fortified an irregular camp on the highest eminence, and from thence they defended themselves without difficulty, the enemy failing in his attempt to get at them, from the difficulty of the ascent.  But a siege in a place bare and affording no means of subsistence, was hardly to be supported, even for a few days; the troops therefore deserted to the enemy.  At last the general himself, having procured some ships, for the sea was not at a great distance, left his army by night and effected his escape to Gades.  Scipio, having heard of the flight of the general of the enemy, left ten thousand foot and one thousand cavalry for Silanus to carry on the siege of the camp, and returned to Tarraco with the rest of the troops, after a march of seventy days, during which he took cognizance of the causes of the petty princes and states, in order that rewards might be conferred according to a just estimate of their merits.  After his departure, Masinissa, having held a private conference with Silanus, passed over into Africa with a few of his countrymen, in order that he might induce his nation also to acquiesce in his new designs.  The cause of this sudden change was not so evident at the time, as the proof was convincing which was afforded by his subsequent fidelity, preserved to extreme old age, that he did not on this occasion act without reasonable grounds.  Mago went to Gades in the ships which had been sent back by Hasdrubal.  Of the rest of the troops thus abandoned by their generals, some deserted and others betook themselves to flight, and in this manner were dispersed through the neighbouring states.  There was no body of them considerable either for numbers or strength.  Such were, as near as possible, the circumstances under which the Carthaginians were driven out of Spain, under the conduct and auspices of Publius Scipio, in the thirteenth year from the commencement of the war, and the fifth from the time that Publius Scipio received the province and the army.  Not long after, Silanus returned to Tarraco to Scipio, with information that the war was at an end.

17.  Lucius Scipio was sent to Rome to convey the news of the reduction of Spain, and with him a number of distinguished captives.  While everybody else extolled this achievement as an event in the highest degree joyful and glorious, yet the author of it alone, whose valour was such that he never thought he had achieved enough, and whose search for true glory was insatiable, considered the reduction of Spain as affording but a faint idea of the hopes which his aspiring mind had conceived.  He now directed his view to Africa and Great Carthage, and the glorious termination of the war, as redounding to his honour, and giving lustre to his name.  Judging it therefore to be now necessary to pave the way to his object, and to conciliate the friendship of kings and nations, he resolved first to sound the disposition of Syphax, king of the Masaesylians, a nation bordering on the Moors, and lying for the