Hannibal by Ernle Bradford Read Free Book Online Page A

preparations for which can hardly have gone undetected, two Roman envoys reached him with the message that the city came under Roman protection. This he knew, but he could also claim that the fact had not been mentioned in the treaty with Hasdrubal, and that the Romans had been meddling in affairs well south of the Ebro. The envoys, coldly dismissed, made their way to Carthage, where they hoped to convince the peace party that Hannibal had broken faith and that the senate in Rome was threatening war. Meanwhile the siege of Saguntum continued, the city holding out bravely for all of eight months, to fall with the inevitable rapine and massacre that marked the end of long-disputed sieges. A large portion of the spoil was set aside to be sent to Carthage as an earnest of the riches of further conquest. The news of Saguntum reached Rome at about the same time as the return of their envoys from Carthage, bearing the message that the Carthaginians had no regard for any treaty between Rome and Saguntum.
    There followed a confused debate in Rome, some of the nobles declaring for war immediately and others favouring negotiations, while the assemblies of the people voted for peace. A compromise was finally reached and a delegation sent to North Africa to inquire whether Hannibal had been acting under his own initiative over Saguntum, or on the orders of the Carthaginians. If they disavowed Hannibal, then he must be handed over to Roman authority. Much argument followed, the Carthaginians denying that Hannibal had committed any offence against Rome and maintaining that, to their knowledge, there had never been any treaty of alliance between Rome and this city, which in any case was well within the sphere of Carthaginian influence. In conclusion they refused to surrender Hannibal and asked the Roman envoys what was now their intention. Fabius, the leader of the delegation, placed his hand in his toga with a melodramatic gesture and asked them to choose: ‘Peace or war?’ After some consultation with the senate, the elder of the two Carthaginian suffetes (the senior administrators and judges) told the Roman to make the decision himself. When Fabius said ‘War’, the Carthaginians replied, ‘We accept!’ The Second Punic War, the Hannibalic War as it came to be known, had been declared.
    The news that Carthage was officially at war with Rome reached Hannibal when he was back at New Carthage. With a successful campaign behind him, and with his men well paid and snug in their winter quarters, it was pleasant to receive the reassurance that Carthage supported him. It was not difficult to arouse enthusiasm among the troops for a long and hazardous expedition (though it is doubtful if as yet he disclosed their real destination), for the news that the arrogant Romans had demanded the surrender of their general was enough to infuriate them and the thought of further plunder lured them on. The successful record of Hamilcar and Hasdrubal the Handsome and the infinite promise held out by this young Carthaginian lion made recruitment easy. The thought of a campaign beginning in the new year of 118 B.C. was as attractive as the thought of spring itself. The fact that the Romans had been unable to save Saguntum had so reduced their reputation that a Roman mission to northern Spain was sent back contemptuously to Gaul. Here they found little if any more friendliness. The Gauls were determined in any ensuing conflict between Rome and Carthage to remain neutral although, aware of the treatment of their kinsmen in Italy, their inclination was to take sides with the Carthaginians.
    Hannibal knew all this, and knew also that the disconsolate Roman mission had returned to Rome with the news that Spain was hostile, the Gauls neutral but unfriendly, and only the people of Massilia firmly committed to their cause. When the two new consuls were chosen for the year the most active of them, Publius Cornelius Scipio, drew the lot which determined him to regard