ed redeeming themselves at their own cost; and that those who had not the money at present should receive a loan from the public coffer, and security given to the people by their sureties and properties; Titus Manlius Torquatus, a man of primitive, and as some considered, over-rigorous severity, being asked his opinion, is reported thus to have spoken: "Had the deputies confined themselves to making a request, in behalf of those who are in the hands of the enemy, that they might be ransomed, I should have briefly given my opinion, without inveighing against any one. For what else would have been necessary but to admonish you that you ought to adhere to the custom handed down from your ancestors, a precedent indispensable to military discipline? But now, since they have almost boasted of having surrendered themselves to the enemy, and have claimed to be preferred, not only to those who were captured by the enemy in the field, but to those also who came to Venusia and Canusium, and even to the consul Terentius himself, I will not suffer you to remain in ignorance of things which were done there. And I could wish that what I am about to bring before you were stated at Canusium, before the army itself, the best witness of every man's cowardice or valor; or at least that one person, Publius Sempronius, were here, whom had they followed as their leader, they would this day have been soldiers in the Roman camp, and not prisoners in the power of the enemy. But though the enemy was fatigued with fighting, and engaged in rejoicing for their victory, and had, the greater part of them, retired into their camp, and they had the night at their disposal for making a sally, and, as they were seven thousand armed troops, might have forced their way through the troops of the enemy, however closely arrayed, yet they neither of themselves attempted to do this, nor were willing to follow another. Throughout nearly the whole night Sempronius ceased not to admonish and exhort them, while but few of the enemy were about the camp, while there was stillness and quiet, while the night would conceal their design, that they would follow him; that before day-break they might reach places of security, the cities of their allies. If, as Publius Decius, the military tribune in Samnium, said, within the memory of our

grandfathers; if he had said, as Calpurnius Flamma, in the first Punic war, when we were youths, said to the three hundred volunteers, when he was leading them to seize upon an eminence situated in the midst of the enemy: LET US DIE, SOLDIERS, AND BY OUR DEATHS RESCUE THE SURROUNDED LEGIONS FROM AMBUSCADE-if Publius Sempronius had said thus, he would neither have considered you as Romans nor men, had no one stood forward as his companion in so valorous an attempt. He points out to you the road that leads not to glory more than to safety; he restores you to your country, your parents, your wives and children. Do you want courage to effect your preservation? What would you do if you had to die for your country? Fifty thousand of your countrymen and allies on that very day lay around you slain. If so many examples of courage did not move you, nothing ever will. If so great a carnage did not make life less dear, none ever will. While in freedom and safety, show your affection for your country; nay, rather do so while it is your country, and you its citizens. Too late you now endeavor to evince your regard for her when degraded, disfranchised from the rights of citizens, and become the slaves of the Carthaginians. Shall you return by purchase to that degree which you have forfeited by cowardice and neglect? You did not listen to Sempronius, your countryman, when he bid you take arms and follow him; but a little after you listened to Hannibal, when he ordered your arms to be surrendered and your camp betrayed. But why do I charge those men with cowardice, when I might tax them with villainy? They not only refused to follow him who gave them good advice, but endeavored to oppose and hold him back, had not some men of the greatest bravery, drawing their swords, removed the cowards. Publius Sempronius, I say, was obliged to force his way through a band of his countrymen before he burst through the enemy's troops. Can our country regret such citizens as these, whom if all the rest resembled, she would not have one citizen of all those who fought at Canna? Out of seven thousand armed men, there were six hundred who had courage to force their way, who returned to their country free and in arms; nor did forty thousand of the enemy successfully VOL. II.-7

oppose them. How safe, think you, would a passage have been for nearly two legions? Then you would have had this day at Canusium, conscript fathers, twenty thousand bold and faithful. But now how can these men be called faithful and good citizens (for they do not even call themselves brave), except any man suppose that they showed themselves such when they opposed those who were desirous of forcing their way through the enemy? or, unless any man can suppose that they do not envy those men their safety and glory acquired by valor, when they must know that their timidity and cowardice were the cause of their ignominious servitude? Skulking in their tents, they preferred to wait for the light and the enemy together, when they had an opportunity of sallying forth during the silence of the night. But though they had not courage to sally forth from the camp, had they courage to defend it strenuously? Having endured a siege for several days and nights, did they protect their rampart by their arms, and themselves by their rampart? At length, having dared and suffered every extremity, every support of life being gone, their strength exhausted with famine, and unable to hold their arms, were they subdued by the necessities of nature rather than by arms? At sunrise, the enemy approached the rampart: before the second hour, without hazarding any contest, they delivered up their arms and themselves. Here is their military service for you during two days. When they ought to have stood firm in array and fight on, then they fled back into their camp; when they ought to have fought before their rampart, they delivered up their camp: good for nothing, either in the field or the camp. I redeem you? When you ought to sally from the camp, you linger and hesitate; and when you ought to stay and protect your camp in arms, you surrender the camp, your arms, and yourselves to the enemy. I am of opinion, conscript fathers, that these men should no more be ransomed than that those should be surrendered to Hannibal who sallied from the camp through the midst of the enemy and, with the most distinguished courage, restored themselves to their country."

61. After Manlius had thus spoken, notwithstanding the captives were related to many even of the Senators, be

sides the practice of the state, which had never shown favor to captives, even from the remotest times, the sum of money also influenced them, for they were neither willing to drain the treasury, a large sum of money having been already issued for buying and arming slaves to serve in the war, nor to enrich Hannibal, who, according to report, was particularly in want of this very thing. The sad reply, that the captives would not be ransomed, being delivered, and fresh grief being added to the former on account of the loss of so many citizens, the people accompanied the deputies to the gate with copious tears and lamentations. One of them went home, because he had evaded his oath by artfully returning to the camp. But when this was known and laid before the Senate, they all resolved that he should be apprehended, and conveyed to Hannibal by guards furnished by the state. There is another account respecting the prisoners, that ten came first, and that, the Senate hesitating whether they should be admitted into the city or not, they were admitted, on the understanding that they should not have an audience of the Senate. That when these staid longer than the expectation of all, three more came-Scribonius, Calpurnius, and Manlius. That then at length a tribune of the people, a relation of Scribonius, laid before the Senate the redemption of the captives, and that they resolved that they should not be ransomed. That the three last deputies returned to Hannibal, and the ten former remained, because they had evaded their oath, having returned to Hannibal after having set out, under pretense of learning afresh the names of the captives. That a violent contest took place in the Senate on the question of surrendering them, and that those who thought they ought to be surrendered were beaten by a few votes, but that they were so branded by every kind of stigma and ignominy by the ensuing censors that some of them immediately put themselves to death, and the rest, for all their life afterwards, not only shunned the Forum, but almost the light and publicity. You can more easily wonder that authors differ so much than determine what is the truth. How much greater this disaster was than any preceding, even this is a proof, that such of the allies as had stood firm till that day then began to wa

ver, for no other cause certainly but that they despaired of the empire. The people who revolted to the Carthaginians were these: the Atellani, Calatini, the Hirpini, some of the Apulians, the Samnites, except the Pentrians, all the Bruttians, and the Lucanians. Besides these, the Surrentinians, and almost the whole coast possessed by the Greeks, the people of Tarentum, Metapontum, Croton, the Locrians, and all Cisalpine Gaul. Yet not even these losses and defections of their allies so shook the firmness of the Romans that any mention of peace was made among them, either before the arrival of the consul at Rome or after he came thither, and renewed the memory of the calamity they had suffered. At which very juncture, such was the magnanimity of the state, that the consul, as he returned after so severe a defeat, of which he himself was the principal cause, was met in crowds of all ranks of citizens, and thanks bestowed because he had not despaired of the republic, in whose case, had he been a Carthaginian commander, no species of punishment would have been spared.

BOOK XXIII.

The Campanians revolt to Hannibal. Mago is sent to Carthage to announce the victory of Cannæ. Hanno advises the Carthaginian Senate to make peace with the Romans, but is overborne by the Barcine faction. Claudius Marcellus the prætor defeats Hannibal at Nola. Hannibal's army is enervated in mind and body by luxurious living at Capua. Casilinum is besieged by the Carthaginians, and the inhabitants reduced to the last extremity of famine. A hundred and ninetyseven Senators elected from the equestrian order. Lucius Postumius is, with his army, cut off by the Gauls. Cneius and Publius Scipio defeat Hasdrubal in Spain, and gain possession of that country. The remains of the army, defeated at Cannæ, are sent off to Sicily, there to remain until the termination of the war. An alliance is formed between Philip, king of Macedon, and Hannibal. Sempronius Gracchus defeats the Campanians. Successes of Titus Manlius in Sardinia: he takes Hasdrubal the general, Mago, and Hanno prisoners. Claudius Marcellus again defeats the army of Hannibal at Nola, and the hopes of the Romans are revived as to the results of the war.

1. AFTER the battle of Cannæ, Hannibal, having captured and plundered the Roman camp, had immediately removed from Apulia into Samnium; invited into the ter