Till, in so long a fight, their weapons all
Consumed, he fell, death hasting through his fall.”
Silius Italicus, by Thomas Ross.
After the battle of Trebia, the elephants were marched with the army, over the Apennines; and Livy tells us that seven starved to death; later, in passing the Arno, which was a raging torrent, numbers of men, elephants, and horses were swept away, the only elephant left being the one the great general himself rode.
Previous to this, in crossing the Po, Hannibal had arranged his elephants in a long line across the shallow river, to break the force of the stream by a living dam. Perdiccas did the same, in an unfortunate attempt to cross the Nile near Memphis; but the waters of the Arno were too swift, and, notwithstanding the fact that elephants are fine swimmers, they were carried away and drowned. Hannibal was not cast down by his misfortune, and immediately sent for a new supply of elephants from Carthage. At the battle of Cannæ (216 B.C.),’the Roman forces attacked the elephants with torches, and succeeded in firing the towers upon their backs. This terrible scene is thus described by Silius Italicus:—
“The yet prevailing Roman, to withstand
The fury of these monsters, gives command
That burning torches, wheresoe’er they go,
Should be opposed, and sulph’rous flames to throw
Into their towers. This, with all speed, obeyed,