The Comic History of Rome

by Gilbert Abbott À Beckett

Considerate Conduct of Scipio Africanus.

Hasdrubal now turned his attention to Italy, while Scipio continued his conquests in Spain, and, among other places, took Astapa, which, if tradition tells the truth, he must have found without a single inhabitant. It is said that the place was defended with such valour that only fifty men remained alive, and these became impressed with the feeling that when a thing must be done, it is better to do it oneself than to leave it to be done by others. They came to the resolution that they were sure not to be spared, and they had, therefore, better get rid of one another. They accordingly proceeded to the sanguinary task of mutual destruction; though, as one must have remained to the last, and there would have been some difficulty in disposing of him, it is probable that he survived for the purpose of acting as his own reporter of the dreadful incident. The graver historians insist that not one was left alive in the city; that the last fifty soldiers, having first killed all their women, and all their children, made away with all of themselves; a state of things which induces us to ask how the particulars have come down to us. If, however, we were to indulge this spirit of inquiry to any extent, we should, we fear, be compelled to throw a doubt upon many of those interesting particulars which form the most agreeable portions of history.

Hasdrubal resolved to make a grand effort, and assembled an army, which including some Iberians, under his brother Mago, as well as some Numidians, headed by Masinissa, their king, numbered 75,000 men, and six-and-thirty elephants. Scipio, though objecting to attack a power more than twice his size, was compelled to do so, by a want of provisions, for he had so little food that his army could not even have grubbed on for a month or two. He was again victorious, and Hasdrubal proceeded to join his brother Hannibal; but the letters written by the former to apprise the latter of his coming, instead of going regularly through all the military posts, fell, by some misdirection or indirection, into the hands of the enemy. The Consul Livius Salinator went into the neighbourhood of Sena Gallica—now Senigaglia—and was joined by his colleague, C. Claudius Nero, who came, under cover of the night, with a large army; and it would appear that the forces of Hasdrubal kept such very early hours, that they had all gone to bed, and knew nothing of the reinforcements that had been sent against them. Hasdrubal, however, saw among the Romans, on the following morning, some soldiers, whose faces were so sun-burnt, as to give a strange complexion to a part of the troops, and he concluded that they had recently been on a journey. After having indulged in an inquiring look, he commenced a patient listen, and he fancied he heard two trumpet calls in the hostile camp, when, without considering whether the second might have been the mere echo of the first, he resolved, in his own mind, that the armies of the two Consuls had joined together. He accordingly determined to fly, and began by trying to swim across the river Metaurus, which is usually shallow enough; but the rains had swelled it to such a torrent that he was soon plunged into the depths of misery. His guides, following the impulse of their own cowardice, ran away as fast as they could, and he, in perfect ignorance of the country, found the river rising and his spirits sinking in about an equal ratio. The Romans came up with him in time to find his army completely damped, and his troops were, according to the military practice of the period, cut, at once, to pieces.

Hasdrubal, who had lost heart early in the battle, seems ultimately to have lost his head, for rushing into the midst of a cohort, he was decapitated by a Roman soldier. It is said that the head of Hasdrubal was afterwards brutally thrown into the camp of his brother Hannibal; but happily for the credit of humanity, this story of the head is absurd on the very face of it.

Spain was now subject to Rome; and Scipio, after quelling an insurrection in his army, paid a visit to Syphax, who was king of a portion of Numidia, and who was desperately in love with a young lady, named Sophonisba, the daughter of Hasdrubal Gisco, a Carthaginian general. Sophonisba was one of those troublesome persons, known as fascinating creatures, who, by attracting the eyes of mankind, set them very often by the ears, and lead to much calamity. This too interesting individual had also won the admiration of Masinissa, another king of another part of Numidia, when her father, irrespective of any attachment she might have formed, gave her hand to Syphax, by way of attaching the latter to his interests. Masinissa, in a fit of jealousy, went over to Rome, leaving Syphax and Hasdrubal to fight it out with Scipio.

The Africans and Carthaginians were, to a certain extent, people of straw, which was the material they used in constructing their tents, and Scipio, basely pretending that he desired to negotiate a peace, sent a set of firebrands, under the garb of envoys, into the camp of the enemy. These hypocritical incendiaries carried fire among the foe; and, though the elephants fought like lions, the Carthaginians behaved like lambs, for the poor creatures, thinking the burning of their tents was accidental, looked on with simple bewilderment. 40,000 Africans were cut to pieces on the spot; and Syphax, who had managed to escape, was ready immediately with 30,000 more, to engage Scipio in the neighbourhood of Utica. Syphax was urged on by his wife, who is described as a woman of remarkable spirit—a character equivalent to that of a very troublesome body. Poor Syphax did all he could against a very superior force, but he was ultimately taken prisoner, and sent to Scipio, while Sophonisba remained at home to receive Masinissa—like a woman of spirit—at the gates of her husband's palace.

The lovely creature, admitting that she was vanquished, and declaring that further opposition would be vain, appealed, in the character of an unprotected female, to the generosity of Masinissa. Expressing the utmost horror at being placed as a captive behind the car of Scipio, she entreated the protection of her husband's conqueror; and Masinissa, not knowing exactly what to do, politely offered to marry her. She at once consented; and, after a widowhood of a few hours, she was presented to Lælius, the Roman Consul, in her new character.

Syphax, not being dead, was of course rather painfully alive to the conduct of his wife, and having hinted to Scipio that she might be the cause of further mischief, an order was immediately sent to Masinissa to send her back by the bearer. This her new husband was unwilling to do, but he forwarded her a cup of poison, which she drank off with the air of a tragedy queen, and died with a clap-trap in her mouth, which was almost as nauseous as the stuff that she was called upon to swallow.

The Carthaginians now began to feel that every thing went wrong in the absence of Hannibal, whom they invited home, and on his arrival he was really anxious for peace and quietness. Scipio felt much the same, and the two generals, having met, looked at each other for some time in silent admiration. It may be doubted whether they got any further than this point, for even if they had a few words, it did not prevent them from ultimately coming to blows at the great and decisive battle of Zama. Hannibal brought into the field 50,000 men, and about 80 real elephants; but his soldiers were most of them raw, and liable to be roasted on the ground of extreme awkwardness. He put the Moors, the Gauls, and Libyans in front, the Carthaginian cowards in the centre, for they were but a middling set, and he brought up the rear, with a few of his best soldiers. Scipio exhibited some very skillful generalship on this momentous occasion, and by a clever arrangement of his forces, he left room for the elephants to run through the ranks without coming into contact with any of his soldiers.