hopes they conceived on that day when all the centuries concurred in naming him first consul.  Thus they set out on their return in the highest spirits, as though they were about to carry to Rome tidings of a victory, and not of a grand preparation for war.  Pleminius, and those who were implicated in the same guilt with him, when they arrived at Rome, were thrown immediately into prison.  At first, when brought before the people by the tribunes, they found no place in their compassion, as their minds were previously engrossed by the sufferings of the Locrians; but afterwards, being repeatedly brought before them, and the hatred with which they were regarded subsiding, their resentment was softened.  Besides, the mutilated appearance of Pleminius, and their recollections of the absent Scipio, operated in gaining them favour with the people.  Pleminius, however, died in prison, before the people had come to a determination respecting him.  Clodius Licinius, in the third book of his Roman history, relates, that this Pleminius, during the celebration of the votive games, which Africanus, in his second consulate, exhibited at Rome, made an attempt, by means of certain persons whom he had corrupted by bribes, to set fire to the city in several places, that he might have an opportunity of breaking out of prison, and making his escape; and that afterwards, the wicked plot having been discovered, he was consigned to the Tullian dungeon, according to a decree of the senate.  The case of Scipio was considered no where but in the senate; where all the deputies and tribunes, bestowing the highest commendations on the fleet, the army, and the general, induced the senate to vote that he should cross over into Africa as soon as possible; and that permission should be given him to select himself, out of those armies which were in Sicily, those forces which he would carry with him into Africa, and those which he would leave for the protection of the province.

23.  While the Romans were thus employed, the Carthaginians, on their part, though they had passed an anxious winter, earnestly inquiring what was going on, and terrified at the arrival of every messenger, with watch-towers placed on every promontory, had gained a point of no small importance for the defence of Africa, in adding to their allies king Syphax, in reliance on whom chiefly they believed the Romans would cross over into Africa.  Hasdrubal, son of Gisgo, not only formed a connexion of hospitality with the before-named king, when Scipio and Hasdrubal happened to come to him at the same time out of Spain, but mention had also been slightly made of an affinity to take place between them, by the king’s marrying the daughter of Hasdrubal.  Hasdrubal, who had gone for the purpose of completing this business, and fixing a time for the nuptials, for the virgin was now marriageable, perceiving that the king was inflamed with desire, for the Numidians are, beyond all the other barbarians, violently addicted to love,