gnificancy of Proserpina's
life.--Pyrrhus resolves to confiscate the treasures at Locri.--The
ships are wrecked and the treasures lost.--Pyrrhus is oppressed
with superstitious fears.--He goes forth from Tarentum to meet the
Romans.--Pyrrhus meets Curius near Beneventum.--He advances through a
mountain path by torch-light.--The Romans taken by surprise.--Pyrrhus
is repulsed.--Adventures of Pyrrhus on the field of battle.--Onset of
the elephants.--They are terrified by the torches.--The young elephant
and its mother.--Pyrrhus's flight.--His desperate expedient.--He
arrives at length safely in Epirus.--

The force with which Pyrrhus returned to Tarentum was very nearly as
large as that which he had taken away, but was composed of very
different materials. The Greeks from Epirus, whom he had brought over
with him in the first instance from his native land, had gradually
disappeared from the ranks of his army. Many of them had been killed
in battle, and still greater numbers had been carried off by exposure
and fatigue, and by the thousand other casualties incident to such a
service as that in which they were engaged. Their places had been
supplied, from time to time, by new enlistments, or by impressment and
conscription. Of course, these new recruits were not bound to their
commander by any ties of attachment or regard. They were mostly
mercenaries--that is, men hired to fight, and willing to fight, in any
cause or for any commander, provided they could be paid. In a word,
Pyrrhus's fellow-countrymen of Epirus had disappeared, and the ranks
of his army were filled up with unprincipled and destitute wretches,
who felt no interest in his cause--no pride in his success--no concern
for his honor. They adhered to him only for the sake of the pay and
the indulgences of a soldier's life, and for their occasional hopes of
plunder.

Besides the condition of his army, Pyrrhus found the situation of his
affairs in other respects very critical on his arrival at Tarentum.
The Romans had made great progress, during his absence, in subjugating
the whole country to their sway. Cities and towns, which had been
under his dominion when he went to Sicily, had been taken by the
Romans, or had gone over to them of their own accord. The government
which he had established at Tarentum was thus curtailed of power, and
shut in in respect to territory; and he felt himself compelled
immediately to take the field, in order to recover his lost gro