!) in the Temple of Bellona. Lævinus moved that they should be at once dismissed, and that orders should be sent to Scipio to push on the war with vigour. After some debate, his proposition was adopted. The close of the year 203 B.C. therefore rendered it certain that the war must be decided by a trial of strength between the two great generals, who, each triumphant in his own career, had never yet encountered each other in arms. About the same time old Fabius died in extreme old age. He has the merit of first successfully opposing Hannibal; but his somewhat narrow mind, and the jealous obstinacy which often accompanies increasing years, prevented him from seeing that there is a time for all things; that his own policy was excellent for retrieving the fortunes of the republic, but that the weakness of Hannibal left the field open for the bolder measures of Scipio.

Hannibal landed at Leptis, to the south of Carthage, with his veterans; and thence marching northwards, took up his position on the plain of Zama, within five days’ march of Carthage. Scipio, early in the year (202 B.C.), advanced from Tunis to meet him; and finding that the Carthaginian general had sent spies to ascertain his strength, he ordered them to be led through his camp, and bade them make a full report of what they had seen. Hannibal felt that he had to deal with a superior force, led by a general only second in ability to himself. His own veterans were few in number; the remainder of his army were raw levies or allies little to be trusted; the Numidian horse, his main arm in Italy, were now arrayed against him under the enterprising Masinissa. He therefore proposed a personal conference, in the faint hope that he might effect a treaty with Scipio. But it was too late. The generals parted from their conference with feelings of mutual esteem, and prepared to decide the fate of the civilised world by battle.[b]

THE BATTLE OF ZAMA DESCRIBED BY POLYBIUS

[Sidenote: [202 B.C.]]

On the following day, as soon as the dawn appeared, they drew out their forces on both sides and prepared to engage; the Carthaginians, for their own safety and the possession of Africa; the Romans, for the sovereignty of the whole, and for universal empire. Is there any one that can forbear to pause at this part of the story or remain unmoved by the relation? Never were there seen more warlike nations; never more able generals, or more completely exercised in all the art and discipline of war; never was a greater prize proposed by fortune than that which was now laid before the combatants. For it was not Africa alone, nor Italy, that waited to award the conquerors, but the entire dominion of the whole known world. And this, indeed, was not long afterwards the event.

Scipio drew up his army in battle in the following manner: He placed in the first line the Hastati, leaving intervals between the cohorts. In the second, the Principes; but posted their cohorts, not, as the Roman custom was, opposite to the intervals, but behind the cohorts of the former line and at a considerable distance from them, on account of the great number of elephants that were in the Carthaginian army. Last of all, in the third line, he drew up the Triarii. Upon the left wing he stationed Caius Lælius, with the cavalry of Italy; and Masinissa and the Numidians upon the right. The intervals of the first line he filled with companies of the light-armed troops, who were ordered to begin the action, and if they should find themselves too violently pressed by the elephants, that the swiftest of them should retire through the strait intervals to the rear of all the army, and the rest, if they should be intercepted on their way, direct their course to the right or left along the open distances that were between the lines. When his disposition was thus completed, he went round to all the troops and harangued them in a few words, but such as the occasion seemed to require.

“Remember,” said he, “your former victories, and show now a courage worthy of yourselves and of your country. Let it ever be present to your view that by gaining the victory in this battle, you not only will become the masters of all Africa, but secure to Rome the undisputed sovereignty of the rest of the world. If, on the other hand, you should be conquered, they who fall bravely in the action will obtain an honour far more glorious than any rights of sepulchre, the honour of dying for their country; while those that shall escape must be condemned to pass the remainder of their lives in the extremity of disgrace and misery. For Africa will afford no place of safety, and if you fall into the hands of the Carthaginians, what your condition must be your own reason will easily instruct you to foresee. But may none of you ever know it by experience. When fortune, then,” continued he, “has offered to us upon either side so noble a prize, universal empire or glorious death, how lost must we be both to honour and to sense, if we should reject these, the greatest of goods, and choose, through a desire of life, the most insupportable of evils. When you advance, therefore, against the enemy, carry that resolution with you into action, which is sure always to surmount the strongest resistance. Be determined either to conquer or to die. Retain not so much as a thought of life. With such sentiments, the victory cannot fail to be your own.”

Such was the harangue of Scipio. Hannibal, on his part, having placed the elephants, more than eighty in number, at the head of all the army, formed his first line of the mercenaries, who were a mixed multitude of Gauls, Ligurians, Balearics, and Maurusians, and amounted together to about twelve thousand men. Behind these were the Carthaginians and the subject Africans. The third line was composed of the troops which he had brought with him from Italy, and was placed at the distance of more than a stadium from the second line. The cavalry was posted upon the wings; that of the Numidian auxiliaries upon the left, and the Carthaginian cavalry upon the right. He ordered the officers who commanded the different bodies of the mercenaries to exhort severally their own soldiers, and to encourage them to be assured of victory, since they were now joined by Hannibal and his veteran forces. The leaders of the Carthaginians were instructed, on the other hand, to lay before their view the fatal consequences of a defeat, and to enumerate all evils to which their wives and children would be exposed. And while these orders were obeyed, he himself, going round to his own troops, addressed them with the greatest earnestness, and in words like these:

“Remember, soldiers, that we have now borne arms together during the course of seventeen years. Remember in how many battles we have been engaged against the Romans. Conquerors in them all, we have not left to the Romans even the smallest hope that they ever should be able to defeat us. But beside the other innumerable actions in which we always obtained the victory, remember also, above all the rest, the battle of Trebia, which we sustained against the father of that very general who now commands the Roman army; the battle of Thrasymene, against Flaminius, and that of Cannæ, against Æmilius. The action in which we are now ready to engage is not to be compared with those great battles, with respect either to the number or the courage of the troops. For, turn now your eyes upon the forces of the enemy. Not only they are fewer; they scarcely make even a diminutive part of the numbers against which we were then engaged. Nor is the difference less with respect to courage. The former were troops whose strength was entire, and who had never been disheartened by any defeat. But these before us are either the children of the former or the wretched remains of those very men whom we subdued in Italy, and who have so often fled before us. Lose not then upon this occasion the glory of your general and your own. Preserve the name which you have acquired, and confirm the opinion which has hitherto prevailed, that you are never to be conquered.”

When the generals had thus on both sides harangued their troops, and the Numidian cavalry for some time had been engaged in skirmishing against each other, all things being now ready, Hannibal ordered the elephants to be led against the enemy. But the noise of the horns and trumpets, sounding together on every side, so affrighted some of these beasts that they turned back with violence against their own Numidians, and threw them into such disorder that Masinissa dispersed without much difficulty that whole body of cavalry which was on the left of the Carthaginian army. The rest of the elephants, encountering with the light-armed forces of the Romans in the space that was between the armies, suffered much in the conflict, and made great havoc also among the enemy; till at last, having lost all courage, some of them took their way through the intervals of the Roman army, which afforded an open and safe passage for them, as Scipio wisely had foreseen; and the rest, directing their course to the right, were chased by darts from the cavalry, till they were driven quite out of the field. But as they occasioned likewise some disorder upon their own right wing in their flight, Lælius also seized that moment to fall upon the Carthaginian cavalry; and having forced them to turn their backs, he followed closely after them, while Masinissa, on his side, was pursuing the Numidian cavalry with no less ardour.

And now the heavy-armed forces on both sides advanced to action with a slow and steady pace, those troops alone excepted which had returned with Hannibal from Italy, and which remained still in the station in which they at first were placed. As soon as they were near, the Romans, shouting all together, according to their custom, and rattling their swords against their bucklers, threw themselves upon the enemy. On the other side, the Carthaginian mercenaries advanced to the charge with confused and undistinguishable cries. For as they had been drawn together, as we have said, from different countries, there was not among them, as the poet expresses it (Iliad, IV, 437):

“One voice, one language found; But sounds discordant as their various tribes.”

In this first onset, as the combatants were so closely joined that they were unable to make use of their spears, or even of their swords, and maintained the action hand to hand and man to man, the mercenaries, by their boldness and dexterity, obtained at first the advantage, and wounded many of the Romans; but the latter, assisted by the excellence of their disposition and the nature of their arms, pressed forward and still gained ground, being supported by the rest of their own army, who followed and encouraged them from behind.

The mercenaries, on the other hand, were neither followed nor supported. For the Carthaginians that were behind them came not near to assist them in the action, but stood like men who had lost all courage. At last, therefore, the strangers turned their backs; and, thinking themselves manifestly to have been deserted by their own friends, they fell, as they retired, upon the Carthaginians that were behind, and killed them. The latter, however, fell not without a brave and vigorous defence; for, being thus unexpectedly attacked, and compelled to fight both with their own mercenaries and the Romans, they exerted their utmost efforts; and engaging with a frantic and disordered rage, made a promiscuous slaughter of friends and enemies. Amidst this confusion, the Hastati also were so pressed that they were forced to break their ranks. But the leaders of the principes, perceiving the disorder, brought up their troops close behind to support them; so that, in the end, the greatest part of the Carthaginians and the mercenaries were destroyed in the place, partly by themselves and partly by the Hastati. Hannibal would not suffer the rest that escaped to be received into the third line towards which they fled, but ordered the foremost ranks to point their spears against them as they approached. They were forced, therefore, to retire along the wings into the open plain.

As the whole ground that was between the forces that now remained was covered with blood and slaughter and dead bodies, the Roman general was in no small degree perplexed, being apprehensive that this obstacle would prevent him from obtaining a complete and perfect victory. For it seemed to be no easy thing to lead on the troops, without breaking their ranks, over bleeding and slippery carcasses, thrown one upon another, and over arms which were scattered in confusion, and preposterously intermingled with the heaps of the dead. Having ordered the wounded, however, to be carried into the rear of the army, he called back the Hastati from the pursuit, and drew them up in order, as they returned, in the forepart of the ground upon which the action had passed, and the opposite to the centre of the enemy. He then commanded the principes and the Triarii to close their ranks, to form a wing on either side, and to advance over the dead. And when these troops, having surmounted all the intermediate obstacles, were come into the same line, with the Hastati, the action was then begun on both sides with the greatest eagerness and ardour. As the numbers were nearly equal, as the sentiments, the courage, and the arms on both sides were the same, the battle remained for a long time doubtful; for so obstinate was the contention that the men all fell in the place in which they fought. But Lælius and Masinissa, returning back from the pursuit of the routed cavalry, arrived most providentially in the very moment in which their assistance was chiefly wanted, and fell upon the rear of Hannibal. The greatest part, therefore, of his troops were now slaughtered in their ranks; and among those that fled, a very small number only were able to escape, as they were followed closely by the cavalry through an open country. Above fifteen hundred of the Romans fell in the action; but on the side of the Carthaginians, more than twenty thousand were killed, and almost an equal number taken prisoners. Such was the battle between Hannibal and Scipio,--the battle which gave to the Romans the sovereignty of the world.

When the action was ended, Publius, after he had for some time pursued those that fled, and pillaged the camp of the Carthaginians, returned back to his own camp. Hannibal, with a small number of horsemen, continued his retreat without stopping, and arrived safe at Adrumetum, having performed, upon this occasion, all that was possible to be done by a brave and experienced general. For first, he entered into a conference with his enemy, and endeavoured by himself alone to terminate the dispute. Nor was this any dishonour to his former victories, but showed only that he was diffident of fortune and willing to secure himself against the strange and unexpected accidents which happen in war. In the battle afterwards, so well had he disposed things for the action, that no general, using even the same arms and the same order of battle as the Romans, could have engaged them with greater advantage.

The order of the Romans in battle is very difficult to be broken, because the whole army in general, as well as each particular body, is ready always to present a front to their enemies on which side soever they appear. For the cohorts by a single movement turn themselves together as the occasion requires towards the side from whence the attack is made. Add to this that their arms also are well contrived both for protection and offence, their bucklers being large in size, and their swords strong, and not easily injured by the stroke. Upon these accounts, they are very terrible in action, and are not to be conquered without great difficulty. But Hannibal opposed to each of these advantages the most effectual obstacles that it was possible for reason to contrive. He had collected together a great number of elephants, and stationed them in the front of his army, that they might disturb the order of the enemy and disperse their ranks. By posting the mercenaries in the first line, and the Carthaginians afterwards in a line behind them, he hoped to disable the Romans by fatigue before the battle should be brought to the last decision, and render their swords useless by continual slaughter. As he had thus placed the Carthaginians also between two lines, he compelled them to stand, and, as the poet has said (Iliad, IV, 430):

“Forced them by strong necessity to fight, However loth.”

In the last place he drew up the bravest and the firmest of his troops at a distance from the rest; that, observing from afar the progress of the action, and possessing their whole strength as well as their courage entire, they might seize the most favorable moment, and fall with vigour upon the enemy. If therefore, when he had thus employed all possible precautions to secure the victory, he was now for the first time conquered, he may very well be pardoned. For fortune sometimes counteracts the designs of valiant men. Sometimes again, according to the proverb,

“A brave man by a braver is subdued.”

And this indeed it was which must be allowed to have happened upon the present occasion.

TERMS DICTATED TO CARTHAGE; SCIPIO’S TRIUMPH

When men, in lamenting the wretchedness of their fortunes, exceed in their actions all the customary forms of grief, if their behaviour seems to be the effect of genuine passion, and to arise only from the greatness of their calamities, we are all ready to be moved by the strangeness of the sight, and can neither see nor hear them without commiserating their condition. But if these appearances are feigned, and assumed only with an intention to deceive, instead of compassion, they excite indignation and disgust. And this was now what happened with respect to the Carthaginian ambassadors. Publius told them in few words: That with regard to themselves, they had clearly no pretensions to be treated with gentleness or favour, since by their own acknowledgment they had at first begun the war against the Romans, by attacking Saguntum in contempt of treaty; and now lately again had violated the articles of a convention which they had ratified in writing, and bound themselves by oaths to observe. That the Romans, however, as well upon their own account as in consideration also of the common condition and fortune of humanity, had resolved to display towards them upon this occasion a generous clemency. That such indeed it must appear to themselves to be, if they would view all circumstances in a proper light, for since fortune having first precluded them by the means of their own perfidious conduct, from every claim to mercy or to pardon, had now thrown them wholly into the power of their enemies, no hardships which they should be forced to suffer, no conditions which should be imposed, no concessions which should be exacted from them, could be considered as rigorous or severe; but rather it must appear to be a matter of astonishment if any article of favour should be yielded to them. After this discourse he recited first the conditions of indulgence which he was willing to grant, and afterwards those of rigour, to which they were required to submit. The terms which he proposed to them were these:

That they should retain all the cities which they held in Africa before the beginning of the last war which they had made against the Romans; and all the lands likewise which they had anciently possessed, together with the cattle, the men, and the goods that were upon them. That from the present day all hostilities should cease. That they should be governed by their own laws and customs, and not receive any garrison from the Romans. Such were the articles of favour; the others, of a contrary kind, were these:

That the Carthaginians should restore all that they had taken unjustly from the Romans during the continuance of the truce. That they should send back all the prisoners and deserters, that had at any time fallen into their hands. That they should deliver up all their long vessels, ten triremes only excepted; and likewise their elephants. That they should not make war at any time upon any state out of Africa, nor upon any in Africa, without the consent of the Romans. That they should restore to King Masinissa the houses, lands, and cities, and everything besides that had belonged to him, or to his ancestors within the limits which should hereafter be declared. That they should furnish the Roman army with corn sufficient for three months, and pay also the stipends of the troops, till an answer should be received from Rome confirming the conditions of the treaty. That they should pay ten thousand talents of silver in the course of fifty years, bringing two hundred Euboic talents every year. That, as a security for their fidelity, they should give a hundred hostages which should be chosen by the Roman general out of all their youth, between the ages of fourteen and of thirty years.

As soon as Publius had finished the recital of these articles, the ambassadors returned in haste to Carthage, and reported the terms that were proposed. Upon this occasion, when one of the senators was going to object to the conditions and had begun to speak, Hannibal, it is said, stepped forward, and taking hold of the man, dragged him down from his seat. And, when the rest of the senate appeared to be much displeased at an action so injurious to the customs of that assembly, he again stood up and said, That he might well be excused, if his ignorance had led him to offend against any of their established forms. That they knew that he had left his country when he was only nine years old and had now returned to it again at the age of more than forty-five. He entreated them, therefore, not so much to consider whether he had violated any custom, as whether he had been moved by a real concern for the distressed condition of his country. That what he had felt upon that account was indeed the true cause of his offence. For that it appeared to him to be a most astonishing thing, and altogether preposterous, that any Carthaginian, not ignorant of all which their state in general, as well as particular men, had designed against the Romans, should not be ready to worship his good fortune, when, having fallen into their power, he now found himself treated by them with so great clemency. That if the Carthaginians had been asked but a few days before what their country must expect to suffer if they should be conquered by the Romans, they would not have been able to make any answer, so great, so extensive were the calamities which were then in prospect. He begged therefore that they would not now bring the conditions into any debate, but admit them with unanimous consent; offering sacrifices at the same time to the gods, and joining all together in their prayers, that the treaty might be ratified by the Roman people. This advice appeared to be so sensible and so well suited to the present exigency, that the senate resolved to consent to a peace upon the terms which have been mentioned, and immediately sent away some ambassadors to conclude the treaty.

[Sidenote: [201 B.C.]]

Not long after this time [in the beginning of the year 201 B.C.], Publius Scipio returned to Rome from Africa. As the greatness of his actions had raised in men a very high and general expectation, he was surrounded by vast crowds upon his entrance and received by the people with the greatest marks of favour. Nor was this only reasonable, but an act also of necessary duty. For they who not long before had not so much as dared to hope that Hannibal ever could be driven out of Italy, or the danger be removed from their own persons and their families, now saw themselves not only freed from apprehension of any present evils, but established also in a lasting and firm security by the entire conquest of their enemies. Upon this occasion, therefore, they set no bounds to their joy. On the day likewise in which he entered the city in triumph, as the objects that were viewed in the procession represented most clearly to the senses of the people the dangers from which they had escaped, they stood as in an ecstasy of passion, pouring out thanks to the gods, and acknowledgments to the author of so great a deliverance. Among the rest of the prisoners Syphax also, the Masæsylian king, was led along a captive in the procession; and after some time he died in prison. When the solemnity of the triumph was finished, there was afterwards in Rome, during many days a continual succession of games and spectacles, the expense of which was defrayed by Scipio with a generosity which was worthy of him.[c]

AN ESTIMATE OF HANNIBAL

[Sidenote: [201-202 B.C.]]

Scipio’s great antagonist lived a good many years after the battle of Zama, finally dying in exile, as we shall see. But his career as the foremost man of his time practically terminated with his defeat at Zama, and we may fitly pause for a moment here to attempt an estimate of his character and influence. One of the most recent historians of the Punic Wars, Dr. Fuchs, thus characterises the greatest of Carthaginians:

Hannibal doubtless stands in the first rank of warrior heroes. Many indeed would, and not without justice, give him the first place. Certainly Alexander conquered the enormous kingdom which overspread the whole of Asia Major and once stretched its arm over Europe and Africa; but the feet of this colossus were of clay and it was long known to the world that its power was not in proportion to its size. Seventy years before, a prince of the reigning house conceived the valiant idea of attacking it with ten thousand Greek heavy-armed soldiers, and Agesilaus had the bold design of piercing the heart of the giant with eight thousand men. Alexander’s father not only bequeathed him the means of carrying out this great plan, but left him a powerful peasant class, a nobility ready for service, well-ordered finances, and the majesty of the royal name.

Cæsar and Napoleon also excited the admiration of their times. The former traversed three parts of the world with his victorious legions, and the latter shook to the foundation the whole of Europe and her constitutions. Less fortunate than the royal heir, Agesilaus, they were not only the leaders but the creators of their armies. But the supremacy of the might environing the Roman government, and the power of the French consulate and imperialism were due to their being founded on law. Thus having full and free scope, it cheerfully sacrificed the prevalent enthusiasm for young liberty, and enthusiasm never weighs what it gives. The strength of the enemy in the first case was weak in that it was founded on a decadent system, the unity of leadership had been destroyed by the arrogance of the high-born Romans who reaped but did not sow; and in the latter case, the art of war was divorced from nature and made as pedantic as the whole trend of the time.

It was not so easy for Hannibal. He also had an inheritance--the inheritance of a resemblance to his great father, which gained him the commander’s staff. Hannibal had made too great an impression upon the minds of the Carthaginian mercenaries for them to withhold the leadership from the son on the threshold of manhood, who bore the features of his father. But flattering as this choice was to the father, it was fraught with danger to the son. It certainly put him at the head of the army, but it did not endow him with the authority which hedges a royal heir or one empowered by government to hold a high position in the state; he was placed in the difficult situation of either compensating for this drawback by his own personality or gradually becoming the tool of a licentious soldiery.

This danger was increased by the character of the troops which chose him, whose will was undirected by the moral force of patriotism, and uninspired with the desire for freedom; they were brought together only by a common desire for loot. But Hannibal succeeded by his own force of character in giving a moral turn to this mass, in disciplining them, and imbuing them with the spirit of military honour. He not only dared to impose the greatest fatigue upon the troops, but always remained their master; and even in the supreme effort of crossing the Alps not a sound of complaint or cowardice is recorded in history--and such a difficult march is an infallible test of military discipline. Hannibal, therefore, proved himself to be an incomparable leader of men and performed a task which neither Alexander, Cæsar, nor Napoleon could have accomplished. He surpasses them in this deed, high as they may stand in the estimation of history.[56]

And Hannibal was not favoured by fate in death. Alexander was right in envying the heroes of antiquity because they had in Homer a recorder of their greatness. For every heroic deed lies dead and is belittled and made of no account if there be no clever pen inspired by enthusiasm to raise it to its fitting place of greatness. Alexander has found grateful pens which have acquainted the astonished world with his deeds; Cæsar himself gave to posterity an account of his campaigns with incomparable clearness and remarkable simplicity; and our own military era calls Napoleon the professor of the field of war. But Hannibal’s portrait has been given only by his enemies. However, try as they may to call wisdom cunning, and strong measures, necessitated by war, cruelty, they cannot cast down this colossal figure, deface as they may the regularity of its features. Clouds may envelop the contour of a great mountain, but its summit shows its height.[d]

FOOTNOTES

[56] [It is in fact impossible to say what Cæsar or Napoleon could or could not have done, had either been in Hannibal’s place. Most modern estimates of Hannibal are favourable; cf. especially R. B. Smith.[e]]

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