country; and that it would be difficult to
excuse some actions and circumstances of his life. Polybius observes,(846)
that Hannibal was accused of avarice in Carthage, and of cruelty in Rome.
He adds, on the same occasion, that people were very much divided in
opinion concerning him; and it would be no wonder, as he had made himself
so many enemies in both cities, that they should have drawn him in
disadvantageous colours. But Polybius is of opinion, that though it should
be taken for granted, that all the defects with which he is charged are
true; yet that they were not so much owing to his nature and disposition,
as to the difficulties with which he was surrounded, in the course of so
long and laborious a war; and to the complacency he was obliged to show to
the general officers, whose assistance he absolutely wanted, for the
execution of his various enterprises; and whom he was not always able to
restrain, any more than he could the soldiers who fought under them.

SECT. II. DISSENSIONS BETWEEN THE CARTHAGINIANS AND MASINISSA, KING OF
NUMIDIA.--Among the conditions of the peace granted to the Carthaginians,
there was one which enacted, that they should restore to Masinissa all the
territories and cities he possessed before the war; and further, Scipio,
to reward the zeal and fidelity which that monarch had shown towards the
Romans, had added to his dominions those of Syphax. This present
afterwards gave rise to disputes and quarrels between the Carthaginians
and Numidians.

These two princes, Syphax and Masinissa, were both kings in Numidia, but
reigned over different nations. The subjects of Syphax were called
Masaesuli, and their capital was Cirtha. Those of Masinissa were the
Massyli: but they are better known by the name of Numidians, which was
common to them both. Their principal strength consisted in their cavalry.
They always rode without saddles, and some even without bridles, whence
Virgil(847) calls them _Numidae infraeni_.

In the beginning of the second Punic war,(848) Syphax siding with the
Romans, Gala, the father of Masinissa, to check the career of so powerful
a neighbour, thought it his interest to join the Carthaginians, and
accordingly sent out against Syphax a powerful army under the conduct of
his son, at that time but seventeen years of age. Syphax, being overcome
in a battle, in which it is said he lost thirty thousand men, escaped into
Mauritania. However, the face of things was afterwards gr