s king had elephants
in great numbers, to dismay him by showing that she, too, was well
supplied, caused the skins of many oxen and buffaloes to be sewn
together in the shape of elephants and placed upon camels and sent to
the front. But the trick being detected by the king, turned out not only
useless but hurtful to its contriver. In a battle which the Dictator
Mamercus fought against the people of Fidenae, the latter, to strike
terror into the minds of the Romans, contrived that while the combat
raged a number of soldiers should issue from Fidenae bearing lances
tipped with fire, thinking that the Romans, disturbed by so strange a
sight, would be thrown into confusion.

We are to note, however, with regard to such contrivances, that if they
are to serve any useful end, they should _be_ formidable as well as
_seem_ so; for when they menace a real danger, their weak points are not
so soon discerned. When they have more of pretence than reality, it will
be well either to dispense with them altogether, or resorting to them,
to keep them, like the muleteers of Sulpitius, in the background, so
that they be not too readily found out. For any weakness inherent in
them is soon discovered if they be brought near, when, as happened with
the elephants of Semiramis and the fiery spears of the men of Fidenae,
they do harm rather than good. For although by this last-mentioned
device the Romans at the first were somewhat disconcerted, so soon as
the dictator came up and began to chide them, asking if they were not
ashamed to fly like bees from smoke, and calling on them to turn on
their enemy, and "_with her own flames efface that Fidenae whom their
benefits could not conciliate_," they took courage; so that the device
proved of no service to its contrivers, who were vanquished in the
battle.

CHAPTER XV.--_That one and not many should head an Army: and why it is
harmful to have more Leaders than one._

The men of Fidenae rising against the colonists whom the Romans had
settled among them, and putting them to the sword, the Romans to avenge
the insult appointed four tribunes with consular powers: one of whom
they retained to see to the defence of Rome, while the other three were
sent against the Fidenati and the Veientines. But these three falling
out among themselves, and being divided in their counsels, returned from
their mission with discredit though not with loss. Of which discredit
they were themselves the cause. That th