When the religious rites were ended, Fabius prepared to meet the enemy.
Two new legions were soon raised, and Servilius was ordered to bring his two legions to Rome, so that Fabius had four legions to lead to battle.
The Dictator had his own idea of how best to beat Hannibal, and to this idea he remained faithful, although his own followers as well as the enemy derided his policy.
Fabius had determined not to meet the Carthaginians in a pitched battle. They had already been victorious too often in such a struggle. He intended to harass the rear guard of the enemy and to cut off the parties Hannibal sent out in search of food or forage. This discreet policy proved pleasing neither to Hannibal nor to his own troops, but of this Fabius recked little.
After deciding on these tactics, the Dictator led his legions into Northern Apulia and encamped near to the enemy. In vain Hannibal tried to tempt Fabius to fight. He wantonly burned the homesteads and destroyed the vineyards of the Italians, that the Dictator might grow indignant and hasten to their help. But seemingly untouched by the desolation of his country, Fabius continued to follow his own method of warfare.
This method of delay has since his time become a byword, and is known as ‘The Fabian Policy.’ He himself was named, or perhaps I should say he was nicknamed, Cunctator, The Delayer.
Minucius, the master of the horse, eager for battle, encouraged the soldiers in their discontent with the Dictator, until they even dared to say that Minucius was more fit to command Romans than Fabius.
Then Minucius, seeing the men were in his favour, grew more daring, and ventured to jest at the Dictator because he encamped always on the hills, while the enemy was in the plains. ‘It is,’ said the officer, ‘as if Fabius has taken us to the hills as to a theatre, to look at the flames and desolation of our country.’ Or he would mockingly declare that the Dictator was leading them up to heaven, having no hopes on earth, or even that he was trying to hide them in the clouds from the Carthaginians.
These words were told to Fabius, and his friends urged him, as they had often done before, to fight.
But the Dictator answered, ‘I should be more faint-hearted than they make me, if through fear of idle reproaches I should abandon my own convictions.’