view, admits of a very different construction. Ferdinand had no confidence
in the discretion of his envoy, whom, if we are to believe the Spanish
writers, he employed in the affair more from accident than choice; and,
notwithstanding the full powers intrusted to him, he did not consider
himself bound to recognize the validity of any treaty which the other
should sign, until first ratified by himself. With these views, founded on
principles now universally recognized in European diplomacy, it was
natural to caution his general against any unauthorized interference on
the part of his envoy, which the rash and presumptuous character of the
latter, acting, moreover, under an undue influence of the French monarch,
gave him good reason to fear.

As to the Great Captain, who has borne a liberal share of censure on this
occasion, it is not easy to see how he could have acted otherwise than he
did, even in the event of no special instructions from Ferdinand. For he
would scarcely have been justified in abandoning a sure prospect of
advantage on the authority of one, the validity of whose powers he could
not determine, and which, in fact, do not appear to have warranted such
interference. The only authority he knew, was that from which he held his
commission, and to which he was responsible for the faithful discharge of
it.

[16] Neither Polybius (lib. 3, sec. 24 et seq.) nor Livy, (Hist., lib. 22,
cap. 43-50,) who give the most circumstantial narratives of the battle,
are precise enough to enable us to ascertain the exact spot in which it
was fought. Strabo, in his topographical notices of this part of Italy,
briefly alludes to "the affair of Cannae" (_ta peri Kannas_), without
any description of the scene of action. (Geog., lib. 6, p. 285.) Cluverius
fixes the site of the ancient Cannae on the right bank of the Anfidus, the
modern Ofanto, between three and four miles below Canusium; and notices