The History of Rome, Books 09 to 26 - Livy

But fortune afforded materials also to the headstrong and precipitate disposition of the consul, for in checking the plundering parties a battle having taken place, of a tumultuary kind, and occasioned rather by a disorderly advance of the soldiers, than by a preconcerted plan, or by the command of the general, the contest was by no means equal with the Carthaginians. As many as one thousand seven hundred of them were slain, but not more than one hundred of the Romans and allies. The consul Paulus, however, who was in command on that day, (for they held the command on alternate days,) apprehending an ambuscade, restrained the victorious troops in their headstrong pursuit; while Varro indignantly vociferated, that the enemy had been allowed to slip out of their hands, and that the war might have been terminated had not the pursuit been stopped. Hannibal was not much grieved at that loss; nay, rather he felt convinced, that the temerity of the more presumptuous consul, and of the soldiers, particularly the fresh ones, would be lured by the bait; and besides, all the circumstances of the enemy were as well known to him as his own: that dissimilar and discordant men were in command; that nearly two-thirds of the army consisted of raw recruits. Accordingly, concluding that he now had both a time and place adapted for an ambuscade, on the following night he led his troops away with nothing but their arms, leaving the camp filled with all their effects, both public and private. His infantry drawn up he conceals on the left, on the opposite side of the adjoining hills; his cavalry on the right; his baggage in an intermediate line he leads over the mountains through a valley, in order that he might surprise the enemy when busy in plundering the camp, deserted, as they would imagine, by its owners, and when encumbered with booty. Numerous fires were left in the camp, to produce a belief that his intention was to keep the consuls in their places by the appearance of a camp, until he could himself escape to a greater distance, in the same manner as he had deceived Fabius the year before.

When it was day, the outpost withdrawn first occasioned surprise, then, on a nearer approach, the unusual stillness. At length, the desertion being manifest, there is a general rush to the pavilions of the consuls, of those who announced the flight of the enemy so precipitate, that they left their camp, with their tents standing; and, that their flight might be the more secret, that numerous fires were left. Then a clamour arose that they should order the standards to be advanced, and lead them in pursuit of the enemy, and to the immediate plunder of the camp. The other consul too was as one of the common soldiers. Paulus again and again urged, that they should see their way before them, and use every precaution. Lastly, when he could no longer withstand the sedition and the leader of the sedition, he sends Marius Statilius, a prefect, with a Lucanian troop, to reconnoitre, who, when he had ridden up to the gates, ordered the rest to stay without the works, and entered the camp himself, attended by two horsemen. Having carefully examined every thing, he brings back word that it was manifestly a snare: that fires were left in that part of the camp which faced the enemy: that the tents were open, and that all their valuables were left exposed: that in some places he had seen silver carelessly thrown about the passages, as if laid there for plunder. This intelligence, which it was hoped would deter their minds from greediness, inflamed them; and the soldiers clamorously declaring, that unless the signal was given they would advance without their leaders, they by no means wanted one, for Varro instantly gave the signal for marching. Paulus, whom, unwilling from his own suggestions to move, the chickens had not encouraged by their auspices, ordered the unlucky omen to be reported to his colleague, when he was now leading the troops out of the gate. And though Varro bore it impatiently, yet the recent fate of Flaminius, and the recorded naval defeat of Claudius, the consul in the first Punic war, struck religious scruples into his mind. The gods themselves (it might almost be said) rather postponed than averted the calamity which hung over the Romans; for it fell out by mere accident, that when the soldiers did not obey the consul who ordered them to return to the camp, two slaves, one belonging to a horseman of Formiae, the other to one of Sidicinum, who had been cut off by the Numidians among a party of foragers, when Servilius and Atilius were consuls, had escaped on that day to their masters: and being brought into the presence of the consuls, inform them that the whole army of Hannibal was lying in ambush on the other side of the adjoining mountains. The seasonable arrival of these men restored the consuls to their authority, when the ambition of one of them had relaxed his influence with the soldiers, by an undignified compliance.43. Hannibal, perceiving that the Romans had been indiscreetly prompted rather than rashly carried to a conclusion, returned to his camp without effecting any thing, as his stratagem was discovered. He could not remain there many days, in consequence of the scarcity of corn; and, moreover, not only among the soldiers, who were mixed up of the off-scouring of various nations, but even with the general himself, day by day new designs arose: for, first, when there had been murmuring of the soldiers, and then an open and clamorous demand of their arrears of pay, and a complaint first of the scarcity of provisions, and lastly of famine; and there being a report that the mercenaries, particularly the Spanish, had formed a plan of passing over to the enemy, it is affirmed that Hannibal himself too sometimes entertained thoughts of flying into Gaul, so that, having left all his infantry, he might hurry away with his cavalry. Such being the plans in agitation, and such the state of feeling in the camp, he resolved to depart thence into the regions of Apulia, which were warmer, and therefore earlier in the harvest. Thinking also, that the farther he retired from the enemy, the more difficult would desertion be to the wavering. He set out by night, having, as before, kindled fires, and leaving a few tents to produce an appearance; that a fear of an ambuscade, similar to the former, might keep the Romans in their places. But when intelligence was brought by the same Lucanian Statilius, who had reconnoitred every place on the other side the mountains, and beyond the camp, that the enemy was seen marching at a distance, then plans began to be deliberated on about pursuing him. The consuls persisted in the same opinions they ever entertained; but nearly all acquiesced with Varro, and none with Paulus except Servilius, the consul of the former year. In compliance with the opinion of the majority, they set out, under the impulse of destiny, to render Cannae celebrated by a Roman disaster. Hannibal had pitched his camp near that village, with his back to the wind Vulturnus, which, in those plains which are parched with drought, carries with it clouds of dust. This circumstance was not only very advantageous to the camp, but would be a great protection to them when they formed their line; as they, with the wind blowing only on their backs, would combat with an enemy blinded with the thickly blown dust.

When the consuls, employing sufficient diligence in exploring the road in pursuit of the Carthaginian, had arrived at Cannae, where they had the enemy in the sight of them, having divided their forces, they fortify two camps with nearly the same interval as before, at Geronium. The river Aufidus, which flowed by both the camps, afforded approach to the watering parties of each, as opportunity served, though not without contest. The Romans in the lesser camp, however, which was on the other side the Aufidus, were more freely furnished with water, because the further bank had no guard of the enemy. Hannibal, entertaining a hope that the consuls would not decline a battle in this tract, which was naturally adapted to a cavalry engagement, in which portion of his forces he was invincible, formed his line, and provoked the enemy by a skirmishing attack with his Numidians. Upon this the Roman camp began again to be embroiled by a mutiny among the soldiers, and the disagreement of the consuls: since Paulus instanced to Varro the temerity of Sempronius and Flaminius; while Varro pointed to Fabius, as a specious example to timid and inactive generals. The latter called both gods and men to witness, "that no part of the blame attached to him that Hannibal had now made Italy his own, as it were, by right of possession; that he was held bound by his colleague; that the swords and arms were taken out of the hands of the indignant soldiers who were eager to fight." The former declared, "that if any disaster should befall the legions thus exposed and betrayed into an ill-advised and imprudent battle, he should be exempt from any blame, though the sharer of all the consequences. That he must take care that their hands were equally energetic in the battle whose tongues were so forward and impetuous."