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  Then, obedient to Juno’s petition, the Trebia, that river of ill omen, began a fresh assault upon the weary Romans, and roused up its waters. The bank fell in and swallowed up the bodies of the fugitives, and sucked them in by the treacherous quagmire of the soil. Nor could they move on and extract their feet from the deep and sticky mud. For the clinging mire held them prisoners; the crumbling bank entangled them, or the swampy ground trapped them without warning and overthrew them. One after another they struggled up the slippery sides, each trying to outstrip the rest along the pathless bank, and battling with the crumbling turf; but they slipped and fell, buried under the rubbish that fell with them. One of them, a speedy swimmer, struggled for a safe hand-hold and forced his way upward, to grasp the turf at the top; but, just as he emerged from the water, a spear was hurled and pinned him to the bank to which he was clinging. Another, having no weapon left, clasped a foe in his arms and held him fast as he tried to swim, till they were drowned together. Death showed itself in a thousand shapes. Though Ligus fell on land, his head hung over the river and drank in the blood-stained water with long sobbing gasps. After much effort comely Irpinus had almost swum ashore from mid-stream; he was shouting to his comrades for a helping hand, when a horse, infuriated by wounds, was carried down by the swift current and struck him down and submerged the weary swimmer.

  The crowning disaster came suddenly in sight, when a troop of elephants, with towers upon their backs, were driven into the river. For they rushed headlong through the water, like a cliff falling down from a shattered mountain. They drove the Trebia, dreading dangers unknown till now, before them with their forequarters, and lay down above the foaming channel. Manhood is tested by trial, and valour climbs unterrified the rocky path and difficult ascent that leads to glory. So Fibrenus disdained to die to no purpose, unhonoured and unsung. “The eyes of men shall behold me,” he cried, “and Fortune shall not hide my death beneath the flood. I shall find out whether there is aught on earth which a Roman sword cannot master or a Roman spear cannot pierce.’ Rising to his full height he threw his cruel shaft and planted it in the right eye of one great beast; and the weapon remained in the wound. When the point of the spear went in, the monster met it with a hideous trumpeting; then it raised its wounded and bleeding head, threw its rider, and turned in flight. But now the Romans, daring at last to hope that they might kill it, assailed it with darts and showers of arrows. Soon the vast expanse of its shoulders and sides was covered with wounds from the cruel steel; many a lance stuck in its dusky back and rump; and, when it shook itself, the huge forest of missiles waved. At last, when the long contest had used up all their weapons, it fell, and the huge carcass blocked the stream beneath it.

  But see! Scipio appears on the opposite bank. Though his limbs, hampered by his wound, cannot move freely, yet he enters the river, and ruthlessly deals out death to countless foes. The Trebia was covered over with close-packed bodies, and shields and helmets of the fallen, till it was scarce possible to see the water. He overthrew Mazaeus with a javelin and Gestar with his sword, and next Thelgon, a native of Cyrene whose ancestors came from the Peloponnese. At him Scipio hurled a javelin which he had caught up from the running stream, and drove the whole length of the tapering-iron point through his open mouth; and the shaft made the teeth rattle in the wound. Nor did death bring him peace; for the Trebia carried the swollen corpse to the Po, and the Po to the sea. Thapsus also fell, and a grave was denied to him after death.

  What availed him the home of the Hesperides, or the grove where the goddesses guard the ruddy branches of their gold-bearing tree?

  And now the Trebia swelled high, and rose from its lowest depths, driving all its waters fiercely forward, and exerting all its might; the stream raged with noisy eddies, and a fresh flood came roaring after. When Scipio felt this, his rage grew fiercer, and he cried: “O Trebia, you shall suffer as you deserve, and pay dearly for your treachery : I shall divide your stream and make it flow in separate channels through the land of Gaul; and I shall rob you of the name of river, and stop the spring from which you rise; and never shall you be able to reach the banks of the Po and flow into its stream. What sudden madness has turned you, wretched Trebia, into a Carthaginian river?”

  As Scipio hurled these taunts, the rising wall of water smote him and weighed down his shoulders with its arching flood. The general, standing erect, matched his strength against the onset of the waves, and held up the rushing river with his shield. But behind him also the foaming flood with roaring blast bedewed with its spray the topmost plume of his helmet. The river-god, withdrawing the soil from beneath his feet, prevented him from wading through the water and finding firm footing; the boulders were smitten and sent afar a hollow sound; the waves, called forth to battle by their sire, joined the fray; and the banks of the river were lost to sight. Then the river-god raised his dripping locks and his head crowned with blue-green weed, and spoke thus : “Arrogant man and enemy of my realm, do you threaten to punish me further and to wipe out my name? How many corpses I carry, slain by your arm! So packed am I with the shields and helmets of your victims that I have left my proper channel; you see how my deep pools, red with carnage, are flowing backwards. Put a limit to your deeds of arms, or else attack the plains hard by.”

  Vulcan was looking on meanwhile from a high hill, hidden in the darkness of a black cloud, with Venus at his side. Then Scipio raised his hands to heaven with a bitter cry: “Ye gods of our country, by whose favour Dardan Rome is preserved, did ye save my life just now in the fierce battle for such a death as this? Did I seem unworthy to end my life by a soldier’s arm? Give me back, my son, to danger, give me back to the foe! Suffer me to fight and to welcome such a death as my country and my brother would approve.” Then Venus groaned, moved by his prayer, and turned against the river the devouring strength of her invincible consort. Fire spread and burned all over the banks and fiercely devoured the trees that the river had nourished for many a year. All the copses were burnt up, and the victorious flame crackled as it spread in full career to the high groves. Soon the foliage of the fir-tree was seared, and the leaves of pine and alder; soon nothing was left of the poplar but the trunk, and the tree sent off into the sky the birds that were wont to nest on its branches. The devouring flame sucked the moisture from the very bottom of the stream and licked it up; and the blood upon the banks was dried up and caked by the fierce heat. The rugged earth everywhere split up and cracked, showing yawning chasms; and ashes settled in heaps in the bed of the river.

  Father Eridanus marvelled when his immemorial stream suddenly ceased to flow; and the sorrowing company of Nymphs filled their inmost caves with anguished cries. Thrice he strove to lift up his scorched head, and thrice Vulcan threw a firebrand which sent him down below the steaming water; and thrice the reeds caught fire and left the god’s head bare. At last the voice of his petition was heard, and his prayer was granted — that he might keep his former banks. And at length Scipio, accompanied by Gracchus, recalled his weary troops from the Trebia to a fortified height. But Hannibal paid high honour to the river, and raised altars of turf to the friendly stream. He knew not, alas! the much greater boon that Heaven intended for him, or the mourning that Lake Trasimene had in store for Italy.

  The tribe of the Boii had formerly been attacked by an army under Flaminius; and then he had gained an easy triumph and crushed a fickle and guileless people; but to fight the Carthaginian general was a far different task. Flaminius was born in an evil hour to inflict fatal loss upon Rome; and Juno now chose him as ruler of an exhausted nation and a fit instrument of coming destruction. When his first day of office came, he seized the helm of the state and commanded the armies. So, if a mere landsman, with no skill to manage the sea, has got the command of a luckless vessel, he himself does the work of foul weather, and exposes the ship to be tossed by every gale; she drifts at random over the sea, and the hand of her own captain drives her upon the rocks. So the army was equipped in haste and led toward t
he consulship he had fought with success against the Gauls in N. Italy, the Boii and Insubres. land of the Lydians, where stands the sacred city founded of old by Cory thus, and where Maeonian settlers had mixed their blood with that of Italians in ancient times.

  A warning from heaven came quickly to Hannibal, that he might learn the consul’s design and win great glory. Sleep had lulled all things to rest and brought to men forgetfulness of trouble, when Juno, counterfeiting the deity of the neighbouring lake, appeared before him, the hair on the dripping brow crowned with poplar leaves. She stirred the general’s heart with sudden anxiety, and broke his sleep with a voice he could not disregard. “Hannibal — a glorious name, though a cause of tears to Latium — had Fortune made you a Roman, you would have joined the ranks of the high gods. But why do we arrest the course of destiny? Make haste! The flood-tide of Fortune soon ebbs. Those rivers of blood that you vowed, when you swore to your father enmity against Rome, shall flow now from the veins of Italy, and you shall glut your father’s ghost with carnage. When your troubles are over, you must pay me the honour that is my due. For I am the lake surrounded by lofty mountains, round which dwell the settlers from Tmolus; I am Trasimene, the lake of shady waters.”

  Hannibal was encouraged by this prediction, and the soldiers rejoiced in the divine aid. At once he led them at speed over the barrier of lofty mountains. The Apennines were frozen hard and lifted their pine-clad summits to heaven between slippery cliffs. The forests were buried deep in snow, and the hoary peaks climbed high into the sky over snow-drifts. He bade them march on. He thought his past glory tarnished and lost, if any mountains barred his way after he had crossed the Alps. They clambered up the storm-swept heights and rocky precipices; but even when the mountains were crossed, there was no end and no alleviation of their toil. The plains were flooded, the rivers swollen with melted snow, and the pathless fields covered with a slimy morass. And amid such inhospitable surroundings, Hannibal’s uncovered head felt the buffetings of this savage clime, and from his eye a discharge flowed over face and cheeks. Physicians he laughed to scorn. He thought no danger too high a price to pay for the coveted opportunity for war. For the beauty of his brow he cared nothing, provided that his march was not in vain; if victory demanded it, he was willing to sacrifice every limb for the sake of war; it seemed to him that he had sight enough, if he could see his victorious path to the Capitol, and a way to strike home at his foe. Such were their sufferings in that unkind region; but they came at last to the lake they longed to see — the place where Hannibal was to find on the field of battle many a victim in atonement for his lost sight.

  But behold! senators came as envoys from Carthage; they had good reason for their voyage, and they bore heavy tidings. The nation which Dido founded when she landed in Libya were accustomed to appease the gods by human sacrifices and to offer up their young children — horrible to tell — upon fiery altars. Each year the lot was cast and the tragedy was repeated, recalling the sacrifices offered to Diana in the kingdom of Thoas. And now Hanno, the ancient enemy of Hannibal, demanded the general’s son, as the customary victim to suffer this doom according to the lot; but the thought of the armed general’s wrath struck home to men’s hearts, and the image of the boy’s father stood formidable before their eyes.

  Their fear was heightened by Imilce, who tore her cheeks and hair and filled the city with woeful cries. As a Bacchant in Thrace, maddened by the recurring festival, speeds over the heights of Mount Pangaeus and breathes forth the wine-god who dwells in her breast, so Imilce, as if set on fire, cried aloud among the women of Carthage: “O husband, hearken! whatever the region of the world where you are fighting now, bring your army hither; here is a foe more furious and more pressing. Perhaps at this moment you stand beneath the walls of Rome itself, parrying the hurtling missiles with dauntless shield; perhaps you are brandishing a dreadful torch and setting fire to the Tarpeian temple. Meanwhile your first-born and only son is seized, alas, in the heart of his native country, for a hellish sacrifice. What boots it to ravage the homes of Italy with the sword, to march by ways forbidden to man, and to break the treaty which every god was called to witness? Such is the reward you get from Carthage, and such the honours she pays you now! Again, what sort of religion is this, that sprinkles the temples with blood? Alas! their ignorance of the divine nature is the chief cause that leads wretched mortals into crime. Go ye to the temples and pray for things lawful, and offer incense, but eschew bloody and cruel rites. God is merciful and akin to man. Be content with this, I pray you — to see cattle slaughtered before the altar. Or, if you are sure beyond all doubt that wickedness is pleasing to the gods, then slay me, me the mother, and thus keep your vows. Why rob the land of Libya of the promise shown by this child? If my husband’s glorious career had been thus nipped in the bud long ago by the fatal lot, would not that have been as lamentable a disaster as the battle by the Aegatian islands when the power of Carthage was sunk beneath the waves?” The senators, hesitating between their fear of the gods and their fear of Hannibal, were induced by her appeal to run no risks; and they left it to Hannibal himself to decide, whether he would defy the lot or comply with the tribute due to the gods. Then indeed Imilce became half-frantic with terror; for she dreaded the stern heart of her high-souled husband.

  Hannibal listened eagerly to the message and thus replied: “O Mother Carthage, you have set me on a level with the gods, and how shall I repay you in full for such generosity? What sufficient recompense can I find? I shall fight on, night and day, and many a high-born victim from the people of Quirinus shall I send from this place to your temples. But the child must be spared, to carry on my career in arms. You, my son, on whom rest my hopes, you, who are the only safeguard of Carthaginian power against the menace of Italy, remember to fight against the Aeneadae all your life long. Go forward — the Alps lie open now — and apply yourself to my task. To you also I call, gods of my country, whose shrines are propitiated with bloodshed, and who rejoice in a tribute that strikes terror to mothers’ hearts, turn hither joyful looks and your whole hearts; for I am preparing a sacrifice and building for you mightier altars. You, Mago, must encamp on the top of the mountain opposite, while Choaspes keeps closer and approaches the hills on our left; and let Sychaeus lead his men through the woods to the gorge and its mouth. I myself shall ride swiftly about Lake Trasimene with a flying force, and shall seek victims of war to offer to the gods. For the express promise of the god assures me of a great victory. It is for you, ambassadors, to witness it and carry back the tale to Carthage.”

  BOOK V

  ARGUMENT

  HANNIBAL LAYS A TRAP FOR THE ENEMY. THE NAME OF LAKE TRASIMENE (1-23). FLAMINIUS MAKES LIGHT OF EVIL OMENS AND THE WARNING OF CORVINUS, THE SOOTHSAYER, AND ENCOURAGES HIS MEN TO FIGHT (24-185). THE BATTLE OF LAKE TRASIMENE (186-687).

  THE Carthaginian leader had seized the Tuscan hills with an unseen force, and in the deep silence of night had occupied the winding woods with troops in ambush. But on their left hand the lake, like a sluggish sea, spread over all the region round with the overflow of its mighty waters and marred the prospect with its abundant slime. This lake was ruled over in ancient times by Arnus, son of Faunus, and now, in a later age, keeps green the name of Trasimene. The father of Trasimene was Tyrrhenus, a Lydian and the pride of Tmolus; he had formerly brought men of Maeonia the long sea-voyage to the Latian land, and had given his own name to the country, and it was he who first revealed to men the sound of the trumpet, unheard till then, and broke the spiritless silence of battle. An ambitious man, he bred up his son for a higher destiny. But the nymph Agylle loved the young Trasimene; and indeed in beauty he could contend with the gods themselves. Casting off maiden shame, she seized him on the shore and carried him down to the depths; for her young heart was quick to feel the spell of youthful beauty, nor was she slow to catch fire from the arrow of the Idalian goddess.” The Naiads, in their green cave far below, comforted and cherished the boy, when he shrank from his br
ide’s embrace and that watery world. From him the lake, a gift from the bride, got its name; and the water, aware through all its extent of the marriage joy, still bears the name of Trasimene.

  And now the chariot of dewy night was close to its dusky goal, and the spouse of Tithonus, not yet emerged from her marriage-chamber, stood shining on the threshold — a time when the wayfarer is less sure that day has begun than that night is ended. The Roman general was marching over the uneven ground, ahead even of his standards; all his cavalry hastened in confusion after him; the skirmishers were not arrayed in separate companies; the footmen were mixed up with the body of cavalry; and the unwarlike rabble of camp-followers filled the air with ominous uproar, and went into battle like fugitives. Then, in addition, the lake itself breathed forth a black and blinding mist, so that the doomed army could see nothing on any side; and the sky, hidden beneath night’s dark robe, was gloomy with pitch-black clouds. Nor did Hannibal forget his cunning. He lay in hiding with sword in rest; no advance of his blocked the progress of the foe. Their course was free; and far and wide, as in the stillness of peace, stretched the unguarded shore — the shore, from which there would soon be no returning; for, the path narrowing as it passed into the closing gorge, their route led into the trap; and a double doom, with the cliffs on one side and the barrier of the lake on the other, kept them fast in the toils. Meanwhile on the wooded mountain-top careful watch waited for the entrance of the Romans, ready to strike whenever they took to flight. Even so beside a glassy stream a cunning angler weaves osiers to make a light and wide-mouthed weel; the inmost part he frames with especial care, and for the centre he makes the trap taper gradually to a point, and fastens together the narrowed ends; so by the contracting aperture’s deceit he forbids return to the fish which, free as they were to enter, he has drawn in from the stream.