from the fleet as light horsemen or archers in the land-army could not be of much avail.  The diversions which Caesar suggested were somewhat more effectual.  He succeeded in bringing into arms against Juba the Gaetulian pastoral tribes wandering on the southern slope of the great Atlas towards the Sahara; for the blows of the Marian and Sullan period had reached even to them, and their indignation against Pompeius, who had at that time made them subordinate to the Numidian kings,(48) rendered them from the outset favourably inclined to the heir of the mighty Marius of whose Jugurthine campaign they had still a lively recollection.  The Mauretanian kings, Bogud in Tingis and Bocchus in Iol, were Juba’s natural rivals and to a certain extent long since in alliance with Caesar.  Further, there still roamed in the border-region between the kingdoms of Juba and Bocchus the last of the Catilinarians, that Publius Sittius of Nuceria,(49) who eighteen years before had become converted from a bankrupt Italian merchant into a Mauretanian leader of free bands, and since that time had procured for himself a name and a body of retainers amidst the Libyan quarrels.  Bocchus and Sittius united fell on the Numidian land, and occupied the important town of Cirta; and their attack, as well as that of the Gaetulians, compelled king Juba to send a portion of his troops to his southern and western frontiers.

Caesar’s situation, however, continued sufficiently unpleasant.  His army was crowded together within a space of six square miles; though the fleet conveyed corn, the want of forage was as much felt by Caesar’s cavalry as by those of Pompeius before Dyrrhachium.  The light troops of the enemy remained notwithstanding all the exertions of Caesar so immeasurably superior to his, that it seemed almost impossible to carry offensive operations into the interior even with veterans.  If Scipio retired and abandoned the coast towns, he might perhaps achieve a victory like those which the vizier of Orodes had won over Crassus and Juba over Curio, and he could at least endlessly protract the war.  The simplest consideration suggested this plan of campaign; even Cato, although far from a strategist, counselled its adoption, and offered at the same time to cross with a corps to Italy and to call the republicans there to arms—­ which, amidst the utter confusion in that quarter, might very well meet with success.  But Cato could only advise, not command; Scipio the commander-in-chief decided that the war should be carried on in the region of the coast.  This was a blunder, not merely inasmuch as they thereby dropped a plan of war promising a sure result, but also inasmuch as the region to which they transferred the war was in dangerous agitation, and a good part of the army which they opposed to Caesar was likewise in a troublesome temper.  The fearfully strict levy, the carrying off of the supplies, the devastating of the smaller townships, the feeling in general that they were being sacrificed for a cause