their ruin were their avarice and their cruelty. 8 Their avarice was shewed both in exacting from their vassals (besides ordinary tributes) the one h half of the fruits of the earth, and in conferring of great offices, not upon gentle and merciful persons, but upon those who could best tyrannize over the people, to augment their treasures. Their cruelty appeared in putting them to death without mercy that had offended through ignorance; the one of these rendered them odious to their vassals, whom it made ready upon all occasions to revolt from them: the other did break the spirits of their generals, by presenting, in the heat of their actions abroad, the fear of a cruel death at home. Hereby it came to pass, that many good commanders of the Carthaginian forces, after some great loss received, have desperately cast themselves, with all that remained under their charge, into the throat of destruction, holding it necessary either to repair their losses quickly, or to ruin all together; and few of them have dared to manage their own best projects after that good form wherein they first conceived them, for fear lest the manner of their proceeding should be misinterpreted, it being the Carthaginian rule to crucify, not only the unhappy captain, but even him whose bad counsel had prosperous event. The faults, wherewith in general they of Carthage are taxed by Roman historians, I find to be these; lust, cruelty, avarice, craft, unfaithfulness, and perjury.

In Pol. Arist. 1. 2. c. 9.

h The Turks at this day do also take the one half of the poor man's corn, that labours the earth; yea, they take tribute both of the bodies and of the souls of the Christians their vassals, by bereaving them of their ablest children, and bringing them up in the Mahometan religion. The Irish take the fourth sheaf, and were wont to eat up with their horsemen, footmen, and dogs, what they pleased of the other three parts remaining. The husbandman and the yeoman of England are the freest of all the world; and reason good; for of them have the bodies of our victorious armies been compounded. And it is the freeman, and not the slave, that hath

courage, and the sense of shame deserved by cowardice. How free the English yeomen have been in times not long since past, Fortescue hath shewed in his praise of our country's laws. But I may say, that they are more free now than ever, and our nobility and gentry more servile. For since the excessive bravery and vain expense of our grandees hath taught them to raise their rents, since by enclosures and dismembering of manors, the court baron, and the court leet, the principalities of the gentry of England have been dissolved, the tenants, having paid unto their lords their rack-rent, owe them now no service at all, and (perchance) as little love.

Whether the Romans themselves were free from the same crimes, let the trial be referred unto their actions. The first league between Carthage and Rome was very ancient, having been made the year following the expulsion of Tarquin. In that league the Carthaginians had the superiority, as imposing upon the Romans the more strict conditions. For it was agreed that the Romans should not so much as have trade in some part of Afric, nor suffer any ship of theirs to pass beyond the headland, or cape, then called the Fair Promontory, unless it were by force of tempest: whereas on the other side no haven in Italy was forbidden to the Carthaginians. A second league was made long after, which (howsoever it hath pleased i Livy to say that the Romans granted it at the Carthaginians entreaty) was more strict than the former, prohibiting the Romans to have trade in any part of Africa or in the island of Sardinia.

By these two treaties it may appear that the Carthaginians had an intent, not only to keep the Romans (as perhaps they did other people) from getting any knowledge of the state of Afric, but to countenance and uphold them in their troubling all Italy, whereby they themselves might have the better means to occupy all Sicily, whilst that island should be destitute of Italian succours. Hereupon we find good cause of the joy that was in Carthage, and of the crown of gold weighing twenty and five pound, sent from thence to Rome, when the Samnites were overthrown. But the little state of Rome prevailed faster in Italy, than the great power of Carthage did in Sicilyk. For that mighty army of three hundred thousand men, which Hannibal conducted out of Afric into Sicily, won only two cities therein; many great fleets were devoured by tempests; and howsoever the Carthaginians prevailed at one time, the Sicilians, either by their own valour, or by assistance of their good friends out of Greece, did at some other time repair their own losses, and take revenge upon these invaders. But never were the people of Carthage in better hope of getting all Sicily, than when the death of Agathocles the tyrant had left the Livy, Dec. 1. 1. 7. Xenoph. Græc. Hist. 1. 2.

whole island in combustion; the estate of Greece being such, at the same time, that it seemed impossible for any succour to be sent from thence. But whilst the Carthaginians were busy in making their advantage of this good opportunity, Pyrrhus, invited by the Tarentines and their fellows, came into Italy, where he made sharp war upon the Romans. These news were unpleasing to the Carthaginians, who, being a subtle nation, easily foresaw that the same busy disposition, which had brought this prince out of Greece into Italy, would as easily transport him over into Sicily, as soon as he could finish his Roman war. To prevent this danger they sent Mago ambassador to Rome, who declared in their name, that they were sorry to hear what misadventure had befallen the Romans, their good friends, in this war with Pyrrhus; and that the people of Carthage were very willing to assist the state of Rome, by sending an army into Italy, if their help were thought needful against the Epirots.

It was indeed the main desire of the Carthaginians to hold Pyrrhus so hardly to his work in Italy, that they might at good leisure pursue their business in Sicily, which caused them to make such a goodly offer. But the Romans were too high minded, and refused to accept any such aid of their friends, lest it should blemish their reputation, and make them seem unable to stand by their own strength. Yet the message was taken lovingly, as it ought, and the former league between Rome and Carthage renewed, with covenants added concerning the present business, that if either of the two cities made peace with Pyrrhus, it should be with reservation of liberty to assist the other, in case that Pyrrhus should invade either of their dominions. All this notwithstanding, and notwithstanding that the same Mago went and treated with Pyrrhus, using all means to sound his intentions, (a matter very difficult, where one upon every new occasion changeth his own purposes,) yet Pyrrhus found leisure to make a step into Sicily; where, though in fine he was neither getter nor saver, yet he clean defeated the purposes of Carthage, leaving them at his

departure thence as far from any end as when they first began.

So many disasters, in an enterprise that from the first undertaking had been so strongly pursued, through the length of many generations, might well have induced the Carthaginians to believe that an higher providence resisted their intendment. But their desire of winning that fruitful island was so inveterate, that with unwearied patience they still continued in hope of so much the greater an harvest, by how much their cost and pains, therein buried, had been the more. Wherefore they recontinued their former courses, and by force or practice recovered in few years all their old possessions, making peace with Syracuse, the chief city of the island, that so they might the better enable themselves to deal with the rest.

Somewhat before this time a troop of Campanian soldiers, that had served under Agathocles, being entertained within Messana as friends, and finding themselves too strong for the citizens, took advantage of the power that they had to do wrong, and with perfidious cruelty slew those that had trusted them; which done, they occupied the city, lands, goods, and wives of those whom they had murdered. These mercenaries called themselves Mamertines: good soldiers they were; and like enough it is, that mere desperation of finding any that would approve their barbarous treachery added rage unto their stoutness. Having therefore none other colour of their proceedings than the law of the stronger, they overran the country round about them.

In this course, at first, they sped so well, that they did not only defend Messana against the cities of Sicily confederate, to wit, against the Syracusians and others, but they rather won upon them, yea, and upon the Carthaginians, exacting tribute from many neighbour places. But it was not long ere, fortune turning her back to these Mamertines, the Syracusians won fast upon them, and finally confining them within the walls of Messana, they also with a powerful army besieged the city. It happened ill, that about the same time a contention began between the Syracusian sol

diers, then lying at Megara, and the citizens of Syracuse and governors of the commonwealth; which proceeded so far, that the army elected two governors among themselves, to wit, Artemidorus, and Hiero, that was afterward king. Hiero, being for his years excellently adorned with many virtues, although it was contrary to the policy of that state to approve any election made by the soldiers, yet, for the great clemency he used at his first entrance, was by general consent established, and made governor. This office he rather used as a scale, thereby to climb to some higher degree, than rested content with his present preferment.

In brief, there was somewhat wanting, whereby to strengthen himself within the city; and somewhat without it, that gave impediment to his obtaining and safe keeping of the place he sought; to wit, a powerful party within the town, and certain mutinous troops of soldiers without, often and easily moved to sedition and tumult. For the first, whereby to strengthen himself, he took to wife the daughter of Leptines, a man of the greatest estimation and authority among the Syracusians. For the second, leading out the army to besiege Messana, he quartered all those companies which he held suspected on the one side of the city; and leading the rest of his horse and foot unto the other side, as if he would have assaulted it in two several parts, he marched away under the covert of the town walls, and left the mutineers to be cut in pieces by the assieged: so returning home, and levying an army of his own citizens, well trained and obedient, he hasted again towards Messana, and was by the Mamertines (grown proud by their former victory over the mutineers) encountered in the plains of Mylæum, where he obtained a most signal victory, and leading with him their commander captive into Syracuse, himself by common consent was elected and saluted king. Hereupon the Mamertines, finding themselves utterly enfeebled, some of them resolved to give themselves to the Carthaginians, others to crave assistance of the Romans: to each of whom the several factions despatched ambassadors for the same purpose.