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A moment more and the Saguntines, having destroyed every engine of war, reached the camp. The chieftain was snarling curses and threats against his brother and Maherbal who did not come up with the reserves to stay the torrent of the rout. He saw the troops issuing from the camp hurriedly, but on foot and in disorder, with the precipitation produced by an unexpected event.
Hannibal, as if reading Actæon's thought, smiled savagely while his eyes swept the work of destruction wrought by his army outside the city. "You find all this greatly changed, eh, Actæon?" "I see that your troops have not been idle while you were off punishing the rebels in Celtiberia." "Maherbal, my chief of cavalry, is an excellent aide.
An attack which he had made on Spoletium had proved the inadequacy of the small Carthaginian army to carry a strongly fortified town. Had he followed the advice of Maherbal, he would in all likelihood have dashed his army to pieces against the walls of Rome.
Calling Maherbal and his brother Mago, he laid before them the necessity of capturing a position on the hill, and of assaulting a portion of the immense Acropolis to attack the city from that direction, obliging it to surrender. Several days went by without resumption of hostilities on the side toward the river.
No one knows. Maherbal said yesterday that there were a hundred and twenty thousand; I believe that soon there will be a hundred and eighty thousand. Blind faith in Hannibal draws them on; they feel that with me they march to victory; perhaps their gods have told them that this is but the beginning of a series of achievements which will astound the world. Ponder over it, Asbyte!
Nearly 20,000 men were taken prisoners. The consul Paulus, the proconsul Servilius, the master of the horse Minucius, 21 military tribunes, and 60 senators lay amid the slain. On his side Hannibal lost but 5,700 men. "Send me on with the horse, general," said Maherbal, "and in five days thou shalt sup in the Capitol." But the general was wiser than the fiery captain of the horse.
The Romans pushed into the valley; the pass in their rear was secured by the Carthaginians who had lain in ambush; Hannibal's men charged from the heights, and the army of Flaminius was annihilated. Six thousand infantry cut their way through the farther pass, but these were overtaken by the horse under Maherbal and forced to yield on the following day.
Give me at least the consolation of seeing you near, of telling you what I feel. If not, why have I come to Iberia, joining my fate to yours?" The chieftain glanced around, as if fearing that someone might be listening to his conversation with the Amazon. "Fear not," said Asbyte, divining his thought. "Mago, your brother, sleeps far from here with Maherbal, the favorite captain.
The Saguntine soldiers reached the vicinity of the camp, while the unarmored citizens scattering throughout the battle field dispatched the wounded and tried to set fire to the besieging engines. They would have destroyed them all had it not been for Maherbal, Hannibal's lieutenant, who came out of the camp with some cohorts of cavalry.
He put on a short lorica of bronze scales, adjusted his helmet, selected a shield, and on leaving his tent he met Maherbal and his brother Mago, in charge of the reserves who remained in the camp. "Your legs are unprotected," said his brother. "Are you not going to cover them with greaves?" "No," replied the chieftain spiritedly.
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