23.18
When
Hannibal was now not far from the place he sent on in advance a troop of
Gaetulians under an officer named Isalca, to try and get a parley with the
inhabitants and persuade them by fair words to open their gates and admit a
Carthaginian detachment to hold the town. If they refused, they were to use
force and make an attack, wherever it seemed feasible, on the place. When
they approached the walls the town was so silent that they thought it was
deserted, and taking it for granted that the inhabitants had fled through fear
they began to force the gates and break down the bars. Suddenly the gates
were thrown open and two cohorts which had been standing inside ready for
action dashed out and made a furious charge, utterly discomfiting the enemy.
Maharbal was sent with a stronger force to their assistance, but even he was
unable to withstand the impetuosity of the cohorts. At last Hannibal pitched
his camp before the walls, and made preparations for assaulting the little
town and its small garrison with the combined strength of his entire army.
After completing the circle of his investing lines he began to harass and
annoy the garrison, and in this way lost some of his most daring soldiers who
were hit with missiles from the wall and turrets. On one occasion when the
defenders were taking the aggressive in a sortie he nearly cut them off with
his elephants and drove them in hasty flight into the city; the loss,
considering their numbers, was quite severe enough, and more would have
fallen had not night intervened. The next day there was a general desire to
begin the assault. The enthusiasm of the men had been kindled by the offer of
a "mural crown" of gold and also by the way in which the general himself
remonstrated with the men who had taken Saguntum for their slackness in
attacking a little fortress situated in open country, and also reminded them
one and all of Cannae, Trasumennus, and the Trebia. The vineae were
brought up and mines commenced, but the various attempts of the enemy
were opposed with equal strength and skill by the defenders, the allies of
Rome; they created defences against the vineae, intercepted their mines with
counter-mines, and met all their attacks above ground or below with steady
resistance until at last Hannibal for very shame gave up his project. He
contented himself with fortifying his camp and leaving a small force to
defend it, so that it might not be supposed that the siege was entirely
abandoned; after which he settled in Capua as his winter quarters.
There he kept his army under shelter for the greater part of the
winter. A long and varied experience had inured that army to every form of
human suffering, but it had not been habituated to or had any experience of
ease and comfort. So it came about that the men whom no pressure of
calamity had been able to subdue fell victims to a prosperity too great and
pleasures too attractive for them to withstand, and fell all the more utterly
the more greedily they plunged into new and untried delights. Sloth, wine,
feasting, women, baths, and idle lounging, which became every day more
seductive as they became more habituated to them, so enervated their minds
and bodies that they were saved more by the memory of past victories than
by any fighting strength they possessed now. Authorities in military matters
have regarded the wintering at Capua as a greater mistake on the part of
Hannibal than his not marching straight to Rome after his victory at Cannae.
For his delay at that time might be looked upon as only postponing his final
victory but this may be considered as having deprived him of the strength to
win victory. And it certainly did look as if he left Capua with another army
altogether; it did not retain a shred of its former discipline. A large number
who had become entangled with women went back there, and as soon as
they took to tents again and the fatigue of marching and other military toils
had to be endured their strength and spirits alike gave way just as though
they were raw recruits. From that time all through the summer campaign a
large number left the standards without leave, and Capua was the only place
where the deserters sought to hide themselves.
