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ELEPHANTS USED IN WAR.
In the old days, as I told you, Carthage was the London of that time, being a city of 700,000 inhabitants, and the capital of a great empire, which had overseas colonies in Spain, Corsica, and Sicily.
For a very long time it was at war with the Romans, who were the great military nation then, and at first the Carthaginians got the better of their adversaries.
One great help to them was their corps of elephants. These elephants had scythes fixed on to their tusks, so that when they charged they not only cut down the serried ranks of their enemies, but they also trampled them underfoot.
In their great fight outside Carthage, the army belonging to the Carthaginians under a Greek officer, Xanthippus, carried the day with a grand charge of elephants, and thus defeated and routed the Romans under Regulus.
Of the 20,000 men who formed the Roman force only 2000 escaped. Regulus and a number of his best officers were captured and held as prisoners of war for several years.
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A BRAVE MAN FACES TORTURE.
As time went on, the Carthaginians tried to make peace, and they sent their prisoner, Regulus, over to Rome to persuade the Roman Government to come to terms. They made him promise on his word of honour that if he failed to bring about peace he would return again to Carthage, and become a prisoner once more.