been in the strictest principles of honour,
and owing it to such a father to give extraordinary proofs of courage,
he thought that life would be intolerable for him if he allowed an enemy
to carry off such a trophy from him, and ran about calling upon every
friend or acquaintance whom he saw to help him to recover it. Many brave
men thus assembled, and with one accord left the rest of the army and
followed him. After a sharp conflict and much slaughter, they succeeded
in driving the enemy from the ground, and having thus chased it, they
betook themselves to searching for the sword. When at last after much
trouble it was found among the heaps of arms and corpses, they were
overjoyed, and with a shout assailed those of the enemy who still
resisted. At length the three thousand picked men were all slain
fighting in their ranks. A great slaughter took place among the others
as they fled, so that the plain and the skirts of the hills were covered
with corpses, and the stream of the river Leukus ran red with blood even
on the day after the battle; for, indeed, it is said that more than
twenty-five thousand men perished. Of the Romans there fell a hundred,
according to Poseidonius, but Nasica says only eighty.

XXII. This battle, fraught with such important issues, was decided in a
remarkably short time; beginning to fight at the ninth hour, the Romans
were victorious before the tenth. The remainder of the day was occupied
in pursuit, which being pressed for some fifteen (English) miles, it was
late before they returned to their camp. All the officers on their
return were met by their servants with torches, and conducted with songs
of triumph to their tents, which were illuminated and wreathed with ivy
and laurel; but the general himself was deeply dejected. The youngest of
the two sons who were serving under him--his own favourite, the noblest
of all his children in character--was nowhere to be found; and it was
feared that, being high-spirited and generous, though but a boy in
years, he must have become mixed up with the enemy, and so perished. The
whole army learned the cause of his sorrow and perplexity, and quitting
their suppers, ran about with torches, some to the tent of Aemilius, and
some outside the camp to look for him among the corpses. The whole camp
was filled with sorrow, and all the plain with noise, covered as it was
with men shouting for Scipio--for he had won all hearts from the very
beginning, having beyond