Page:Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto volume 2 Haines 1920.djvu/179

 and eager character, when he came to know the temper of P. Scipio, who was then the Roman general, and the ways of the enemy rather than respected.

5. The qualities of a general held in the highest honour

6. Nor must the sketch of the country be left out:

''The sea is stormy and harbourless; the country fruitful in grain, good for cattle, but not kindly for trees; there is a scarcity of water from rain or springs. The inhabitants are healthy in body, active, inured to toil; the majority succumb to old age, unless they perish by violence or wild beasts, for disease seldom claims a victim. It must be added that noxious animals abound.''

7. Then he goes on as follows with no little skill:

He turned his thoughts to Adherbal's kingdom: himself daring, warlike, but he whom he was to assail quiet, unwarlike, of a gentle disposition, at the mercy of any attack, the victim rather than the cause of fear.

8. This of the consul's generalship:

For our consul had many excellent endowments of body and mind, but avarice was a clog upon them all: he was inured to toils, enterprising in character, but wary enough, no novice in war, and undaunted in the face of danger and surprises.

9. Then the demoralized soldiery:

The army handed over to the general, Spurius Albinus the proconsul, was without energy or warlike spirit, inured neither to danger nor toil, quicker with a word than a blow, spoiler of the allies and itself the spoil of the 163