Fabius," he said, "when dictator, had been unable to withstand the arrogance of his master of the horse, what power or influence could a consul have; to oppose a seditious and hot-headed colleague? As to himself, he had in his former consulate, escaped the flames of popular rage, not without being scorched. He wished that all might end happily: but should any misfortune occur, he would expose his life to the weapons of the enemy, rather than to the votes of his incensed countrymen." Immediately after this conversation, as we are told, Paullus set out, escorted by the principal patricians, while the plebeians attended their own consul in a crowd more numerous than respectable. When they came into the field, and the old and new troops were intermixed, they formed two separate camps; the new one, which was likewise the smaller, was nearer to Hannibal; the old one contained the greater number, and the main strength of the army. Then Marcus Atilius, one of the consuls of the former year, wishing to be dismissed,. on account of the state of his health was sent to Rome; and the other, Geminus Servilius, was charged with the command of a Roman legion, and two thousand of the confederate infantry and cavalry, stationed in the smaller camp. Hannibal, though he saw the force of the enemy doubled, yet rejoiced exceedingly at the arrival of the consuls. For, besides that he had no part remaining of the provisions acquired by plunder from day to day, there was nothing now left within his reach, of which he could make prey: all the corn in every quarter, when it was found unsafe to keep it in the country, having been collected together into the fortified towns; so that, as was afterwards discovered, he had scarcely a quantity sufficient for ten days; and, in consequence of the scarcity, a design had been formed, among the Spaniards, of going over to the enemy, had time been allowed them to bring it to maturity.

XLI. But fortune herself concurred in administering fuel to the impatient temper and rashness of the consul; for, an

attack having been made on their plundering parties, and a tumultuary kind of engagement ensuing, occasioned rather by the voluntary exertions of the soldiers running up to the spot, than by any preconcerted design, or order, of the commanders, the Carthaginians were considerably worsted, losing a thousand seven hundred men, while there fell, of the Romans and their confederates, not more than, an hundred. However, while the victors pursued with eagerness, the consul Paullus, who held the command on that day, (for they commanded alternately,) dreading an ambuscade, obliged them to halt, though Varro expressed great indignation at it, exclaiming, that the enemy had been allowed to slip out of their hands; and that the war might have been finished, had not a stop been put to the action. Hannibal grieved not much for this loss; on the contrary, he rather believed that it would serve as a bait to ensnare the more presumptuous consul, and the soldiers, particularly the raw ones. All the circumstances of the enemy were as well known to him as his own; that the commanders were of dissimilar characters, and disunited in opinion; and that almost two-thirds of their army were raw recruits. Thinking, therefore, that he had now found both time and place convenient for a stratagem, on the following night, he led away his men, with no other encumbrance than their arms, the camp being full of their effects of all kinds, public and private: then, making them halt out of sight, behind the nearest mountains, he formed the foot in order of battle on the left, and the cavalry on the right, and conducted the baggage, as a centre line, through the interjacent valley; intending, while the enemy should be busy and encumbered in the pillaging of the camp, as if deserted by the owners, to fall upon them by surprise. Numerous fires were left in the camp, to create a belief that his intention was, by such appearances, to detain the consuls in their posts, while he should gain the advantage of time, to retreat

to the greater distance, in like manner as he had deceived Fabius the year before.

ས་

XLII. When day arrived, the Romans, on observing, first, that the advanced guards had been withdrawn, and afterwards, on a nearer approach, the extraordinary silence, were filled with surprise. Then, when they discovered plainly that the camp was deserted, they ran together in crowds to the pavilions of the consuls, informing them that the enemy had fled in such haste, as to leave the tents standing; and in order to conceal their flight, had left also a number of fires. They then, with loud clamours demanded, that orders should be given for the troops to march in pursuit; and, that they should plunder the camp in their way. Varro acted the same part as the common soldiers. Paullus repeatedly represented, that they ought to proceed with care and circumspection; and, at last, when he could no otherwise restrain their mutinous proceedings, or the leader of them, he despatched Marius Statilius, a præfect of the allies, with a troop of Lucanian horse, to procure intelligence. He rode up to the gates, and, ordering the rest to halt at the outside of the trenches, he went himself with two horsemen into the camp; and, having carefully examined every circumstance, returned and reported that there was without doubt an ambush intended; for the fires were left in that quarter which faced the enemy, the tents were open, and every thing of value left in view; and that he had seen silver thrown at random in the passages, as if to invite a pillage. The very circumstances, mentioned with the intent of repressing their ardour for booty, served to inflame it; and the soldiers, shouting aloud, that if the signal were not given, they would proceed without their leaders; they did not long want one, for Varro instantly gave the signal for marching. Paullus was desirous of checking this precipitancy, and being informed that the chickens had not given a favourable auspice, ordered that the ill omen should be reported to his colleague when he

was just leading the troops out of the gate; whereupon Varro, though heartily vexed at this, yet from the recollection of the recent disaster of Flaminius, and of the memorable overthrow of the consul Claudius at sea, in the first Punic war, was sensibly struck with religious scruples. The gods themselves on that day postponed, in a manner, rather than averted the calamity which hung over the Romans: for it luckily happened, that, while the troops refused to obey the consul's orders to return into the camp, two slaves, one belonging to a horseman of Formia, the other to one of Sidicinum, who had been taken prisoners by the Numidians, among a party of foragers, in the consulate of Servilius and Atilius, made their escape on that very day to their owners; and, being brought before the consuls, informed them, that Hannibal's whole army lay in ambush behind the nearest mountains. The seasonable arrival of these men procured obedience to the authority of the consuls, when one of them, by his immoderate pursuit of popular applause, had, through improper indulgence, forfeited people's respect for their dignity, particularly with regard to himself.

XLIII. When Hannibal perceived that the Romans, though they took some inconsiderate steps, had not carried their rashness to the full extent, the stratagem being now discovered, he returned with disappointment to his camp. In this place he could not remain, many days, by reason of the scarcity of corn, and new measures were daily in contemplation, not only among the soldiery, a multitude compounded of the refuse of all nations, but even in the mind of the general himself; for the men begun to murmur, and afterwards proceeded with open clamours to demand the arrears of their pay, and to complain at first of the dearness of provisions, at last of famine. A report too prevailed, that the mercenary soldiers, particularly those from Spain, had formed a scheme of going over to the enemy, so that Hannibal himself is said to have some times entertained thoughts

of flying into Gaul; intending to have left all the infantry behind, and, with the cavalry, to have made a hasty retreat. While these matters were in agitation, and this the disposition in the camp, he formed a resolution of removing into Apulia, where the weather was warmer, and consequently more favourable to the ripening of the harvest; and where, in proportion as he was placed at a greater distance from the enemy, the discontented would find desertion the more difficult. Accordingly he set out by night, after kindling fires as before, and leaving a few tents to keep up the appearance of a camp, in the expectation that fears of an ambush, as on the former occasion, would keep the Romans within their works. But Statilius, the Lucanian, having examined all the ground beyond the camp, and on the other side of the mountains, and bringing back an account that he had seen the enemy marching at a great distance, a consultation was held about pursuing him. Here each consul maintained the same opinion which he had ever held; but almost all the officers siding with Varro, and no one except Servilius, the consul of the former year, with Paullus, they, pursuant to the determination of the majority, set forward, under the impulse of unhappy fate, to render Cannæ for ever memorable, as a scene of disaster to the Romans. Near that town Hannibal had pitched his camp, turning the rear towards the wind called Vulturnus, which, in those plains, parched with heat, carries along with it clouds of dust. As this choice of situation was highly commodius to the men, while in camp, so was it particularly advantageous, when they were drawn up for battle; because, while the wind only blew on their backs, it would nearly blind the enemy with whom they were to fight, by carrying great quantities of dust into their faces.

XLIV. The consuls pursued the Carthaginians, taking proper care to examine the roads; when they arrived near Cannæ, and had the foe in sight, they divided their forces, as before, and fortified two camps at nearly the same dis