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These, having narrowly escaped violence from the assembled multitude, and perceiving that they would be exposed to similar danger on their return, requested of the magistrates, by whose aid they had been protected from violence, to send ships to escort them. Two triremes were assigned them, which, when they had come to the river Bagradas, whence the Roman camp could be seen, returned to Carthage.
Micipsa and his brothers retained in substance their former territory, including the districts recently wrested from the Carthaginians on the Bagradas and in Emporia; their long-cherished hope of obtaining Carthage as a capital was for ever frustrated; the senate presented them instead with the Carthaginian libraries. The Carthaginian territory as possessed by the city in its last days viz.
Utica was situated a little to the west of Carthage, at the mouth of the Mejerda or Bagradas river. It stood on a rocky promontory which ran out into the sea eastward, and partially protected its harbour.
Pliny speaks of snakes in India of such a size as to be capable of swallowing stags and bulls; and Valerius Maximus, quoting a lost portion of Pliny's work, narrates the alarm into which the troops under Regulus were thrown by a serpent which had its lair on the banks of the river Bagradas, between Utica and Carthage, and which intercepted the passage to the river.
Massinissa, however, was prudent enough not to take arms now, but to submit himself unconditionally to the decision of the Romans respecting the disputed territory on the Bagradas; and thus the Romans could assert with some plausibility that the Carthaginian preparations must have been directed against them, and could insist on the immediate dismissal of the army and destruction of the naval stores.
Massinissa, however, was prudent enough not to take arms now, but to submit himself unconditionally to the decision of the Romans respecting the disputed territory on the Bagradas; and thus the Romans could assert with some plausibility that the Carthaginian preparations must have been directed against them, and could insist on the immediate dismissal of the army and destruction of the naval stores.
We have followed the transformation of the outward relations of Rome and the Romano-Hellenic world generally in its leading outlines, from the battle of Pydna to the period of the Gracchi, from the Tagus and the Bagradas to the Nile and the Euphrates.
The nature of the country rendered it impossible for him to enter the defiles of the Bagradas from the north-west, while it was equally impossible for him to march direct from Vaga to Sicca, for the road was blocked by the mountains which intervened on his south-eastern side.
His cavalry, which had gone forward in the evening, actually succeeded in surprising the corps of Saburra on the Bagradas during the night and inflicting much damage upon it; and on the news of this victory Curio hastened the march of the infantry, in order by their means to complete the defeat Soon they perceived on the last slopes of the heights that sank towards the Bagradas the corps of Saburra, which was skirmishing with the Roman horsemen; the legions coming up helped to drive it completely down into the plain.
And he overtook them at the city of Membresa, three hundred and fifty stades distant from Carthage. There both armies made camp and prepared themselves for battle, the forces of Belisarius making their entrenchment at the River Bagradas, and the others in a high and difficult position. For neither of them saw fit to enter the city, since it was without walls.
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