econd division. The Romans were supported, but the
Carthaginian militia was wavering. Upon seeing this, Hannibal hastily
withdrew what remained of the two first lines to the flanks, and pushed
forward his choice Italian troops along the whole line. Scipio gathered
together in the centre all that were able to fight of the first line, and
made the second and third divisions close up on the right and left of the
first. Once again the conflict was renewed with more desperate fighting,
till the cavalry of the Romans and of Masinassa, returning from pursuit of
the beaten cavalry of the enemy, surrounded them on all sides. This
movement annihilated the Punic army. All was lost, and Hannibal was only
able to escape with a handful of men."

(M877) It was now in the power of Scipio to march upon Carthage and lay
siege to the city, neither protected nor provisioned. But he made no
extravagant use of his victory. He granted peace on the terms previously
rejected, with the addition of an annual tribute of two hundred talents
for fifty years. He had no object to destroy a city after its political
power was annihilated, and wickedly overthrow the primitive seat of
commerce, which was still one of the main pillars of civilization. He was
too great and wise a statesman to take such a revenge as the Romans sought
fifty years afterward. He was contented to end the war gloriously, and see
Carthage, the old rival, a tributary and broken power, with no possibility
of reviving its former schemes, B.C. 201.

(M878) This ended the Hannibalic war, which had lasted seventeen years,
and which gave to Rome the undisputed sovereignty of Italy, the conversion
of Spain into two Roman provinces, the union of Syracuse with the Roman
province of Sicily, the establishment of a Roman protectorate over the
Numidian chiefs, and the reduction of Carthage to a defenseless mercantile
city. The hegemony of Rome was established over the western region of the
Mediterranean. These results were great, but were obtained by the loss of
one quarter of the burgesses of Rome, the ruin of four hundred towns, the
waste of the accumulated capital of years, and the general demoralization
of the people. It might seem that the Romans could have lived side by side
with other nations in amity, as modern nations do. But, in ancient times,
"it was necessary to be either anvil or hammer." Either Rome or Carthage
was to become the great power of the world.