WARS and BATTLES
From Ancient Greece - to modern day.

                                                 
The Taking of Thelesia by Hannibal and His Army, 1860 Giclee Print
Masson, Benedict
24 in. x 18 in.
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Nor is the parallel between them limited to their military characters and exploits. Scipio, like Wellington, became an important leader of the aristocratic party among his countrymen, and was exposed to the unmeasured invectives of the violent section of his political antagonists. When, early in the last reign, an infuriated mob assaulted the Duke of Wellington in the streets of the English capital on the anniversary of Waterloo, England was even more disgraced by that outrage than Rome was, by the factious accusations which demagogues brought against Scipio, but which he proudly repelled on the day of trial by reminding the assembled people that it was the anniversary of the battle of Zama. Happily, a wiser and a better spirit has now, for years, pervaded all classes of our community and we shall be spared the ignominy of having worked out to the end the parallel of national ingratitude.

Scipio died a voluntary exile from the malevolent turbulence of Rome. Englishmen of all ranks and politics have now long united in affectionate admiration of our modern Scipio ; and even those who have most widely differed from the duke on legislative or administrative questions, forget what they deem the political errors of that time-honored head, while they gratefully call to mind the laurels that have wreathed it.

Scipio at Zama trampled in the dust the power of Carthage, but that power had been already irreparably shattered in another field, where neither Scipio, nor Hannibal commanded. When the Metaurus witnessed the defeat and death of Husdrubal, it witnessed the ruin of the scheme by which alone Carthage could hope to organize decisive success - the scheme of enveloping Rome at once from the north and the south of Italy by two chosen armies, led by two sons of Hamilcar. That battle was the determining crisis of the contest, not merely between Rome and Carthage but between the two great families of the world, which then made Italy the arena of their oft-renewed contest for pre-eminence.

The French historian, Michelet, whose "Histoire Romaine" would have been invaluable if the general industry and accuracy of the writer had in any degree equalled his originality and brilliancy, eloquently remarks, "It is not without reason that so universal and vivid a remembrance of the Punic wars has dwelt in the memories of men. They formed no mere struggle to determine the lot of two cities or two empires; but it was a strife, on the event of which depended the fate of two races of mankind, whether the dominion of the world should belong to the Indo-Germanic or to the Semitic family of nations. Bear in mind that the first of these comprises, beside the Indians and the Persians, the Greeks, the Romans, and the Germans. In the other are ranked the Jews and the Arabs, the Phenicians and the Carthaginians. 

On the one side is the genius of heroism, of art, and legislation; on the other is the spirit of industry, of commerce, of navigation. The two opposite races have everywhere come into contact, everywhere into hostility. In the primitive history of Persia and Chaldea, the heroes are perpetually engaged in combat with their industrious and perfidious neighbors. The struggle is renewed between the Phenicians and the Greeks on every coast of the Mediterranean.

The Greek supplants the Phenician in all his factories, all the companies in the East: soon will the Roman come, and do likewise in the West. Alexander did far more against Tyre than Salmanasar or Nebuchodonpsor had done. Not content with crushing her, he took care that she never should revive; for he founded Alexandria as her substitute, and changed forever the track of the commerce of the world. There remained Carthage—the great Carthage, and her mighty empire—mighty in a far different degree than Phenicia's had been Rome annihilated it. Then occurred that which has no parallel in history—an entire civilization perished at one blow—vanished, like a falling star. The " Periplus " of Hanno, a few coins, a score of lines in Plautus, and lo, all that remains of the Carthaginian world!

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