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  “Long ago the nations of Greece — marvellous to tell — heard the shell of the tortoise sound, and the shell had power to draw stones and bring them of their own accord, to make walls for a city. The lyre on which Amphion played built walls round Thebes and bade the towers rise high at its music; and the stone climbed up of itself upon the ramparts that came to the call of the musician. Another lyre calmed the stormy sea with its music and arrested the seals; it drew after it Proteus in all his changes of shape, and carried Arion on the sea-beast’s back. A third lyre, whose strains moulded the minds of heroes and the spirit of great Achilles in the cave of Mount Pelion — the lyre that Cheiron loved, could quell the raging sea or the wrath of Hell itself, when he struck the strings. But the chords which Orpheus struck beside the Riphean Strymon, charming the gods above and the gods below the earth, earned a place in heaven and shine there among the bright stars. Even his mother, together with the whole train of her sister Muses, marvelled at his playing. At his music neither Pangaeus nor Haemus, the mountain of Mars, nor remotest Thrace, could stand still. Wild beasts and forests, rivers and mountains, followed him. The bird forgot her loved nestlings, stopped her flight, and hung arrested in the motionless air. Moreover, when the Argo at Pagasae refused to launch out on the blue water which on land she had never known, the sea, summoned by the lyre, obeyed the music and came up to the stern of the sacred bark. The Thracian bard charmed with his quill the sunless land and the crackling flames of Acheron, and stopped the stone from rolling. Alas for the cruelty of the Ciconian women and the madness of the Thracians! alas for Rhodope pronounced guilty by the gods! When the Hebrus bore his severed head to the sea, both banks followed it; and then, when it was carried along by the rushing waves, suddenly the sea-beasts emerged from the water and bounded high at the low sound of that voice all over the sea.” Thus Teuthras, votary of Castalia and the Muses, enfeebled by his music the soldiers’ war-hardened hearts.

  Meanwhile Mago had been wafted by gentle breezes to the Libyan land. His ship, wreathed with laurel, entered the desired harbour, and the glittering spoils on her lofty bows shone from a distance across the water. Then the shouting of the sailors, which had long been rising from the open sea, filled all the shore with its sound; and, when the rowers all together brought the oars back sharply to their breasts, the sea foamed under the stroke of a hundred blades. Eager to snatch a hasty joy, the citizens waded out into the water, and the exuberant crowd eagerly hailed the good news with a storm of applause. Hannibal is ranked with the gods. All the women, all the little children, rejoicing at their mothers’ bidding, and all the older citizens — senate and people alike — think him worthy of divine honours and the slaughter of oxen. Thus Mago came back to Carthage and entered the gates that rang with the report of his brother’s exploits. The senate assembled in haste, and the senate-house was packed with a great assembly. Mago prayed to the gods in the fashion of his sires and then spoke thus: “I bring news of a great victory: the strength upon which Italy relied has been shattered; and I myself played no small part in the work. The gods favoured us in the battle. There is a land which bears the name of a famous king of Aetolia and was possessed by Daunus in an age long past; the rapid stream of the Aufidus flows round the watery plains and cuts off the promise of harvest by its floods; and later, dashing against the waves of the Adriatic, with a loud noise it forces the salt water to retreat seawards.

  Here the Roman commanders — Paulus, a name honoured in Latium, and Varro — took the field, when the darkness of night had hardly been dispelled; and the far-seen glitter of their weapons added a brighter light to the rising sun. We marched quickly from the camp to meet them; for my brother was driven on by a passionate desire for battle. The earth shook and the welkin rang as we fought. Then our general, as great a leader in war as this earth ever bore, hid the river and the plains with heaps of corpses. Before my eyes all Italy was routed and fled from him alone, from the fierce onset and the sound of his warfare. Before my eyes degenerate Varro threw down his arms and galloped from the field. I witnessed also the death of brave Paulus, when he fell, pierced through with many a dart, above the corpses of his men. The great slaughter of that day avenged the Aegatian Islands and the treaty of subservience; we could not wish to pray for more than was granted us then by divine favour. If such a day came over again, Carthage would be the sole ruler over all nations and would be honoured over all the world. As evidence of the slaughter, behold these tokens, which it is the custom of high-born Romans to wear on their left hand.” Therewith he poured forth before their astonished eyes glittering rings of gold; and the truth of his words was confirmed by the goodly heap of rings. Then he began again: “Rome is undermined, and it only remains to wrench her from her foundations and level her with the ground. Let us make the effort,” he cried; “recruit your armies weakened by so many losses, and open wide your treasury for the pay of mercenaries. Our elephants, so dreaded by the Romans, are now few in number; and our want of food-supplies troubles us.”

  While speaking thus he directed fierce looks at Hanno whose crooked mind had long been tortured by the growing fame of Hannibal: “Do you approve now of the deeds that our hands have wrought? Am I permitted now to refuse a Roman for my master? Or will you vote a second time for the surrender of Hannibal? Unhappy man, be softened at last by so many glorious trophies, and change that heart, so black with the poison of jealousy and so full of bitter gall. See, that hand, that hand which you wished to give up to the Roman torturers, has filled shores and rivers, lakes and spreading plains, with Roman blood.” Thus Mago spoke, and the manifest sympathy of his hearers gave him confidence.

  Then Hanno answered, urged on at once by jealousy and anger: “Such abuse does not surprise me, coming from a brain-sick youth. He is proud by nature, and it is easy to recognize his brother’s disposition and the stingless venom of his tongue. He need not suppose that I have changed and am giving up my policy in despair. For I propose that we should now sue for peace, should now lay down the arms that are stained by a breach of treaty, and avoid a war that will destroy us. Or rather, do you yourselves weigh well his proposals; there is no other decision for us to come to. He asks for arms, soldiers, and gold, for fleets, provisions, and elephants. Had he been defeated, he could not have asked for more. We have drenched the soil of Italy with Roman blood, and all Latium is laid low on the battle-fields. Then suffer us at last, noble conqueror, to forget our troubles and take our ease at home; suffer us to keep some children in the families so often thinned by the insatiable demands of war. Now, yes now, I say — I pray that my forecast may prove untrue and my mind may be the victim of a mere delusion — the fatal day is at hand. I know the stubborn hearts of the foe, and I foresee the martial ardour that defeat will breed. It is Cannae, Cannae that I fear. Lower your standards, or rather, make haste to sue for peace and demand it. You will not get it. Believe me, their resentment is hatching a worse destruction than that which they have suffered; and they will make this peace more readily when victorious than when they are defeated. Or rather tell us, you who proclaim those great deeds so proudly and fill the ears of the ignorant with your frothy flood of words — tell us, why that brother of yours, that match for Mars in battle, the greatest general whom earth has ever borne, has never yet set eyes on the walls of Rome. Shall we, forsooth, snatch from their mothers’ laps boys who are not yet fit to carry heavy armour, and make them fight? Shall we, at his demand, build a thousand ships of war and ransack all Libya for elephants, in order that Hannibal may prolong his command and fight on for years and exercise a tyrant’s sway till the day of his death? But I appeal to you — for the trap is set in our sight — rob not your homes of your loved ones, but set a limit to the armies and the power of these potentates. Peace is the best thing that man may know; peace alone is better than a thousand triumphs; peace has power to guard our lives and secure equality among fellow-citizens. Let us then after so long recall peace to the city of Carthage, and banish the reproach of treach
ery from Dido’s city. If Hannibal has such a passion for war and disobeys his country when she bids him sheathe the sword, then I advise you to refuse all supplies to such a madman, and I move that Mago report this answer to his brother.”

  He would have added more; for he had not yet said enough to gratify his wrath; but loud cries of dissent confounded him:— “If Hannibal, the glory of Libya, the invincible general, excites your anger, shall we leave the conqueror in the lurch just when he is reaching the goal, and refuse to send him supplies? Shall the jealousy of one man delay the imperial power which is already secured?” Then they eagerly voted the supplies required for war, and, in the presence of a witness, made a show of their devotion to the absent general. Next they decided to send supplies also to Spain, though malicious envy belittled Hannibal’s immortal deeds and sought to refuse the assistance needed for the increase of his fame.

  BOOK XII

  ARGUMENT

  HANNIBAL LEAVES CAPUA: HIS TROOPS HAVE LOST THEIR VIGOUR AND FAIL IN ATTACKS UPON NEAPOLIS, CUMAE, AND PUTEOLI (1-103). HE VISITS BAIAE AND OTHER FAMOUS PLACES (103-157). HE MARCHES AGAINST NOLA BUT IS BEATEN OFF BY MARCELLUS (158294). THE ROMANS BECOME MORE HOPEFUL AND ARE FURTHER ENCOURAGED BY AN ORACLE FROM DELPHI (295-341). THE WAR IN SARDINIA: TORQUATUS DEFEATS HAMPSAGORAS: A TRIBUTE TO THE POET ENNIUS (342-419). HANNIBAL BURNS SEVERAL CITIES AND TAKES THE CITY OF TARENTUM BUT NOT THE CITADEL (420-448). HE RETURNS TO DEFEND CAPUA AGAINST A ROMAN BLOCKADE, BEATING TWO ROMAN ARMIES ON THE WAY: HE BURIES THE BODY OF TI. SEMPRONIUS GRACCHUS (449-478). UNABLE TO FORCE HIS WAY INTO CAPUA, HE MARCHES AGAINST ROME (479-540). CONSTERNATION AT ROME (541-557). HE EXAMINES THE WALLS AND SURROUNDINGS OF THE CITY, BUT IS DRIVEN BACK TO HIS CAMP BY FULVIUS FLACCUS WHO HAD HASTENED BACK FROM CAMPANIA (558-573). TWO ATTEMPTS TO FIGHT A BATTLE ARE FRUSTRATED BY A TERRIBLE STORM SENT BY JUPITER (574-667). MAKING A THIRD ATTEMPT, HE IS STOPPED BY JUNO, ACTING BY JUPITER’S COMMAND (668-730). REJOICING OF THE ROMANS (731-752).

  UNKINDLY Winter was now hiding in the earth his icy head, his temples fraught with storms, and his cloud-capped brow that towers aloft with menace of gales; and healthful Spring was cheering the land with her gentle zephyrs and clear warm weather. Then the Carthaginians burst forth from Capua with terror in their van, and harassed all the surrounding country. Thus the serpent hides away in winter while the Riphaean mountains are frozen by the North-wind’s breath; but at last, when the season gives it confidence, it glides forth from its secret lair and glitters with a new skin, lifting up its shining head and breathing forth venom from its erected throat. When Hannibal’s dreaded standards gleamed over the land, the country became a desert: driven by fear men shut themselves up behind fortifications and awaited the enemy, trembling for their lives and distrusting even their walls.

  But the former hardihood which had burst through the Alps and cleared a path for the army, which had mastered the Trebia and defiled the Etruscan lake with Italian blood, was no longer there. Their limbs were sluggish and flabby, enervated by luxury and ease, by wine and the enticements of sleep. Once they had been used to spend cold nights under a stormy sky while wearing their heavy breastplates, and had often despised a tent when the rain and hail of winter were pouring down; even at night they did not put off sword and buckler, quivers and lances, but treated their weapons as parts of their bodies. But now the helmet was a burden, the light shield felt too heavy, and their spears made no whizzing sound as they went forth.

  When Hannibal renewed the strife, mild Parthenope was the first to feel it, not because the city was wealthy or because he despised its courage; but the harbour was the attraction: he wanted safe anchorage for vessels coming from Carthage. That city is now an abode of peace, a resting-place where the Muses dwell, and life there is free from pressing anxieties. Parthenope, daughter of Achelous, gave the city its famous name. She was one of the Sirens, and her singing long ruled the waves, when her boding voice sang melodious destruction across the water to hapless sailors. The front of the city was defended by the sea, and therefore Hannibal attacked it on the landward side; but all his efforts failed to break open an entrance: he was baffled in the attempt and vainly belaboured the barred gates with the blows of his battering-rams. The victor of Cannae stood helpless before a Greek city; and the event proved the wisdom of his caution, when he refused to march from the bloody field of Daunus against the citadel of Rome. “You called me a laggard who could not follow up his victory, because you were not allowed to scale the walls of Rome immediately after the battle. Well, then, enter Naples and make for me, in a city defended by Greeks, the banquet which you promised to set in the abode of the Thunderer.” Thus he reproached his men, and, fearing for his fame in time coming if he were to fall back baffled from the first city he attacked, he shrank from no risks and used stratagems to sharpen his assault. But fire flashed suddenly from the walls, and a shower of missiles was discharged unexpectedly from the whole circuit of the ramparts. Even so, when the tawny bird of Jupiter has hidden her young on the top of a cliff, if a serpent climbs noiselessly up the height and opens its dreaded jaws near the nestlings, the mother-bird flies round and round the nest, attacking the foe with her beak and the talons that are wont to carry thunderbolts.

  Wearied out at last he thought to shift his quarters to the seaport of Cumae hard by, to challenge Fortune by change of place, and to prevent loss of reputation by causing unrest. But Gracchus, the governor of the city, a surer defence than the walls themselves, kept the enemy away from the place, preventing them from encamping again by the gates and from hoping again to force an entrance. Hannibal lost courage: he rode about at furious speed and examined closely all the country round; and he tried once more to excite his men by reminding them of their past deeds: “Great Heavens!” he cried; “soldiers, forgetful of your past, is your onward march to be stopped for ever by Greek cities? Will you nowhere draw the line? A mightier obstacle than the Alps, forsooth, blocks your way, and I bid you climb peaks that touch the sky! And yet, if a land like that were before us now and other cliffs were suddenly to rise as high as heaven, would you not go forward, if I led you, and carry your arms up the heights? Are you the men to stand and gape, barred by the ramparts and walls of Cumae, and by Gracchus who dares not stir outside the gates? I see it all but certain, that the world will impute to chance every result of your exertions. By Lake Trasimene where the gods favoured us, by the Trebia and by the ashes of Saguntum, I implore you to make yourselves once more worthy of the reputation you trail after you; and remember Cannae.”

  Thus their leader sought to lift up and steady the hearts enfeebled by luxury and enervated by prosperity. And here, while studying all the means of approach, he saw a temple shining on the summit of the citadel; and Virrius, the harsh governor of proud Capua, then explained its origin. “That building above us,” he said, “was not the work of our time: it was raised by other hands in ancient days. When Daedalus — so the legend runs — feared the power of the Cretan king, he found a way to escape from our world and leave no trace for Minos who pursued him over the whole earth. He dared to ascend the sky on wings not his own and to reveal to mankind the art of flying. Keeping his body poised amid the clouds, he floated on, and the strange winged creature alarmed the gods. He taught his son also to put on a counterfeit semblance of wings and attempt the flight of birds; but, when the feathery oarage melted, he saw him fall and splash the stormy sea with his ill-starred wings. Yielding to his sudden grief, Daedalus smote, his breast, and his blows steered his flight though he knew it not. And here he raised a temple to Phoebus in gratitude for his voyage through the clouds, and here put off his daring wings.”

  So Virrius spoke; but Hannibal was counting up all the idle days that had passed without battle, and was ashamed of inactivity. He groaned at his failure; and looking back at the town he had besieged in vain, he sought to wreak his anger on the city of Dicaearehus. But here too his attempts were foiled, now by the sea, now by the massive stone walls and the exertions of the defenders. And, while h
is men laboured on and on, endeavouring to force a difficult passage through obstruction, he himself visited the strange sights which the neighbouring waters and land presented.

  The nobles of Capua attended him. One explained how the hot springs of Baiae got their name, pointing out that they were named after a mariner who sailed with Ulysses. Another told how the Lucrine lake was called Cocytus in former times, and praised the road which Hercules made over the sea, when the son of Amphitryon, after mastering the Spanish herd, parted the waters asunder. A third pointed out Lake Avernus, formerly called Styx by the people, but now, under a new name, famous among healing waters. Once dreaded by birds and awful in the gloomy shade of a dark forest, it sent up a poisonous exhalation to the lowering sky; the infernal deities were worshipped there with savage rites still kept up by the cities. A swamp, not far away — legend tells that it opens a way to the river Acheron — opens up darksome abysses of stagnant water, and reveals hideous fissures in the earth, and sometimes startles the ghosts below by a flash of light. Then his guides tell Hannibal that close at hand, wrapped in gloom and sunk for long ages in subterranean mists, the city of the Cimmerians lay deep in earth under a pall of shade; and they describe the unfathomed night of that Tartarean city. Next they point to the fields that ever breathe out fire and sulphur and boiling pitch. A black steam rises from the ground; and the earth, long heated by subterranean fires, rumbles and heaves and sends up blasts from Hell into the air. Mulciber is in labour and sends forth a dread sound of hissing from his uneasy caves. At times he struggles to burst his caverns or emerge from the sea; then he sends forth a mournful and menacing rumbling and devours the torn bowels of the earth, and mutters as he undermines the crumbling mountains. Men say that the Giants whom the might of Hercules overthrew shake the earth that lies piled above them; the distant fields are scorched by their panting breath, and, whenever they threaten to burst the framework of their burden, the gods tremble. They could see Prochyte, the place appointed for savage Mimas, and Inarime in the distance, which stands above Iapetus, while he spouts forth black smoke and flame from his mutinous jaws, and seeks, if he is ever suffered to get free, to renew his war against Jupiter and the gods. They showed Hannibal Mount Vesuvius, where fire has eaten away the rocks at its summit, and the wreckage of the mountain lies all around, and the discharge of stones seeks to rival the death dealt by Etna. He saw Misenum also which preserves the name of the Trojan who lies buried there, and Bauli, built by Hercules close by the sea. He looked with wonder at all the anger of the sea and the unrest of the land.