The Bravery of Regulus 1/2
The first part of the fourth tale from Heroes of History
The first wars that the Romans engaged in beyond the bounds of Italy were with the Carthaginians. This race came from Tyre and Sidon and descended from some of the Phoenicians, or Sidonians, who were such dangerous foes, or more dangerous friends, to the Israelites.
Carthage had, as some say, been first founded by some of the Canaanites who fled when Joshua conquered the Promised Land, and whether this were so or not, the inhabitants were in all their ways the same as the Tyrians and Sidonians of whom so much is said in the prophecies of Isaiah and Ezekiel. Like them, they worshiped Baal and Ashtoreth, and the frightful Moloch, with foul and cruel rites, and like them they were excellent sailors and great merchants trading with every known country, living in great riches and splendor at their grand city on the southern shore of the Mediterranean.
That they were a wicked and cruel race is also certain; the Romans used to call deceit Punic faith, that is, Phoenician faith, and though no doubt Roman writers show them up in their worst colors, yet after the time of Hiram, Solomon’s ally at Tyre, it is plain from Holy Scripture that their crimes were great.
The first dispute between Rome and Carthage was about their possession in the island of Sicily. The war thus begun had lasted eight years when it was resolved to send an army to fight the Carthaginians on their own shores. The army and fleet were placed under the command of the two consuls, Lucius Manlius and Marcus Attilius Regulus.
On the way, there was a great sea fight with the Carthaginian fleet, and this was the first naval battle that the Romans ever gained. It made the way to Africa free, but the soldiers, who had never been so far from home before, murmured—for they expected to meet not only human enemies but monstrous serpents, lions, elephants, asses with horns, and dog-headed monsters; to have a scorching sun overhead and a noisome marsh under their feet. However, Regulus sternly put a stop to all murmurs by making it known that disaffection would be punished by death, and the army safely landed, and set up a fortification at Clypea, and plundered the whole country round.
Orders here came from Rome that Manlius should return thither but that Regulus should remain to carry on the war. This was a great grief to him. He was a very poor man, with nothing of his own but a little farm of seven acres, and the person whom he had employed to cultivate it had died in his absence. A hired laborer had undertaken the care of it, but he had been unfaithful and had run away with his tools and his cattle, so that he was afraid that, unless he could return quickly, his wife and children would starve.
However, the Senate engaged to provide for his family, and he remained, making expeditions into the country round, in the course of which the Romans really did fall in with a serpent as monstrous as their imagination had depicted. It was said to be 120 feet long and dwelt upon the banks of the River Bagrada, where it used to devour the Roman soldiers as they went to fetch water. It had such tough scales that they were obliged to attack it with their engines meant for battering city walls and only succeeded with much difficulty in destroying it.
The country was most beautiful, covered with fertile cornfields and full of rich fruit trees, and all the rich Carthaginians had country houses and gardens, which were made delicious with fountains, trees, and flowers. The Roman soldiers, plain, hardy, fierce, and pitiless, did, it must be feared, cruel damage among these peaceful scenes; they boasted of having sacked 300 villages, and mercy was not yet known to them.
The Carthaginian army, though strong in horsemen and in elephants, kept upon the hills and did nothing to save the country, and the wild desert tribes of Numidians came rushing in to plunder what the Romans had left. The Carthaginians sent to offer terms of peace, but Regulus, who had become uplifted by his conquests, made such demands that the messengers remonstrated.
He answered, “Men who are good for anything should either conquer or submit to their betters,” and he sent them rudely away, like a stern old Roman as he was. His merit was that he had no more mercy on himself than on others.
The Carthaginians were driven to extremity and made horrible offerings to Moloch, giving the little children of the noblest families to be dropped into the fire between the brazen hands of his statue, and grown-up people of the noblest families rushed in of their own accord, hoping thus to propitiate their gods and obtain safety for their country. Their time was not yet fully come, and a respite was granted to them.
They had sent, in their distress, to hire soldiers in Greece, and among these came a Spartan named Xanthippus, who at once took the command and led the army out to battle, with a long line of elephants ranged in front of them and with clouds of horsemen hovering on the wings. The Romans had not yet learned the best mode of fighting with elephants, namely, to leave lanes in their columns where these huge beasts might advance harmlessly. Instead, the ranks were thrust and trampled down by the creatures’ bulk, and they suffered a terrible defeat; Regulus himself was seized by the horsemen and dragged into Carthage, where the victors feasted and rejoiced through half the night, testifying their thanks to Moloch by offering in his fires the bravest of their captives. Regulus himself was not, however, one of these victims. He was kept a close prisoner for two years, pining and sickening in his loneliness.
The End, Part One