THE FIRST PUNIC WAR.
264-240.
We are now come to the time when Rome became mixed up in wars with
nations beyond Italy. There was a great settlement of the Phoenicians,
the merchants of the old world, at Carthage, on the northern coast of
Africa, the same place at which Virgil afterwards described Æneas as
spending so much time. Dido, the queen who was said to have founded
Carthage when fleeing from her wicked brother-in-law at Tyre, is thought
to have been an old goddess, and the religion and manners of the
Carthaginians were thoroughly Phoenician, or, as the Romans called them,
Punic. They had no king, but a Senate, and therewith rulers called by
the name that is translated as judges in the Bible; and they did not
love war, only trade, and spread out their settlements for this purpose
all over the coast of the Mediterranean, from Spain to the Black Sea,
wherever a country had mines, wool, dyes, spices, or men to trade with;
and their sailors were the boldest to be found anywhere, and were the
only ones who had passed beyond the Pillars of Hercules, namely, the
Straits of Gibraltar, in the Atlantic Ocean. They built handsome cities,
and country houses with farms and gardens round them, and had all tokens
of wealth and luxury--ivory, jewels, and spices from India, pearls from
the Persian Gulf, gold from Spain, silver from the Balearic Isles, tin
from the Scilly Isles, amber from the Baltic; and they had forts to
protect their settlements. They generally hired the men of the
countries, where they settled, to fight their battles, sometimes under
hired Greek captains, but often under generals of their own.
[Illustration: ROMAN SHIP.]
The first place where they did not have everything their own way was
Sicily. The old inhabitants of the island were called Sicels, a rough
people; but besides these there were a great number of Greek
settlements, also of Carthaginian ones, and these two hated one another.
The Carthaginians tried to overthrow the Greeks, and Pyrrhus, by
coming to help his countrymen, only made them more bitter against one
another. When he went away he exclaimed, "What an arena we leave for the
Romans and Carthaginians to contend upon!" so sure was he that these two
great nations must soon fight out the struggle for power.
The beginning of the struggle was, however, brought on by another cause.
Messina, the place founded long ago by the brave exiles of Messene, when
the Spartans had conquered their state, had been seized by a troop of
Mamertines, fierce Italians from Mamertum; and these, on being
threatened by Xiero, king of Syracuse, sent to offer to become subjects
to the Romans, thus giving them the command of the port which secured
the entrance of the island. The Senate had great scruples about
accepting the offer, and supporting a set of mere robbers; but the two
consuls and all the people could not withstand the temptation, and it
was resolved to assist the Mamertines. Thus began what was called the
First Punic War. The difficulty was, however, want of ships. The Romans
had none of their own, and though they collected a few from their Greek
allies in Italy, it was not in time to prevent some of the Mamertines
from surrendering the citadel to Xanno, the Carthaginian general, who
thought himself secure, and came down to treat with the Roman tribune
Claudius, haughtily bidding the Romans no more to try to meddle with the
sea, for they should not be allowed so much as to wash their hands in
it. Claudius, angered at this, treacherously laid hands on Xanno, and he
agreed to give up the castle on being set free; but he had better have
remained a prisoner, for the Carthaginians punished him with
crucifixion, and besieged Messina, but in vain.
The Romans felt that a fleet was necessary, and set to work to build war
galleys on the pattern of a Carthaginian one which had been wrecked upon
their coast. While a hundred ships were building, oarsmen were trained
to row on dry land, and in two months the fleet put to sea. Knowing that
there was no chance of being able to fight according to the regular
rules of running the beaks of their galleys into the sides of those of
their enemies, they devised new plans of letting heavy weights descend
on the ships of the opposite fleet, and then of letting drawbridges down
by which to board them. The Carthaginians, surprised and dismayed, when
thus attacked off Mylæ by the consul Duilius, were beaten and chased to
Sardinia, where their unhappy commander was nailed to a cross by his own
soldiers; while Duilius not only received in Rome a grand triumph for
his first naval victory, but it was decreed that he should never go out
into the city at night without a procession of torch-bearers.
The Romans now made up their minds to send an expedition to attack the
Carthaginian power not only in Sicily but in Africa, and this was placed
under the command of a sturdy plebeian consul, Marcus Attilius Regulus.
He fought a great battle with the Carthaginian fleet on his way, and he
had even more difficulty with his troops, who greatly dreaded the
landing in Africa as a place of unknown terror. He landed, however, at
some distance from the city, and did not at once advance on it. When he
did, according to the story current at Rome, he encountered on the banks
of the River Bagrada an enormous serpent, whose poisonous breath killed
all who approached it, and on whose scales darts had no effect. At last
the machines for throwing huge stones against city walls were used
against it; its backbone was broken, and it was at last killed, and its
skin sent to Rome.
The Romans met other enemies, whom they defeated, and gained much
plunder. The Senate, understanding that the Carthaginians were cooped up
within their walls, recalled half the army. Regulus wished much to
return, as the slave who tilled his little farm had run away with his
plough, and his wife was in distress; but he was so valuable that he
could not be recalled, and he remained and soon took Tunis. The
Carthaginians tried to win their gods' favor back by offering horrid
human sacrifices to Moloch and Baal, and then hired a Spartan general
named Xanthippus, who defeated the Romans, chiefly by means of the
elephants, and made Regulus prisoner. The Romans, who hated the
Carthaginians so much as to believe them capable of any wickedness,
declared that in their jealousy of Xanthippus' victory, they sent him
home to Greece in a vessel so arranged as to founder at sea.
[Illustration: ROMAN ORDER OF BATTLE.]
However, the Romans, after several disasters in Sicily, gained a great
victory near Panormus, capturing one hundred elephants, which were
brought to Rome to be hunted by the people that they might lose their
fear of them. The Carthaginians were weakened enough to desire peace,
and they sent Regulus to propose it, making him swear to return if he
did not succeed. He came to the outskirts of the city, but would not
enter. He said he was no Roman proconsul, but the slave of Carthage.
However, the Senate came out to hear him, and he gave the message, but
added that the Romans ought not to accept these terms, but to stand
out for much better ones, giving such reasons that the whole people was
persuaded. He was entreated to remain and not meet the angry men of
Carthage; but nothing would persuade him to break his word, and he went
back. The Romans told dreadful stories of the treatment he met with--how
his eyelids were cut off and he was put in the sunshine, and at last he
was nailed up in a barrel lined with spikes and rolled down hill. Some
say that this was mere report, and that Carthaginian prisoners at Rome
were as savagely treated; but at any rate the constancy of Regulus has
always been a proverb.
The war went on, and one of the proud Claudius family was in command at
Trepanum, in Sicily, when the enemy's fleet came in sight. Before a
battle the Romans always consulted the sacred fowls that were carried
with the army. Claudius was told that their augury was against a
battle--they would not eat. "Then let them drink," he cried, and threw
them into the sea. His impiety, as all felt it, was punished by an utter
defeat, and he killed himself to avoid an enquiry. The war went on by
land and sea all over and around Sicily, till at the end of twenty-four
years peace was made, just after another great sea-fight, in which Rome
had the victory. She made the Carthaginians give up all they held in
Sicily, restore their prisoners, make a large payment, and altogether
humble their claims; thus beginning a most bitter hatred towards the
conquerors, who as greatly hated and despised them. Thus ended the First
Punic War.
[Illustration]