Because not only what related to the punishment of the Campanians, but most of the other particulars of this affair, were transacted according to the judgment of Flaccus alone, some authors affirm that Appius Claudius died about the time of the surrender of Capua, and that this same Taurea neither came to Cales voluntarily nor died by his own hand, but that while he was being tied to the stake among the rest, Flaccus, who could not distinctly hear what he vociferated from the noise which was made, ordered silence, when Taurea said the things which have been before related "that he, a man of the greatest courage, was being put to death by one who was by no means his equal in respect to valour." That immediately on his saying this, the herald, by command of the proconsul, pronounced this order. "Lictor, apply the rods to this man of courage, and execute the law upon him first." Some authors also relate, that he read the decree of the senate before he beheaded them, but that as there was a clause in it, to the effect, that if he thought proper he should refer the entire question to the senate, he construed it that the decision as to what was most for the interest of the state was left to himself. He returned from Cales to Capua. Atella and Calatia surrendered themselves, and were received. Here also the principal promoters of the revolt were punished. Thus eighty principal members of the senate were put to death, and about three hundred of the Campanian nobles thrown into prison. The rest were distributed through the several cities of the Latin confederacy, to be kept in custody, where they perished in various ways. The rest of the Campanian citizens were sold. The remaining subject of deliberation related to the city and its territory. Some were of opinion that a city so eminently powerful, so near, and so hostile, ought to be demolished. But immediate utility prevailed, for on account of the land, which was evidently superior to any in Italy from the variety and exuberance of its produce, the city was preserved that it might become a settlement of husbandmen. For the purpose of peopling the city, a number of sojourners, freed-men, dealers, and artificers, were retained, but all the land and buildings were made the property of the Roman state. It was resolved, however, that Capua should only be inhabited and peopled as a city, that there should be no body-politic, nor assembly of the senate or people, nor magistrates. For it was thought that a multitude not possessing any public council, without a ruling power, and unconnected by the participation of any common rights, would be incapable of combination. They resolved to send a praefect annually from Rome to administer justice. Thus were matters adjusted at Capua, upon a plan in every respect worthy of commendation. Punishment was inflicted upon the most guilty with rigour and despatch, the populace dispersed beyond all hope of return, no rage vented in fire and ruins upon the unoffending houses and walls. Together also with advantage, a reputation for clemency was obtained among the allies, by the preservation of a city of the greatest celebrity and opulence, the demolition of which, all Campania, and all the people dwelling in the neighbourhood of Campania, would have bewailed, while their enemies were compelled to admit the ability of the Romans to punish their faithless allies, and how little assistance could be derived from Hannibal towards the defence of those whom he had taken under his protection.
17
The Roman senate having gone through every thing which required their attention relative to Capua, decreed to Caius Nero six thousand foot and three hundred horse, whichever he should himself choose out of those two legions which he had commanded at Capua, with an equal number of infantry, and eight hundred horse of the Latin confederacy. This army Nero embarked at Puteoli, and conveyed over into Spain. Having arrived at Tarraco with his ships, landed his troops, hauled his ships ashore, and armed his mariners to augment his numbers, he proceeded to the river Iberus, and received the army from Titus Fonteius and Lucius Marcius. He then marched towards the enemy. Hasdrubal, son of Hamilcar, was encamped at the black stones in Ausetania, a place situated between the towns Illiturgi and Mentissa. The entrance of this defile Nero seized, and Hasdrubal, to prevent his being shut up in it, sent a herald to engage that, if he were allowed to depart thence, he would convey the whole of his army out of Spain. The Roman general having received this proposition gladly, Hasdrubal requested the next day for a conference, when the Romans might draw up conditions relative to the surrender of the citadels of the towns, and the appointment of a day on which the garrisons might be withdrawn, and the Carthaginians might remove every thing belonging to them without imposition. Having obtained his point in this respect, Hasdrubal gave orders that as soon as it was dark, and during the whole of the night afterwards, the heaviest part of his force should get out of the defile by whatever way they could. The strictest care was taken that many should not go out that night, that the very fewness of their numbers might both be more adapted to elude the notice of the enemy from their silence, and to an escape through confined and rugged paths. Next day they met for the conference; but that day having been spent, on purpose, in speaking and writing about a variety of subjects, which were not to this point, the conference was put off to the next day. The addition of the following night gave him time to send still more out; nor was the business concluded the next day. Thus several days were spent in openly discussing conditions, and as many nights in privately sending the Carthaginian troops out of their camp; and after the greater part of the army had been sent out, he did not even keep to those terms which he had himself proposed; and his sincerity decreasing with his fears, they became less and less agreed. By this time nearly all the infantry had cleared the defile, when at daybreak a dense mist enveloped the whole defile and the neighbouring plains; which Hasdrubal perceiving, sent to Nero to put off the conference to the following day, as the Carthaginians held that day sacred from the transaction of any serious business. Not even then was the cheat suspected. Hasdrubal having gained the indulgence he sought for that day also, immediately quitted his camp with his cavalry and elephants, and without creating any alarm escaped to a place of safety. About the fourth hour the mist, being dispelled by the sun, left the atmosphere clear, when the Romans saw that the camp of the enemy was deserted. Then at length Claudius, recognising the Carthaginian perfidy, and perceiving that he had been caught by trickery, immediately began to pursue the enemy as they moved off, prepared to give battle; but they declined fighting. Some skirmishes, however, took place between the rear of the Carthaginians and the advanced guard of the Romans.
18
During the time in which these events occurred, neither did those states of Spain which had revolted after the defeat that was sustained, return to the Romans, nor did any others desert them. At Rome, the attention of the senate and people, after the recovery of Capua, was not fixed in a greater degree upon Italy than upon Spain. They resolved that the army there should be augmented and a general sent. They were not, however, so clear as to the person whom they should send, as that, where two generals had fallen within the space of thirty days, he who was to supply the place of them should be selected with unusual care. Some naming one person, and others another, they at length came to the resolution that the people should assemble for the purpose of electing a proconsul for Spain, and the consuls fixed a day for the election. At first they waited in expectation that those persons who might think themselves qualified for so momentous a command would give in their names, but this expectation being disappointed, their grief was renewed for the calamity they had suffered, and then regret for the generals they had lost. The people thus afflicted, and almost at their wits' end, came down, however, to the Campus Martius on the day of the election, where, turning towards the magistrates, they looked round at the countenances of their most eminent men, who were earnestly gazing at each other, and murmured bitterly, that their affairs were in so ruinous a state, and the condition of the commonwealth so desperate, that no one dared undertake the command in Spain. When suddenly Publius Cornelius, son of Publius who had fallen in Spain, who was about twenty-four years of age, declaring himself a candidate, took his station on an eminence from which he could be seen by all. The eyes of the whole assembly were directed towards him, and by acclamations and expressions of approbation, a prosperous and happy command were at once augured to him. Orders were then given that they should proceed to vote, when not only every century, but every individual to a man, decided that Publius Scipio should be invested with the command in Spain. But after the business had been concluded, and the ardour and impetuosity of their zeal had subsided, a sudden silence ensued, and a secret reflection on what they had done, whether their partiality had not got the better of their judgment? They chiefly regretted his youth, but some were terrified at the fortune which attended his house and his name, for while the two families to which he belonged were in mourning, he was going into a province where he must carry on his operations between the tombs of his father and his uncle.
19
Perceiving the solicitude and anxiety which people felt, after performing the business with so much ardour, he summoned an assembly, in which he discoursed in so noble and high minded a manner, on his years, the command intrusted to him, and the war which he had to carry on, as to rekindle and renew the ardour which had subsided, and inspire the people with more confident hopes than the reliance placed on human professions, or reasoning on the promising appearance of affairs, usually engenders. For Scipio was not only deserving of admiration for his real virtues, but also for his peculiar address in displaying them, to which he had been formed from his earliest years;--effecting many things with the multitude, either by feigning nocturnal visions or as with a mind divinely inspired; whether it was that he was himself, too, endued with a superstitious turn of mind, or that they might execute his commands and adopt his plans without hesitation, as if they proceeded from the responses of an oracle. With the intention of preparing men's minds for this from the beginning, he never at any time from his first assumption of the manly gown transacted any business, public or private, without first going to the Capitol, entering the temple, and taking his seat there; where he generally passed a considerable time in secret and alone. This practice, which was adhered to through the whole of his life, occasioned in some persons a belief in a notion which generally prevailed, whether designedly or undesignedly propagated, that he was a man of divine extraction; and revived a report equally absurd and fabulous with that formerly spread respecting Alexander the Great, that he was begotten by a huge serpent, whose monstrous form was frequently observed in the bedchamber of his mother, but which, on any one's coming in, suddenly unfolding his coils, glided out of sight. The belief in these miraculous accounts was never ridiculed by him, but rather increased by his address; neither positively denying any such thing nor openly affirming it. There were also many other things, some real and others counterfeit, which exceeded in the case of this young man the usual measure of human admiration, in reliance on which the state intrusted him with an affair of so much difficulty, and with so important a command, at an age by no means ripe for it. To the forces in Spain, consisting of the remains of the old army, and those which had been conveyed over from Puteoli by Claudius Nero, ten thousand infantry and a thousand horse were added; and Marcus Junius Silanus, the propraetor, was sent to assist in the management of affairs. Thus with a fleet of thirty ships, all of which were quinqueremes, he set sail from the mouth of the Tiber, and coasting along the shore of the Tuscan Sea, the Alps, and the Gallic Gulf, and then doubling the promontory of the Pyrenees, landed his troops at Emporiae, a Greek city, which also derived its origin from Phocaea. Ordering his ships to attend him, he marched by land to Tarraco; where he held a congress of deputies from all the allies; for embassies had poured forth from every province on the news of his arrival. Here he ordered his ships to be hauled on shore, having sent back the four triremes of the Massilians which had, in compliment to him, attended him from their home. After that, he began to give answers to the embassies of the several states, which had been in suspense on account of the many vicissitudes of the war; and this with so great dignity, arising from the great confidence he had in his own talents, that no presumptuous expression ever escaped him; and in every thing he said there appeared at once the greatest majesty and sincerity.