Livy

“ When you commenced your march, from the setting to the rising sun, none of you thought it too much for you, but now when you see that by far the greater part of the way has been accomplished; the passes of the Pyrenees, which were held by most warlike tribes, surmounted; the Rhone, that mighty stream, crossed in the face of so many thousand Gauls, and the rush of its waters checked - now that you are within sight of the Alps, on the other side of which lies Italy, you have become weary and are arresting your march in the very gates of the enemy. ”

“ This is the cavalry, this the infantry with whom you are going to fight; you will not have an enemy but only the last vestiges of an enemy to meet. My only fear is that when you have fought it will appear to be the Alps that have conquered Hannibal. But perhaps it was right that it should be so, and that the gods, without any human aid, should begin and all but finish this war with a people and their general who have broken treaties, and that to us, who next to the gods have been sinned against, it should be left to complete what they began. ”

“ This motley population, excited by the news of the energetic defence of Placentia, flew to arms and went out to meet Hannibal. More like a crowd than an army they met him on his march, and as on the one side there was nothing but an undisciplined mob, and on the other a general and soldiers who had perfect confidence in each other, a small body routed as many as 35,000 men. The next day they surrendered and admitted a Carthaginian garrison within their walls. ”

“ Fortune, I am inclined to think has bound you in heavier chains and imposed upon you a sterner necessity than on your captives. You are shut in on the right hand and on the left by two seas, and you have not a single ship in which to make your escape; around you flows the Po, a greater river than the Rhone and a more rapid one; the barrier of the Alps frowns upon you behind, those Alps which you could hardly cross when your strength and vigour were unimpaired. ”

“ When the Romans, after extolling the renown and courage of the Roman people and the greatness of their dominion, asked the Gauls not to allow the Carthaginian invaders a passage through their fields and cities, such interruption and laughter broke out that the younger men were with difficulty kept quiet by the magistrates and senior members of the council. They thought it a most stupid and impudent demand to make, that the Gauls, in order to prevent the war from spreading into Italy, should turn it against themselves and expose their own lands to be ravaged instead of other people's. ”

“ On the one side there was the courage of hope, on the other the courage of despair. The Carthaginians believed that with a little effort on their part the city would be theirs; the Saguntines opposed their bodies as a shield for their fatherland now stripped of its walls; not a man relaxed his foothold for fear of letting an enemy in through the spot which he had left open. So the hotter and closer the fighting became the greater grew the number of wounded, for no missile fell ineffectively amongst the crowded ranks. ”

“ Your armies are investing Saguntum, which by the terms of the treaty they are forbidden to approach; before long the legions of Rome will invest Carthage, led by the same generals under the same divine guidance under which they avenged our breach of treaty obligations in the late war. Are you strangers to the enemy, to yourselves, to the fortunes of each nation? That worthy commander of yours refused to allow ambassadors who came from allies, on behalf of allies, to enter his camp, and set at naught the law of nations. ”

“ As soon as Hannibal heard it and saw that the fighting had slackened and that the enemy were retiring from the camp, he immediately launched his cavalry against them right and left, and sallied in person with the main strength of his infantry from the middle of the camp. Seldom has there been a more equal fight, and few would have been rendered more memorable by the mutual destruction of both armies had the daylight allowed it to be sufficiently prolonged; as it was, night put an end to a conflict which had been maintained with such determined courage. ”

“ For on that occasion it was Hannibal whose action you denounced and whose surrender you demanded, now you are seeking to extort from us a confession of guilt and insist upon obtaining instant satisfaction, as from men who admit they are in the wrong. I do not, however, consider that the question is whether the attack on Saguntum was an act of public policy or only that of a private citizen, but whether it was justified by circumstances or not. It is for us to inquire and take proceedings against a citizen when he has done anything on his own authority ”

“ All to a man demanded arms and battle, and when the lot was cast to decide who should fight, each wished that he might be the one whom Fortune should select for the combat. As each man's lot fell, he hastily seized his arms full of eagerness and exultant delight, amidst the congratulations of his comrades and danced after the custom of his country. ”

“ Here, soldiers, on this spot where you have for the first time encountered the enemy you must either conquer or die. The same Fortune which has imposed upon you the necessity of fighting also holds out rewards of victory, rewards as great as any which men are wont to solicit from the immortal gods. Even if we were only going to recover Sicily and Sardinia, possessions which were wrested from our fathers, they would be prizes ample enough to satisfy us. ”

“ After one consul had been beaten at the Ticinus the other was recalled from Sicily, and now both consuls and both consular armies had been worsted. What fresh generals, men asked, what fresh legions could be brought to the rescue? Amidst this universal panic Sempronius arrived. He had slipped through the enemy's cavalry at immense risk while they were dispersed in quest of plunder, and owed his escape rather to sheer audacity than to cleverness, for he had little hope of eluding them or of successful resistance if he failed to do so. ”

“ He instructed his cavalry to wait until they had actually entered the water and then to attack them; his forty elephants he stationed on the bank. The Carpetani together with the contingents of the Olcades and Vaccaei numbered altogether 100,000 men, an irresistible force had they been fighting on level ground. Their innate fearlessness, the confidence inspired by their numbers, their belief that the enemy's retreat was due to fear, all made them look on victory as certain, and the river as the only obstacle to it. ”

“ A fresh treaty was accordingly made by your government. Now, if no treaties have any binding force for you unless they have been made with the authority of your senate or by order of your Assembly, we, on our side, cannot possibly be bound by Hasdrubal's treaty, which he made without our knowledge. Drop all allusions to Saguntum and the Ebro, and speak out plainly what has long been secretly hatching in your minds." Then the Roman, gathering up his toga, said, "Here we bring you war and peace, take which you please." ”

“ The youthful beauty which Hasdrubal surrendered to Hannibal's father he considers he has a fair claim to ask for in return from the son. It ill becomes us, however, to habituate our youths to the lust of our commanders, by way of military training. Are we afraid that it will be too long before Hamilcar's son surveys the extravagant power and the pageant of royalty which his father assumed, and that there will be undue delay in our becoming the slaves of the despot to whose son-in-law our armies have been bequeathed as though they were his patrimony? ”

“ The loss of Sicily and Sardinia vexed the proud spirit of the man, for he felt that the cession of Sicily had been made hastily in a spirit of despair, and that Sardinia had been filched by the Romans during the troubles in Africa, who, not content with seizing it, had imposed an indemnity as well. ”

“ But we must not be infected by a sick man's lethargy. What will be gained by further delay, or rather, by wasting time? Whom are we expecting as our third consul; what fresh army are we looking for? The camp of the Carthaginians is in Italy, almost in sight of the City. They are not aiming at Sicily and Sardinia, which they lost after their defeats, nor the Spain which lies on this side the Ebro; their sole object is to drive the Romans away from their ancestral soil, from the land on which they were born. ”

“ But the Carthaginians, a veteran enemy which for three-and-twenty years had seen hard and rough service amongst the Spanish tribes, and had always been victorious, trained under a general of exceptional ability, were now crossing the Ebro fresh from the sack of a most wealthy city, and were bringing with them all those Spanish tribes, eager for the fray. They would rouse the various Gaulish tribes, who were always ready to take up arms; there would be the whole world to fight against; the battleground would be Italy; the struggle would take place before the walls of Rome. ”

“ You, therefore, will go into this battle with the exultation of victors, they with the despondency of the vanquished. They are not going to fight now because they are impelled by courage but through sheer necessity; unless indeed you suppose that, after shirking a contest when their army was at its full strength, they have gained more confidence now that they have lost two-thirds of their infantry and cavalry in their passage over the Alps, now that those who survive are fewer than those who have perished. ”

“ After riding round the place and satisfying himself from personal observation that it was capable of concealing even cavalry, Hannibal, turning to his brother Mago, said, "This will be the place for you to occupy. Pick out of our whole force of cavalry and infantry a hundred men from each arm, and bring them to me at the first watch, now it is time for food and rest." He then dismissed his staff. Presently Mago appeared with his 200 picked men. "I see here," said Hannibal, "the very flower of my army, but you must be strong in numbers as well as in courage. ”

“ You have sent to the army, as though supplying fuel to the fire, a young man who is consumed with a passion for sovereign power, and who recognises that the only way to it lies in passing his life surrounded by armed legions and perpetually stirring up fresh wars. ”

“ Still, their courage would have kept them up had it been only infantry that they were fighting against. But the light infantry, after repulsing the cavalry, were hurling their missiles on the flanks of the legions; the elephants had now come up against the centre of the Roman line, and Mago and his Numidians, as soon as it had passed their ambuscade, rose up in the rear and created a terrible disorder and panic. Yet in spite of all the dangers which surrounded them, the ranks stood firm and immovable for some time, even, contrary to all expectation, against the elephants. ”

“ Here he entrenched himself, and as the Gauls felt it would be hopeless to attack him there, the courage of his men revived, though it was tolerably certain that as many as 500 had fallen. They recommenced their march, and as long as they were going through open country there was no enemy in view; when they re-entered the forest their rear was attacked and great confusion and panic created. They lost 700 men and six standards. When they at last got out of the trackless and entangled forest there was an end to the terrifying tactics of the Gauls and the wild alarm of the Romans. ”

“ It is not about the possession of Sicily and Sardinia, the old subjects of dispute, but for Italy that you have to fight. There is no second army at our back to oppose the enemy if we fall to win, there are no more Alps to delay his advance while a fresh army can be raised for defence. ”

“ You have to fight, soldiers, with the men whom you defeated in the former war by land and sea, from whom you have exacted a war indemnity for the last twenty years, and from whom you wrested Sicily and Sardinia as the prizes of war. ”

“ The Balearics and light infantry opened the battle, but on being met by the heavier legions they were rapidly withdrawn to the wings, an evolution which at once threw the Roman horse into difficulties, for the 4000 wearied troopers had been unable to offer an effective resistance to 10,000 who were fresh and vigorous, and now in addition they were overwhelmed by what seemed a cloud of missiles from the light infantry. Moreover, the elephants, towering aloft at the ends of the line, terrified the horses not only by their appearance but by their unaccustomed smell, and created widespread panic. ”

“ Suppose them to be higher than the peaks of the Pyrenees, surely no region in the world can touch the sky or be impassable to man. Even the Alps are inhabited and cultivated, animals are bred and reared there, their gorges and ravines can be traversed by armies. Why, even the envoys whom you see here did not cross the Alps by flying through the air, nor were their ancestors native to the soil. They came into Italy as emigrants looking for a land to settle in, and they crossed the Alps often in immense bodies with their wives and children and all their belongings. ”

“ Those may be allowed to be cowards and dastards who have something to fall back upon, whom their own land, their own territory will receive as they flee through its safe and peaceful roads; you must of necessity be brave men, every alternative between victory and death has been broken off by the resolve of despair, and you are compelled either to conquer, or if Fortune wavers, to meet death in battle rather than in flight. ”