21.14
A
large crowd had gradually collected to listen to the speaker, and the popular
Assembly had become mingled with the senate, when without a moment's
warning the leading citizens withdrew before any reply was given. They
collected all the gold and silver from public and private sources and brought
it into the forum, where a fire had already been kindled, and flung it into the
flames, and most of them thereupon leaped into the fire themselves. The
terror and confusion which this occasioned throughout the city was
heightened by the noise of a tumult in the direction of the citadel. A tower
after much battering had fallen, and through the breach created by its fall a
Carthaginian cohort advanced to the attack and signalled to their commander
that the customary outposts and guards had disappeared and the city was
unprotected. Hannibal thought that he ought to seize the opportunity and act
promptly. Attacking it with his full strength, he took the place in a moment.
Orders had been given that all the adult males were to be put to death; a
cruel order, but under the circumstances inevitable, for whom would it have
been possible to spare when they either shut themselves up with their wives
and children and burnt their houses over their heads, or if they fought, would
not cease fighting till they were killed?