s, a stream which enters the Po near Pavia, he
encountered the Romans under Scipio, the father of Scipio Africanus.
The cavalry of both armies joined battle, Hannibal's Numidian horse
proved their superiority, and Scipio fell back beyond the Po. The
Carthaginians crossed the river, and the first great battle of the
campaign was fought in the plain of the Trebia. Placing Mago in ambush
with 2,000 men, Hannibal enticed the Romans across the stream. His
light troops retired before the legionaries, and as Scipio was
pressing on to fancied victory he was taken in flank by the terrible
Numidian horse, Mago came down in the rear, and the 40,000 men of the
consular army were either cut to pieces or scattered in flight.
Wintering in the valley of the Po, in the early spring Hannibal
crossed the Apennines and pushed through a region of lakes, flooded by
the melting of the snow, to Faesulae. The beasts of burden perished in
vast numbers amid the morasses; the Gauls, disheartened by the perils
of the journey, had to be driven forward by Mago's horsemen, and the
general lost an eye. Quitting Faesulae, Hannibal wasted Etruria with
fire and sword, and marched toward Rome, leaving behind him two
consular armies of 60,000 men. He awaited the consul Flaminius by the
Lake Trasimene, where the hills, retiring in a semicircle from the
shore, inclose a plain entered by two narrow passes. Concealing the
main body of his army amid the hills, he placed his Numidians in
ambush at the pass by which the Romans must enter; while he stationed
part of his infantry in a conspicuous position near the other defile.
The Romans pushed into the valley; the pass in their rear was secured
by the Carthaginians who had lain in ambush; Hannibal's men charged
from the heights, and the army of Flaminius was annihilated. Six
thousand infantry cut their way through the farther pass, but these
were overtaken by the horse under Maherbal and forced to yield on the
following day.

After recruiting his men in the champaign country of Picenum, where
the Numidian horses, we are told, were groomed with old Italian wine,
Hannibal marched through Apulia and ravaged Campania, dogged by the
dictator Quintus Fabius Maximus, whom he vainly endeavored to entice
into an engagement. He wintered at Gerontium, and in the spring took
up a position at Cannae, on the Aufidus. A Roman army of 80,000 men,
under the consuls L. AEmilius Paulus and P. Terentius Varro, marched
against him. H