easury, what proportion of them was consumed by
the ordinary expenses of the state, and how much was alienated by
embezzlement; he asserted in an assembly of the people, that if
payment were enforced of the residuary funds, the taxes might be
remitted to the subjects; and that the state would still be rich
enough to pay the tribute to the Romans: which assertion he proved
to be true. But now those persons who, for several years past, had
maintained themselves by plundering the public, were greatly enraged;
as if this were ravishing from them their own property, and not as
dragging out of their hands their ill-gotten spoil. Accordingly, they
instigated the Romans against Hannibal, who were seeking a pretext
for indulging their hatred against him. A strenuous opposition was,
however, for a long time made to this by Scipio Africanus, who
thought it highly unbecoming the dignity of the Roman people to make
themselves a party in the animosities and charges against Hannibal;
to interpose the public authority among factions of the Carthaginians,
not deeming it sufficient to have conquered that commander in the
field, but to become as it were his prosecutors[1] in a judicial
process, and preferring an action against him. Yet at length the point
was carried, that an embassy should be sent to Carthage to represent
to the senate there, that Hannibal, in concert with king Antiochus,
was forming plans for kindling a war. Three ambassadors were sent,
Caius Servilius, Marcus Claudius Marcellus, and Quintus Terentius
Culleo. These, when they had arrived at Carthage, by the advice of
Hannibal's enemies, ordered, that any who inquired the cause of
their coming should be told, that they came to determine the disputes
subsisting between the Carthaginians and Masinissa, king of Numidia;
and this was generally believed. But Hannibal was not ignorant that he
was the sole object aimed at by the Romans; and that, though they
had granted peace to the Carthaginians, their war against him,
individually, remained irreconcilable. He therefore determined to
give way to fortune and the times; and having already made every
preparation for flight, he showed himself that day in the forum, in
order to guard against suspicion; and, as soon as it grew dark, went
in his common dress to one of the gates, with his two attendants, who
knew nothing of his intention.

[Footnote 1: _Subscribere actioni_ is to join the prosecutor as an
assistant; and the prosecuto