formed two camps near Numantia. His brother Q. Fabius commanded one camp, and Scipio the other. The Numantini often came out and offered battle, but Scipio resolutely persisted in not fighting with desperate men who only sought to die. Neither the taunts of the enemy nor the entreaties of his own men could move Scipio from his settled purpose of reducing Numantia by famine.

He sent orders to the Spanish peoples who were friendly to the Romans to furnish him with men for the siege. He began, as Caesar afterwards did at Alesia, by forming seven forts or castella round the city for the protection of the men who were going to work in the trenches. All the Spanish allies who came were distributed into divisions, and all Scipio's army also. Every division had its superintendent. The line for the ditch and rampart being marked out, each division had its work assigned to it. The circuit of the town was three Roman miles, but the ditch was more than double of this extent. It is said by some antient authorities that Numantia was not walled, and if this was so, the town was probably sufficiently defended by its natural strength against an assault. Orders were given that, if the besieged should disturb the men who were working at the ditches, a signal should be raised, in the daytime a red flag on a long spear, in the night a fire, that either Scipio or Maximus might come to the relief. It is probable that Scipio and Maximus were on opposite sides of the river. When the contravallation was so far completed that it was easy to repel any attack of the besieged, Scipio formed a short distance farther from the town a line of circumvallation to protect himself against attacks from without. Orosius and Appian seem to have drawn from the same authority in describing Scipio's lines, and it is plain if we compare the two writers that neither of them has described the lines exactly. Appian says nothing of the dimensions of the contravallation, but Orosius says that the ditch was ten feet wide and twenty deep, that is from the top of the vallum or rampart. As to the circumvallation Appian says that Scipio placed stakes (the vallum) all round it, and raised a wall (that is a rampart of earth, or agger), which was eight feet thick and ten high without

reckoning the palisade with which it was crowned. But here Appian, contrary to Roman fashion, has given the dimensions by reference to the agger instead of giving them with reference to the ditch, which I suppose was eight feet wide and ten deep measured from the top of the vallum. Towers were erected along this outer line at a distance of one hundred (Greek) feet. Orosius also mentions the towers, but he evidently assigns them to the lines of contravallation, and he does not mention the lines of circumvallation. Freinsheim in his supplement seems to have patched up a description by adding Orosius to Appian, but I think that this diligent scholar is mistaken here. However he correctly understands that Scipio made both a line of contravallation and a line of circumvallation, just as Caesar afterwards did at the siege of Alesia; and this is the important point to settle, and not the exact dimensions of the ditches and ramparts which we can readily allow to be of no importance. Scipio then was either not safe, as he supposed, against an attack from the outside; or, if he did not fear it, he took precautions, as if it were possible, and in this as in every other part of this Spanish campaign he acted with a care and foresight which ensured success. A marsh which was probably connected with the river stood in the way of the lines, and it was necessary to carry them round it.

The river Duero, says Appian, was too broad and the current too rapid to allow Scipio to make a bridge over it, though it must have intersected his lines. If Scipio did not make a wooden bridge, there must have been some sufficient reason for it, but it may not have been exactly either the width or the rapidity of the stream. It was however necessary to stop the passage of the river, for the Numantini brought in supplies that way, and their men could cross the river by swimming, and pass up it in boats with sails, when the wind was strong, or with oars down the stream. Scipio built two forts on opposite sides of the river, and, as we may conclude, above the town. Large beams suspended by ropes were let down from each fort into and athwart the stream. The beams were thick set with sword blades and javelins placed in such a way that the force of the water

falling on the blades and javelins turned the beams round, and so men were prevented from entering or leaving the town either in boats or by diving or swimming. Such was the result of Scipio's contrivance, but Appian's description is not complete enough to enable us to understand all the mechanism.

Appian, whose narrative is generally very scanty, must have derived his minute description of the siege of Numantia from the contemporary historians, and if this probable assumption is true, his story is valuable as evidence of the vigilance and perseverance of Scipio. He placed on the towers the engines for discharging pointed weapons and stones, and stores of stones and other missiles along the ramparts. The forts were filled with slingers and bowmen. He posted men at short intervals along the lines, whose duty it was to transmit to him day and night reports of what was going on. If any tower was attacked he ordered a signal to be raised there, and every tower along the lines would raise the same signal. Thus the general would immediately know what had happened and he would learn the particulars from the men whose duty it was to report. With the Spanish troops Scipio had sixty thousand men, half of whom were employed in guarding the lines and on any other service for which it might be necessary to move them about. Twenty thousand were placed to defend the lines, whenever it might be necessary, and ten thousand were kept in reserve to support them. Every man among these second thirty thousand had his post assigned to him, and he could not leave it without orders. Whenever a signal was given that the enemy were making an attack, every man was at his place in a moment. The Numantini often attacked the besiegers at different parts of the lines, but the Romans were never surprised. When the Numantini stirred, the signals were raised, the watchers ran to carry the news, the men whose business it was to defend the ramparts sprung to their posts, the trumpets sounded from every tower, and the whole circuit of six miles and upwards was all at once alive. Scipio visited all the lines once every day and night. He had completely shut the enemy in, and he knew that time would do the rest.

If a town is to be taken by blockade, it should be blockaded effectually, if it can be done, and a perfect blockade may be the cheapest and surest way of getting possession of a place.

There was a brave Numantine, named Rhetogenes who also bore the surname Caraunius. The name Rhetogenes has occurred before, but we do not know whether there were two of the name or only one. He persuaded five of his friends to take each a slave with him and a horse and to join him in an attempt to break through the Roman lines. One cloudy night they crossed the ground between the city and the Roman lines, carrying with them what Appian calls 'a folded ladder,' probably a contrivance of leather straps and ropes or something that could be carried in parts and easily put together. They scaled the Roman rampart, killed the men on guard on each of the lines, and then sending back the slaves they contrived by means of their 'ladder' to hoist their horses over the ramparts and to escape into the open country. They tried to rouse the Arevaci to come to the aid of Numantia, but they did not succeed. Some would not listen to them at all, so great was the fear of the Romans. There was a rich town named Lutia about thirty-eight Roman miles from Numantia. It has been conjectured that it may have been on the site of Luzon. The young men of Lutia urged the citizens to help Numantia, but the older secretly sent intelligence to Scipio, who coming immediately with some light troops surrounded the city and demanded the surrender of the leaders. On being told that they had left the city, he threatened to plunder the place, if the men were not given up. Four hundred were surrendered, and Scipio cut off their hands. He then returned to his camp before Numantia as speedily as he had come. The Numantini who were now suffering from famine sent six commissioners to Scipio to ask if he would grant them reasonable terms of surrender. Their chief Avarus spoke proudly of the resolution and courage of his townsmen, and maintained that they had done no wrong in enduring so much. for their children and wives and the independence which their fathers had transmitted to them. He said that such

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a man as Scipio ought to spare a courageous enemy, and offer to them some terms which would be tolerable; that it no longer depended on them, but on Scipio, whether the city should be surrendered on fair conditions, or they should resist and perish. Scipio knew from his prisoners the state of affairs in the city, and he merely replied that the Numantini must give up the town and their arms. When this answer was brought back, the Numantini who had never known submission and were now maddened by their sufferings killed Avarus and the five commissioners, who brought these bad tidings. Perhaps too the people suspected that they had bargained for their own safety, as Appian suggests, though the facts, as they are told, do not show any evidence of this treachery.

At last the food was exhausted. The Numantini had neither grain in the city, nor cattle nor herb. As men had done before in like straits, they boiled hides and leather; and this resource failing, they came to the extremity of human suffering and began to feed on the sick and dying. The stronger too fed on the weaker. This unnatural food made men savage in temper; and famine, disease, and want of cleanliness during the long blockade had reduced their bodies to a miserable condition. In this state they proposed to Scipio to surrender. He ordered them on that day to bring all their arms to a place which he pointed out, and on the next day to go to a different place. The Numantini asked for longer time, because many of them still clung to freedom and wished to die by their own hands. Accordingly they demanded a single day more, which was granted. Orosius has preserved on some authority a story not in itself improbable. Some of the most desperate men after heating themselves with a strong fermented drink, named Celia, which was made of grain, sallied out by two gates, and made a fierce attack on the Romans, which was repelled with difficulty. The Numantini after losing their bravest men retired in order to the town, refusing, says Orosius, to accept the dead bodies of their comrades for burial; a part of the story, which, under the circumstances, is not credible, for there is no reason why Scipio should make such an offer. At