of praise or blame, at his entertainments.

XXVI. The last of his political acts is said to have been the
destruction of Carthage. This was actually brought to pass by Scipio
the Younger, but it was chiefly owing to the counsels of Cato that the
war was begun. His reason for insisting on its destruction was this.
He was sent on a mission to Africa to investigate the grounds of a
quarrel which existed between the Carthaginians and Masinissa, the
king of the Numidians. Masinissa had always been the friend of Rome,
whereas the Carthaginians, after their defeat by Scipio, had been
subjected to hard conditions, having lost their sovereignty over the
neighbouring tribes, and having been compelled to pay a large sum as
tribute to Rome. Cato, however, found the city, not, as the Romans
imagined it to be, crushed by its recent overthrow, but full of young
men, overflowing with wealth, well provided with arms and munitions of
war, and, as may be expected, full of warlike spirit. He concluded
that it was no time for the Romans to arbitrate about the grievances
of Masinissa and his Numidians, but that, unless they at once
destroyed a city which bore them an undying hatred and which had
recovered its strength in an incredibly short space of time, they
would have as much to fear from Carthage as ever. He quickly returned
home, and pointed out to the Senate that the former defeats and
misfortunes suffered by the Carthaginians had not really broken their
strength so much as they had dissipated their overweening
self-confidence, and that in the late war they had not lost so much in
strength as they had gained in experience and skill. Their present
difference with the Numidians was, he urged, merely a prelude to an
attack upon Rome, with which city they kept up the fiction of a peace
which would soon upon a suitable opportunity be exchanged for war.

XXVII. After these words it is said that Cato threw down in the senate
house some ripe figs which he had brought on purpose; and when the
senators admired their size and beauty, he remarked that "the country
which produced this fruit is only three days' sail distant from Rome."
Another and a more violent method of forcing the Romans to attack
them was his habit, when giving his opinion on any subject whatever,
to append the words, "And I also am of opinion that Carthage must he
destroyed." On the other hand, Publius Scipio, called Nasica, used to
end all his speeches with the words, "And I