aving read to them some fictitious letters,
by which advice was given him, of a secret design concerted betwixt some
of their comrades and Gisgo for rescuing him out of prison, where he had
been so long detained; he brought them to the barbarous resolution of
murdering him and all the rest of the prisoners; and any man, who durst
offer any milder counsel, was immediately sacrificed to their fury.
Accordingly, this unfortunate general, and seven hundred prisoners who
were confined with him, were brought out to the front of the camp, where
Gisgo fell the first sacrifice, and afterwards all the rest. Their hands
were cut off, their thighs broken, and their bodies, still breathing, were
thrown into a hole. The Carthaginians sent a herald to demand their
remains, in order to pay them the last sad office, but were refused; and
the herald was further told, that whoever presumed to come upon the like
errand, should meet with Gisgo's fate. And, indeed, the rebels immediately
came to the unanimous resolution, of treating all such Carthaginians as
should fall into their hands in the same barbarous manner; and decreed
farther, that if any of their allies were taken, they should, after their
hands were cut off, be sent back to Carthage. This bloody resolution was
but too punctually executed.

The Carthaginians were now just beginning to breathe, as it were, and
recover their spirits, when a number of unlucky accidents plunged them
again into fresh dangers. A division arose among their generals; and the
provisions, of which they were in extreme necessity, coming to them by
sea, were all cast away in a storm. But the misfortune which they most
keenly felt, was, the sudden defection of the two only cities which till
then had preserved their allegiance, and in all times adhered inviolably
to the commonwealth. These were Utica and Hippacra. These cities, without
the least reason, or even so much as a pretence, went over at once to the
rebels; and, transported with the like rage and fury, murdered the
governor, with the garrison sent to their relief; and carried their
inhumanity so far, as to refuse their dead bodies to the Carthaginians,
who demanded them back in order for burial.

The rebels, animated by so much success, laid siege to Carthage, but were
obliged immediately to raise it. They nevertheless continued the war.
Having drawn together, into one body, all their own troops and those of
the allies, (making upwards of fifty thousan