decree of the senate, in order to make inquiries, what states of the Tuscans or Umbrians had, on the approach of Hasdrubal, formed schemes of revolting to him from the Romans; or who had afforded him men, provisions, or any kind of aid. Such were the transactions of that year at home and abroad. The Roman games were thrice repeated by the curule ædiles, Cneius Servilius Cæpio and Servius Cornelius Lentulus. The plebeian games also were once repeated entire by the plebeian ædiles, Manius Pomponius Matho, and Quintus Mamilius Thurinus. In the thirteenth year of the

B.C.206.

Y.R.546. Punic war, when Lucius Veturius Philo, and Quintus Cæcilius Metellus, were consuls, they were both appointed to the province of Bruttium, to conduct the war against Hannibal. The prætors then cast lots for their provinces; the business of the city fell to Marcus Cæcilius Metellus; the jurisdiction in relation to foreigners, to Quintus Mamilius; Sicily, to Caius Servilius; and Sardinia, to Tiberius Claudius. The armies were thus distributed: to one of the consuls, that which had been under Caius Claudius, the consul of the former year; to the other, that which had been under Quintus Claudius, proprætor; they consisted each of two legions. It was decreed that Marcus Livius, proconsul, whose command had been prolonged for a year, should receive two legions of volunteer slaves from Caius Terentius, proprætor in Etruria; and that Quintus Mamilius should transfer his judicial employment to his colleague, and take the command in Gaul with the army which had belonged to Lucius Porcius, proprætor; orders at the same time being given him to lay waste the lands of the Gauls, who had revolted on the approach of Hasdrubal. The protection of Sicily was given in charge to Caius Servilius, with the two legions of Cannæ, as Caius Mamilius had held it. From Sardinia, the old army which had served under Aulus Hostilius, was brought home; and the consuls levied a new legion, which Tiberius Claudius was to carry with him. Quintus

Claudius and Caius Hostilius Tubulus were continued in command for a year, that the former might hold Tarentum as his province, the latter Capua. Marcus Valerius, proconsul, who had been entrusted with the defence of the sea coasts round Sicily, was ordered to deliver thirty ships to Caius Servilius, and to return home with all the rest of the fleet.

XI. While the public was under much anxiety, on account of the great danger and importance of the war, and ever apt to refer to the gods the causes of all their successes and disappointments, accounts were propagated of a number of prodigies: that, at Tarracina, the temple of Jupiter; at Satricum, that of Mother Matuta, had been struck by lightning; the people being also greatly terrified by two snakes creeping into the former unperceived through the very door. From Antium it was reported, that ears of corn had appeared bloody to the reapers. At Cære, a pig had been littered with two heads, and a lamb yeaned which was of both sexes. It was said also, that two suns had been seen at Alba, and that light had burst forth on a sudden during the night time at Fregellæ. An ox, it was asserted, had spoken in the neighbourhood of Rome; and a profuse sweat had flowed from the altar of Neptune, in the Flaminian Circus; and also, that the temples of Ceres, Safety, and Romulus, were struck by lightning. These prodigies the consuls were ordered to expiate with the greater victims, and to perform a solemn supplication to the gods during one day; all which was strictly observed in pursuance of a decree of the senate. But what struck more terror into men's minds than all these ominous and preternatural appearances, at home or abroad, was the extinction of the fire in the temple of Vesta, and for which the vestal who had the watch for that night was whipped to death, by order of the pontiff Publius Licinius. Although this extinction was occasioned, not by the gods directing it as a portent, but by the negligence of a human being, yet it was thought proper that it should be expiated by the greater vic

tims, and that a supplication should be solemnized at the temple of Vesta. Before the consuls set out to the campaign, they received directions from the senate, to take measures to make the common people return to their lands in the country, where they might now reside in safety, as, by the favour of the gods, the war had been removed to a distance from the city of Rome, and from Latium; for it was quite inconsistent to pay more attention to the cultivation of Sicily than to that of Italy." It was, however, no easy matter to obtain a compliance with this injunction: the labourers of free condition were most of them lost in the war, slaves were scarce, the cattle had been carried off in booty, and their dwellings thrown down or burnt. Nevertheless a great number, compelled by the authority of the consuls, returned as directed. The mention of this affair had been occasioned by deputies from Placentia and Cremona, who complained that incursions were made on them by the neighbouring Gauls; that a great part of their settlers had dispersed; that their cities were thinly inhabited, and their territory waste and deserted. A charge was given to the prætor Mamilius, to protect the colonies from the enemy. The consuls, in pursuance of the decree of the senate, issued an edict, that all the citizens of Cremona and Placentia should return before a certain day to those colonies; and then, in the beginning of the spring, they set out to carry on the war. Quintus Cæcilius, consul, received his army from Caius Nero; Lucius Veturius, his from Quintus Claudius, proprætor, he filling it up with the new levies which himself had raised. They led their forces into the territory of Consentia. Here, having made great ravages, the troops, now loaded with spoil, were thrown into such confusion, in a narrow pass, by some Bruttians and Numidian spearmen, that not only that spoil, but themselves were in extreme danger. However, there was more tumult than fighting the booty was sent forward, and the legions

:

without loss made their way to places of safety. From thence they advanced against the Lucanians, which whole nation returned, without a contest, into subjection to the Roman people.

XII. No action took place during that year between them and Hannibal; for the Carthaginian, after the deep wound so lately given both to his own private, and to the public welfare, cautiously avoided throwing himself in their way; and the Romans did not choose to rouse him from his inactivity such powers did they suppose that leader possessed of, in his single person, though all things round him were falling into ruin. In truth, I know not whether he was more deserving of admiration in adversity or in prosperity; considering, that, though he carried on war for thirteen years, and that in an enemy's territory so far from home, with various success, with an army, not composed of his own countrymen, but made up of the refuse of all nations, who had neither law, nor custom, nor language in common; who were of different stature, had different garb, different arms, different rites, and almost different gods; yet he so bound them together by some common tie, that neither among themselves nor against their commander, did any sedition ever appear, although, in a hostile country, he often wanted both money to pay them, and provisions also, wants which, in the former Punic war, had occasioned many distressful scenes between the generals and their men. But, after the destruction of Hasdrubal and his army, on whom he had reposed all his hopes of victory; and when he had given up the possession of all the rest of Italy, and withdrawn into a corner of Bruttium, must it not appear wonderful to all, that no disturbance arose in his camp? For there was this afflicting circumstance in addition to all his other difficulties, that he had no hope of being able even to procure food for his soldiers, except from the lands of Bruttium; which, if they were entirely under tillage, were too small for

the support of so large an army. Besides, the war had employed a great part of the young men, and carried them away from the cultivation of the grounds; a base practice likewise prevailing through the whole nation, of making plundering excursions on every side; nor were there any remittances made him from home, where the whole attention of the public was engaged in endeavouring to keep possession of Spain, as if affairs in Italy were all in a state of prosperity. In the former, the fortune of the parties was, in one respect, the same; in another, widely different: the same so far, that the Carthaginians, being defeated in battle, and having lost their general, had been driven to the remotest coast of the country, even to the ocean; but different in this, that Spain, in the nature both of the ground and of the inhabitants, affords greater conveniences for reviving a war, not only than Italy, but than any other part of the world; and that was the reason, that although this was the first of all the provinces on the continent in which the Romans got footing, yet it was the last subdued; and that not until the present age, under the conduct and auspices of Augustus Cæsar. In this country Hasdrubal, son of Gisgo, a general of the greatest abilities and character next to the Barcine family, returning now from Gades, and being encouraged to a renewal of the war by Mago, the son of Hamilcar, armed to the number of fifty thousand foot, and four thousand five hundred horse, by levies made in the Farther Spain. In the number of his cavalry authors are pretty well agreed; of the infantry, according to some, there were seventy thousand led to the city of Silpia. There the two Carthaginian generals sat down in an extensive plain, determined not to avoid a battle.

XIII. When Scipio received the account of this bearmy ing assembled, he saw plainly, that, with the Roman legions alone, he could not oppose so great a multitude; nor without using the auxiliary troops of the barbarians, at least for the