from which he viewed the enemy, who were already forming their ranks.  When one Gisco, a man of his own rank, said to him that the numbers of the enemy were wonderful, Hannibal with a serious air replied, “Another circumstance much more wonderful than this has escaped your notice, Gisco.”  When Gisco asked what it might be, Hannibal answered, “It is, that among all those men before you there is not one named Gisco.”  At this unexpected answer they all began to laugh, and as they came down the hill they kept telling this joke to all whom they met, so that the laugh became universal, and Hannibal’s staff was quite overpowered with merriment.  The Carthaginian soldiers seeing this took courage, thinking that their General must be in a position to despise his enemy if he could thus laugh and jest in the presence of danger.

XVI.  In the battle Hannibal employed several stratagems:  first, in securing the advantage of position, by getting the wind at his back, for it blew a hurricane, raising a harsh dust from the sandy plains, which rose over the Carthaginians and blew in the faces of the Romans, throwing them into confusion.  Secondly, in his disposition of his forces he showed great skill.  The best troops were placed on the wings, and the centre, which was composed of the worst, was made to project far beyond the rest of the line.  The troops on each wing were told that when the Romans had driven in this part of the line and were so become partly enclosed, that each wing must turn inwards, and attack them in the flank and rear and endeavour to surround them.  This was the cause of the greatest slaughter; for when the centre gave way, and made room for the pursuing Romans, Hannibal’s line assumed a crescent form, and the commanders of the select battalions charging from the right and left of the Romans attacked them in flank, destroying every man except such as escaped being surrounded.  It is related that a similar disaster befel the Roman cavalry.  The horse of Paulus was wounded, and threw its rider, upon which man after man of his staff dismounted and came to help the consul on foot.  The cavalry, seeing this, took it for a general order to dismount, and at once attacked the enemy on foot.  Hannibal, seeing this, said, “I am better pleased at this than if he had handed them over to me bound hand and foot.”  This anecdote is found in those writers who have described the incidents of the battle in detail.  Of the consuls, Varro escaped with a few followers to Venusia.  Paulus, in the whirling eddies of the rout, covered with darts which still stuck in his wounds, and overwhelmed with sorrow at the defeat, sat down on a stone to await his death at the hands of the enemy.  The blood with which his face and head were covered made it hard for any one to recognise him; but even his own friends and servants passed him by, taking no heed of him.  Only Cornelius Lentulus, a young patrician, saw and recognised him.  Dismounting from his horse and leading it up to him he begged him to take