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new allies, were encouraged to extend their views to Africa itself. Syphax, at this time king of a part of Numidia, had suddenly commenced a war with the Carthaginians: to him they sent three centurions as ambassadors, to form a treaty of frendship and alliance, and to assure him, that, if he continued to prosecute the war against the Carthaginians, the Roman senate and people would be thankful for the service, and would use their best endeavours to repay the kindness afterwards to his entire satisfaction. This embassy was very acceptable to the barbarian: he entered into conversation with the ambassadors on the art of war; and when he heard the discourses of those experienced veterans, and compared his own practice with such a regular system of discipline, he became sensible of his ignorance in many particulars. Then he requested, as the first instance of that favour, which he might expect from good and faithful allies, that "two of them might carry back to their commanders the result of their embassy, and the other remain with him as his instructor in military knowledge; adding that the people of Numidia were quite unacquainted with the method of fighting on foot, and were useful only on horseback: that this was the mode practiced by their ancestors since their first existence as a nation, and to the same had the present generation been accustomed since their childhood. That he had to deal with an enemy whose chief confidence lay in the power of their infantry; and that, therefore, if he expected to put himself on an equality with them in point of firm strength, he must procure a body of foot soldiers to oppose theirs. That his dominions abounded with numbers of men fit for the purpose, but that he was totally ignorant of the proper method of arming, training, and marshalling them; and they were in every respect awkward and unmanageable, like a mere mob collected by chance." The ambassadors answered, that they would, at the present, comply with his desire, provided he gave them an assurance that he would send the person back, in

case their commanders should disapprove of what they had done. The name of him who remained with the king was Quintus Statorius. With the two centurions, the Numidian sent into Spain ambassadors on his part, to receive the ratification of the convention from the Roman generals; and he charged them, after they should have executed this commission, to persuade the Numidians, who acted as auxiliaries in the Carthaginian garrisons, to come over to the other side. Satorius, finding abundance of young men, raised an army of infantry for the king, and forming them into distinct bodies, according to the Roman method, taught them, in taking their posts and performing their several evolutions, to follow their standards and keep their ranks; and he so inured them to the practice of military works, and other duties of soldiers, that, in a short time, the king placed not more confidence in his cavalry than in his infantry, and, even in a pitched battle, on a level plain, he defeated an army of Carthaginians. The arrival of the king's ambassadors was productive of great advantages to the Romans in Spain, for, as soon as it was known, the Numidians began to come over in great numbers from the enemy. In this manner did friendship commence between the Romans and Syphax. Of which transaction, as soon as the Carthaginians got notice, they instantly despatched ambassadors to Gala, who reigned in the other part of Numidia, over the nation called Massylians.

XLIX. Gala had a son named Masinissa, at that time only seventeen years old, but endowed with such talents as, even then, afforded strong presumption that he would leave the kingdom more extensive and opulent than when he received it. The ambassadors represented, that, " since Syphax had united himself with the Romans, for the purpose of being enabled, by their assistance, to exert greater force against the other kings and natives of Africa, it would be the interest of Gala to enter into alliance, as soon as possible, with the Carthaginians, on the other side; that, before Syphax passed over VOL. III.-Hh

into Spain, or the Romans into Africa, it would be very practicable to overpower the former, who had, as yet, gained no advantage from his connexion with Rome, except the name of it. Gala was easily persuaded to take part in the war, especially as his son earnestly solicited the command of the armies; and, in conjunction with the legions of the Carthaginians, he totally defeated Syphax in a great battle, in which, as we are told, thirty thousand men were slain. Syphax fled from the field with a few horsemen, and took refuge among the Maurusian Numidians, who inhabit the remotest coast of the ocean, opposite to Gades. Here the barbarians, attracted by his fame, flocked to him from all sides, in such numbers, that he was soon at the head of a very great army. In order to prevent his carrying this force into Spain, from which he was separated only by a narrow streight, Masinissa, with his victorious troops, came up with him; and there, by his own strength, without any aid from the Carthaginians, he maintained the war against Syphax with great glory. In Spain nothing memorable was performed, except that the Roman generals brought over to their side the youth of Celtiberia, granting them the same pay which they had stipulated with the Carthaginians, and sending above three hundred Spaniards of the highest distinction into Italy, to endeavour to draw off their countrymen, who served as auxiliaries in Hannibal's army. The only incident which occurred in Spain remarkable enough to deserve being recorded, was, that the Celtiberians, in this year, were the first mercenary troops ever entertained in the Roman armies.

THE

HISTORY OF ROME.

BOOK XXV.

Publius Cornelius Scipio, afterwards called Africanus, elected ædile before he had attained the age required by the law. The citadel of Tarentum, in which the Roman garrison had taken refuge, betrayed to Hannibal. Games instituted in honour of Apollo, called Apollinarian. Quintus Ful. vius and Appius Claudius, consuls, defeat Hanno the Carthaginian general. Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus betrayed by a Lucanian to Mago, and slain. Centenius Penula, who had been a centurion, asks the senate for the command of an army, promising to engage and vanquish Hannibal; is cut off with eight thousand men. Cneius Fulvius engages Hannibal, and is beaten, with the loss of sixteen thousand men slain; he himself escapes with only two hundred horsemen. Quintus Fulvius and Appius Claudius, consuls, lay siege to Capua. Syracuse taken by Claudius Marcellus, after a siege of three years. In the tumult occasioned by taking the city, Archimedes is killed, while intently occupied upon some figures which he had drawn in the sand. Publius and Cornelius Scipio, after having performed many eminent services in Spain, are slain, together with nearly the whole of their armies, eight years after their arrival in that country; and the possession of that province would have been entirely lost, but for the valour and activity of Lucius Marcius, a Roman knight, who, collecting the scattered remains of the vanquished armies, utterly defeats the enemy, storming their two camps, killing thirty-seven thousand of them, and taking eighteen hundred, together with an immense booty.

I. HANNIBAL passed the summer, during which these events took place in Africa and Spain, in the ter- Y.R. 539. ritory of Tarentum, in continual expectation of B.C. 213. having that city betrayed into his hands. Meanwhile some

inconsiderable towns of that district, with others belonging to the Sallentines, revolted to him. At the same time, of the twelve Bruttian States which had, a year or two before, gone over to the Carthaginians, the Consentians and Thurians put themselves again under the protection of the Roman people, and more of them would have done the same, had not Lucius Pomponius Veientanus, præfect of the allies, who, in consequence of several predatory expeditions in the territory of Bruttium, had acquired an appearance of a regular commander, assembled a tumultuary army, and fought a battle with Hanno. A vast number of his men were killed or taken on the occasion, but they were only an undisciplined rabble of peasants and slaves; and the least part of the loss was the præfect himself being taken among the rest; for, besides his inconsiderate rashnesss in bringing on this engagement, having been formerly a farmer of the revenue, he had, by every iniquitous practice, proved faithless and detrimental, both to the state and to the companies concerned in that business. The consul Sempronius had many slight skirmishes in Lucania, none worthy of mention, but reducing several inconsiderable towns. In proportion as the war was protracted to a greater length, and successes and disappointments produced various alterations, not only in the situations, but in the sentiments of men, superstitious observances, and these mostly introduced from abroad, gained such ground among the people in general, that it seemed as if either mankind or the deities had undergone a sudden change. And now the customed rites were disused, not only in private, and within doors, but even in the public streets, the Forum, and the Capitol. These were frequented by crowds of women sacrificing, and offering prayers to their gods, in modes hitherto unknown at Rome. A low sort of sacrificers, and soothsayers, had enslaved the people's understandings, and the number of these were increased in consequence of the great influx of the peasantry from the country, who, as

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