rather than self-indulgent merchants. So Carthage falls, after three
memorable struggles, extending over more than a century, during which
she produced the greatest general of antiquity, next to Caesar and
Alexander. But not even Hannibal could restore the fortunes of his
country, after having inflicted a bitter humiliation on his enemies.
That city of merchants, like Tyre and Sidon, must drink of the cup of
divine chastisement. Another type of civilization than that furnished by
a "mistress of the sea," was needed for Europe, and another rule for
Asia and Africa. The Carthaginians taught the Romans, in their contest,
how to build ships of war and fight naval battles. As many as three
hundred thousand men were engaged in that memorable sea-fight of Ecnomus
which opened to Regulus the way to Africa. Three times did the Romans
lose their fleets by tempests, and yet they persevered in building new
ones. The fortitude of the Romans, in view of the brilliant successes of
Hannibal, can never be sufficiently admired. The defeat at Cannae was a
catastrophe, but the troops of Fabius, to whom was left the defense of
the city, were not discouraged, and with Scipio--religious, self-reliant,
and lofty--the tide of victory turned. By the first Punic war, which
lasted twenty-two years, Rome gained Sicily; by the second, which opened
twenty-three years after the first, and lasted seventeen years, she
gained Sardinia, a foothold in Spain and Gaul, and a preponderance
throughout the western regions of Europe and Africa; by the third, which
occurred fifty years after the second, and continued but four years, she
gained all the provinces of Africa ruled by Carthage, and a great part
of Spain. Nothing was allowed to remain of the African capital. The
departing troops left behind complete desolation. The captives were sold
as slaves, or put to death, and enough of spoil rewarded the victors to
adorn a triumph only surpassed by that of Paulus on his return from the
conquest of Greece.