[Sidenote:  B.C. 253 (a.u. 496)] The following summer the Romans and the Carthaginians fought in Sicily and Sardinia at once.  Somewhat later Atilius Latinus[18] went to Sicily and finding a city named Mytistratus being besieged by Florus he made use of the latter’s support.  He made assaults upon the circuit of the wall which the natives with the help of the Carthaginians at first withstood vigorously, but when the women and children were moved to tears and laments they abandoned resistance.  The Carthaginians passed out secretly by night and at daybreak the natives voluntarily swung the gates wide open.  The Romans went in and proceeded to slaughter them all till Atilius made proclamation that the remainder of the booty and the human beings belonged to him who might take them.  Forthwith they spared the lives of the remaining captives and after pillaging the city burned it to the ground.

[Footnote 18:  A. Atilius Calatinus is meant.]

VIII, 12.—­Thence they proceeded heedlessly against Camarina and came into a region where an ambuscade had already been set.  They would have perished utterly, had not Marcus Calpurnius, serving as military tribune, matched the catastrophe by his cleverness.  He saw that one and one only of the surrounding hills had by reason of its steepness not been occupied and he asked of the consul three hundred heavy-armed men and with them he set out for that point.  His purpose was to make the enemy turn their attention to his detachment so that then the rest of the Romans might make their escape.  And so it happened; for when the adversaries saw his project, they were thunderstruck and left the consul and his followers as men already captured in order to make a united rush upon Calpurnius.  A fierce battle ensued in which many of the opposing side and all the three hundred fell.  Calpurnius alone survived.  He had been wounded and lay unnoticed among the heaps of slain, being as good as dead by reason of his wounds; afterward he was found alive and his life was saved.  While the three hundred were fighting, the consul got away; and after this escape he reduced Camarina and other cities, some by force and some by capitulation.  Next Atilius set out against Lipara.  But Hamilcar at night by stealth occupied it in advance and by making a sudden sally killed many Romans.

Gaius Sulpicius overran the most of Sardinia and filled with arrogance as a result he set out for Libya.  The Carthaginians, alarmed for the safety of their home population, also set sail with Hannibal, [Sidenote:  FRAG. 43^14] BUT AS A CONTRARY WIND WAS ENCOUNTERED BOTH LEADERS TURNED BACK.  SUBSEQUENTLY ATILIUS[19] BROUGHT ABOUT HANNIBAL’S DEFEAT THROUGH SOME FALSE DESERTERS who pretended that Atilius[20] was going to sail to Libya again.  Hannibal weighed anchor and came out with speed, whereupon Sulpicius sailed to meet him and sank the majority of his vessels, which, because of a mist, did not know for a long