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The earliest treaty, according to Polybius himself, was dated about 250 years before the war; and in this treaty the voyages undertaken by the Romans on account of trade to Africa, Sardinia, and that part of Sicily at that time possessed by the Carthaginians, are expressly mentioned and regulated.
The march was conducted silently for some distance, but no sooner did the soldiers break out into shrieks and yells than the oxen grew frightened and wildly rushed hither and thither. The Romans in the defile below heard the shouts and saw the bobbing lights, but could not tell what they meant. Leaving their post, the whole four thousand climbed the ridge, where they found the Carthaginians.
Then he let fall the cup and related his history. He was called Spendius. The Carthaginians had taken him in the battle of Aeginusae, and he thanked the Mercenaries once more in Greek, Ligurian and Punic; he kissed their hands; finally, he congratulated them on the banquet, while expressing his surprise at not perceiving the cups of the Sacred Legion.
He was one who, even at first sight, won all hearts by his lofty and noble expression, by the kindness and sincerity which his face expressed. The Carthaginians, as a race, were short, but Hannibal was very tall, and his great width of shoulders testified to his immense strength. The beauty of the Carthaginian race was proverbial, but even among them he was remarkable.
The people of Utica, thus beset on all sides with so formidable a force, placed all their hopes in the Carthaginians, and the Carthaginians in the chance there was that Hasdrubal could induce Syphax to take arms. But all their movements were made too slowly for the anxiety felt by those who were in want of assistance.
Here the battle was more bloody as the combatants had less room to move, from the narrowness of the place in which they fought. The prisoners too assisted; for snatching up swords in the confusion, and forming themselves into a body, they slew the Carthaginians in the rear and prevented their flight.
Between the Carthaginian and Roman camps lay a plain; and overhanging the left wing of the Carthaginians and the right of the Romans were some naked hills, which were not objects of suspicion to either party, as they had no wood upon them, nor any hiding-places for an ambuscade.
And even had you got the better of all these, would you bear arms in conjunction with the Carthaginians against your country, against your countrymen? Would you wish that Africa should rule Italy, and Carthage the city of Rome? If so, for what offence on the part of your country?
Hardly had the Carthaginians arrived in sight of the Roman camp at Placentia, when a large body of the Gaulish contingent revolted from Scipio, and contrived, though much reduced in numbers, to cut their way through in spite of all opposition, and join Hannibal.
His contemporaries tried to cast stains of various sorts on his character; the Romans charged him with cruelty, the Carthaginians with covetousness; and it is true that he hated as only Oriental natures know how to hate, and that a general who never fell short of money and stores can hardly have been other than covetous.
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