Thus prepared, Duilius encountered the enemy’s fleet. He found them ravaging the coast at Mylæ, a little to the west of Palermo. The admiral was the same person who had commanded the garrison of Agrigentum, and was carried in an enormous septireme, which had formerly belonged to Pyrrhus. Nothing daunted, Duilius attacked without delay. By his rude assault the skilful tactics of the Carthaginian seamen were confounded. The Roman fighting-men were very numerous, and when they had once boarded an enemy’s ship, easily made themselves masters of her. Duilius took thirty-one Carthaginian ships and sunk fourteen. For a season, no Roman name stood so high as that of Duilius. Public honours were awarded him; he was to be escorted home at night from banquets and festivals by the light of torches and the music of the flute; a pillar was set up in the Forum, ornamented with the beaks of the captured ships, and therefore called the Columna Rostrata, to commemorate the great event; fragments of the inscription still remain in the Capitoline Museum at Rome. And no doubt the triumph was signal. The honours conferred upon the conqueror cannot but give a pleasing impression of the simple manners then prevailing at Rome, especially when we contrast them with the cruelty of the Carthaginian government, who crucified their unfortunate admiral. To have defeated the Mistress of the Sea upon her own element in the first trial of strength was indeed remarkable.
The sea fight of Duilius was fought in the year 260 B.C. In the following years the Carthaginians were only able to act upon the defensive. Not only Agrigentum, but Camarina, Gela, Enna, Segesta, and many other cities had surrendered to the Romans. The Carthaginians were confined to their great trading marts, Drepana, Lilybæum, Eryx, and Panormus. They did not dare to meet the Romans in the field; yet these places were very strong, especially Lilybæum. Against its iron fortifications all the strength of Pyrrhus had been broken. It was not time yet for Carthage to despair.
But in the eighth year of the war the senate determined on more decisive measures. They knew the weakness of the Carthaginians at home; they had a victorious fleet, and they determined not to let their fortune slumber.
SECOND PERIOD (256-250 B.C.)
[256-255 B.C.]
Duilius appears for a brief time as the hero of the first part of the war; but its second period is marked by the name of a man who has become famous as a patriot—M. Atilius Regulus. It was in the year 256, the eighth of the war, that the consuls, M. Regulus and L. Manlius, sailed from Italy and doubled Cape Pachynus with a fleet of 330 quinqueremes. The Carthaginian fleet, even larger in number, had been stationed at Lilybæum to meet the enemy, whether they should approach from the north or from the east. They now put to sea, and sailed westwards along the southern coast of Sicily. They met the Roman fleet at a place called Ecnomus, a little more than halfway along that coast. The battle that ensued was the greatest that, up to that time, had ever been fought at sea; it is calculated that not fewer than 300,000 men were engaged. It was desperately contested on both sides; but at Ecnomus, again, we are astonished to find the Roman fleet victorious (256 B.C.).
Roman Embassy at Carthage
(After Mirys)
The way was now open to Africa. The consuls, after refitting and provisioning their fleet, sailed straight across to the Hermæan promontory, which is distant from the nearest point of Sicily not more than eighty miles. But the omens were not auspicious; the Roman soldiery went on board with gloomy forebodings of their fate; one of the tribunes refused to lead his legionaries into the ships, till Regulus ordered the lictors to seize him. The passage, however, was favoured by the wind. The consuls landed their men, drew up the fleet on shore, and fortified it in a naval camp; and then, marching southwards, they took the city of Aspis or Clupea by assault. No Carthaginian army met them; every place they came near, except Utica, surrendered at discretion, for they were unfortified and defenceless. Carthage, being of old mistress of the sea, feared no invaders, and, like England, trusted for defence to her wooden walls. Yet she had not been unwarned. Sixty years before the adventurous Agathocles had landed like Regulus. Then, as now, the whole country lay like a garden before him, covered with wealthy towns and the luxurious villas of the Carthaginian merchants. Then two hundred towns or more had surrendered almost without stroke of sword. It appeared as if the same easy success now awaited Regulus and the Romans.