Livy

“ Allow us to ascribe all that has gone happily for you and for the dominion of Rome to your wise counsels, and all misfortunes to the uncertain chances of war - the more talent and courage you claim for yourself the more will your native country and all Italy desire to keep such a doughty defender at home. Even you cannot disguise the fact that where Hannibal is, there is the centre and mainstay of the war, for you are giving out that the one reason for your going to Africa is to draw Hannibal there. ”

“ He has represented himself as an old man full of honours, and me as a youth not even as old as his son, as if the passion for glory did not extend beyond the span of human life and find its chief satisfaction in the memory of future generations. I am quite certain that it is the lot of all great men to compare themselves not with their contemporaries alone, but also with the illustrious of all ages. I admit, Quintus Fabius, that I am desirous not only of equalling your renown but - forgive my saying so - of surpassing it, if I can. ”

“ It makes all the difference in the world whether you are devastating the territory of another nation or seeing your own destroyed by fire and sword. It shows more courage to attack than to repel attacks. Then again, the unknown always inspires terror, but when you have entered your enemy's country you have a nearer view of his strength and weakness. Hannibal never hoped that so many communities would go over to him after Cannae; how much less could the Carthaginians, faithless allies, harsh and tyrannical masters as they are, count upon the firmness and stability of their African empire! ”

“ You may look for more cheerful and more frequent news from Africa than you received from Spain. Everything inspires me with hope - the Fortune which waits on Rome, the gods who witnessed the treaty which the enemy has broken, the two princes Syphax and Masinissa, whose fidelity I shall so far trust as to protect myself from any perfidy they may attempt. Many advantages which at this distance are not apparent will be disclosed as the war goes on. A man proves his capacity for leadership by seizing every opportunity that presents itself, and making every contingency subserve his plans. ”

“ You are anxious to win the crowning glory of bringing the Punic War to an end; your natural course will be to defend your own country before you go to attack the enemy's. Let there be peace in Italy before there is war in Africa; let our own fears be banished before we make others tremble. If both objects can be achieved under your generalship and auspices, then when you have conquered Hannibal here, go on and capture Carthage. ”

“ At this moment mutual rivalry and numberless grounds of complaint are embittering them against one another, because external dangers are far distant; but once let them see the arms of Rome and a foreign army, and they will hasten side by side to extinguish, as it were, a conflagration which threatens them both. Those Carthaginians defended Spain in a very different way from that in which they would defend their country's walls, the temples of their gods, their hearths and homes, when their trembling wives will follow them and their little children cling to them as they march out to battle. ”

“ The victory would not have been so costly had the battle been fought in a wider plain where flight would have been easier. Indibilis laid aside all idea of continuing the war, and thought that the safest course, considering his hopeless position, would be to throw himself on Scipio's well-known clemency and honour. He sent his brother Mandonius to him. Throwing himself on his knees before the victor he put everything down to the fatal frenzy of the time, which like some pestilential contagion had infected not only the Ilergetes and Lacetanians but even a Roman army with madness. ”

“ So far, even when deserted by our allies, we stood in our own strength, the soldiery of Rome. The Carthaginians have no citizen army, their soldiers are all mercenaries, ready to change sides on the smallest provocation. If only nothing stops me, you will hear that I have landed, that Africa is wrapped in the flames of war, that Hannibal is tearing himself away from Italy, that Carthage is besieged - all at one stroke. ”

“ Remain on guard as long as the battle is doubtful, but if you see that is going against us, and the city is on the point of being captured, you know that those whom you see going into action will never return alive, and we implore you by all the gods celestial and infernal in the name of liberty, liberty which will end in either an honourable death or a dishonourable servitude, that you leave nothing on which a savage enemy can vent his rage. Fire and sword are in your hands. ”

“ As they looked at each other and saw that each was trying to outdo all the rest in toil and danger, their courage was fired, and they offered such a furious resistance that the army which had conquered Spain was again and again repulsed from the walls of one solitary city, and fell back in confusion after a contest which brought it no honour. Scipio was afraid that the futile efforts of his troops might raise the enemies' courage and depress his own men, and he decided to take his part in the fighting and his share of the danger. ”

“ The question was not how to escape from death but where to meet it, whether, sword in hand, on the battlefield where the fortune of war often raises up the vanquished and flings the victor to the ground, or amidst the ashes of their city before the eyes of their captive wives and children after being torn with the lash and subjected to shameful and horrible tortures. ”

“ Before he broke up his quarters at New Carthage, he called his troops together and after denouncing at some length the treachery of the two chiefs in recommencing war went on to say that the temper in which he was going to avenge that crime was very different from the spirit in which he had recently healed the fault of his misled fellow-citizens. Then he felt as if he were tearing his own vitals, when with groans and tears he expiated either the thoughtlessness or the guilt of 8000 men at the cost of thirty lives. ”

“ Hannibal is not yet such an enemy that the man who prefers to fight against another foe would not be thought to fear rather than to despise him. Why do you not gird yourself to this task? Why do you not march straight from here to where Hannibal is and carry the war thither instead of taking a roundabout course in the hope that when you have crossed over into Africa he will follow you? ”

“ No one thought of making prisoners or securing plunder though everything was at the mercy of the spoilers; the scene was one of indiscriminate butchery, non-combatants together with those in arms, women equally with men were all alike massacred; the ruthless savagery extended even to the slaughter of infants. Then they flung lighted brands on the houses and what the fire could not consume was completely demolished. So bent were they upon obliterating every vestige of the city, and blotting out all record of their foes. From there Scipio marched to Castulo. ”

“ But a much more horrible butchery took place in the city, where a weak and defenceless crowd of women and children were massacred by their own people, and their still writhing bodies flung on to the lighted pile which was again almost extinguished by the streams of blood. And last of all the men themselves, exhausted by the pitiful slaughter of those dear to them, flung themselves arms and all into the midst of the flames. ”

“ The other charge against me will be that I am actuated by motives of malevolence and envy against the ever-growing glory of our most gallant consul. If my past life, my character, my dictatorship and five consulships, the glory I have acquired as a citizen and as a soldier, a glory so great as to produce surfeit rather than a desire for more - if these do not shield me from this imputation at least let my age free me from it. What rivalry can exist between myself and a man who is not even as old as my son? ”

“ Has some calamity occurred recently in Africa greater than the one which happened then in Spain? Are there larger armies and better and more numerous commanders in Africa now than there were then in Spain? Was I then at a riper age for undertaking a great war than I am today? Is Spain a more convenient field for operations against the Carthaginians than Africa? Now that I have scattered four Carthaginian armies in flight, reduced so many cities by force or fear, and subjugated every part down to the shores of the ocean, petty kings and savage tribes alike ”

“ Scipio wanted them to discuss the question calmly and peaceably, but as they had refused to do so at the request of their own relations, they told him that they would not accept the arbitrament of any one, whether god or man except Mars, and to him alone would they appeal. The elder relied upon his strength, the younger on his youth; they both preferred to fight to the death rather than that one should be subject to the commands of the other. They presented a striking spectacle to the army and an equally striking proof of the mischief which the passion for power works amongst men. ”

“ I would not for a moment wish to lay this to the charge of you all, for if I thought that the whole of my army wished for my death, I would die here before your eyes. My life would have no attraction for me if it were hateful to my fellow-countrymen and my soldiers. But every multitude is like the sea which left to itself is naturally motionless, till winds and gales excite it. So it is with calm and storms amongst you, the cause and origin of your madness is to be found in your ringleaders, who infected you with their frenzy. ”

“ As for the army as a body, if you sincerely repent of your wrongdoing you give me satisfaction enough and more than enough. Albius of Cales and Atrius of Umbria with the other ringleaders in this detestable mutiny will expiate their crime with their blood. The sight of their punishment ought to give you satisfaction rather than pain, if indeed you have recovered your sanity, for their designs would have proved more mischievous and destructive to you than to any one else. ”

“ When you, Scipio, have a view of Africa from the sea will not your conquest of Spain seem mere child's play? What resemblance is there between them? You began by coasting along the shores of Italy and Gaul over a sea free from any hostile fleet, and you brought up at Emporiae, a friendly city. After disembarking your troops you led them through a perfectly safe country to Tarraco, to the friends and allies of Rome, and from Tarraco your route led through the midst of Roman garrisons. ”

“ Enough has been said as to the republic and the present war and the allocation of provinces. It would be a long and uninteresting discussion if I were to follow the example of Q. Fabius, and as he has depreciated my services in Spain, so I were to pour ridicule on his glory and extol my own. I will do neither the one nor the other, senators, and if, young as I am, I cannot have the advantage over an old man in anything else, I will at least prove his superior in moderation and restraint of language. ”

“ I admit that if there were no war in Italy or only an enemy from whose defeat no glory was to be gained, then the man who would keep you in Italy though acting in the public interest might appear to be depriving you of the chance of winning glory in a foreign war. ”

“ We must not let the idea get abroad that no Roman general durst do what Hannibal has done, or that whilst in the First Punic War, when the struggle was for Sicily, Africa was frequently attacked by our fleets and armies, in this war, when the struggle is for Italy, Africa is left in peace. Let Italy, which has been so long harassed, have some rest at last; let Africa take its turn of fire and ruin; let a Roman camp threaten the gates of Carthage rather than that we should see the enemy's lines from our walls. Let Africa be the seat of war henceforth ”