[-5-] While this was going on Caesar tried in every way to draw Scipio into close quarters.  Baffled in this, he made friendly overtures to the latter’s soldiers, and distributed among them brief pamphlets, in which he promised to the native that he would preserve his possessions unharmed, and to the Roman that he would grant immunity and the honors which he owed to his own followers.  Scipio in like manner undertook to circulate both offers and pamphlets among the opposite party, with a view to making some of them his own:  however, he was unable to induce any of them to change sides.  Not that some of them would not have chosen his cause by preference, if any announcement similar to Caesar’s had been made:  their failure to do so was due to the fact that he promised them nothing in the way of a prize, but merely urged them to liberate the Roman people and the senate.  And so, inasmuch as he chose a respectable proposition instead of something which would advantage them in the needs of the moment, he failed to gain the allegiance of a single one.

[-6-] While Scipio alone was in the camp, matters progressed as just described, but when Juba also came up, the scene was changed.  For these two both tried to provoke their opponents to battle and harassed them when they showed unwillingness to contend; moreover by their cavalry they kept inflicting serious damage upon any who were scattered at a distance.  But Caesar was not for getting into close quarters with them if he could help it.  He stuck to his circumvallation, kept seizing provender as was convenient, and sent after other forces from home.  When at last these reached him with much difficulty—­(for they were not all together, but kept gathering gradually, since they lacked boats in which to cross in a body)—­still, when in the course of time they did reach him and he had added them to his army, he took courage again; so much so, that he led out against the foe, and drew up his men in front of the trenches.  Seeing this his opponents marshaled themselves in turn, but did not join issue with Caesar’s troops.  This continued for several days.  For aside from cavalry skirmishes of limited extent after which they would invariably retire, neither side risked any important movement.

[-7-] Accordingly Caesar, who bethought himself that because of the nature of the land he could not force them to come into close quarters unless they chose, started toward Thapsus, in order that either they might come to the help of the city and so engage his forces, or, if they neglected it, he might capture the place.  Now Thapsus is situated on a kind of peninsula, with the sea on one side and a marsh stretching along on the other:  between them lies a narrow, swampy isthmus so that one has access to the town from two directions by an extremely narrow road running along both sides of the marsh close to the surf.  On his way toward this city Caesar, when he had come within these narrow approaches, proceeded to dig ditches and to erect palisades.  And the others made no trouble for him (for they were not his match), but Scipio and Juba undertook to wall off in turn the neck of the isthmus, where it comes to an end near the mainland, dividing it into two portions by means of palisades and ditches.