[Illustration: Generosity of Scipio.]

Toward the close of the year B.C. 206, Scipio surrendered the command
of the Roman forces in Spain to the proconsuls L. Lentulus and L.
Manlius Acidinus, and returned to Rome. He delivered to the aerarium
the immense treasures which he brought from Spain. He evidently
wished for a triumph, but the senate paid no attention to his wishes,
for no one had ever triumphed at Rome before he had held the
consulship. In the year B.C. 205, Scipio was made consul with P.
Licinius Crassus, who was at the same time pontifex maximus, and was
consequently not allowed to leave Italy. If, therefore, a war was to
be carried on abroad, the command necessarily devolved upon Scipio.
His wish was immediately to sail with an army to Africa, but the more
cautious senators, and especially Q. Fabius, were decidedly opposed to
his plan, partly because Hannibal, as long as he was in Italy,
appeared too formidable to be neglected, and partly because they were
influenced by jealousy.

All that Scipio could obtain was that Sicily should be assigned to him
as his province, with thirty vessels, and with permission to sail over
to Africa in case he should think it advantageous to the republic. But
he did not obtain from the Senate permission to levy an army, and he
therefore called upon the Italian allies to provide him with troops
and other things necessary for carrying on the war. As they were all
willing to support the conqueror of the Carthaginians in Spain, he was
soon enabled to sail to Sicily with nearly seven thousand volunteers
and thirty ships. Soon after his arrival in Sicily he sent his friend
Laelius with a part of his fleet to Africa, partly to keep up the
connection which he had formed there, on his visit from Spain, with
Syphax and Massinissa (for to the latter Scipio had sent back a nephew
who had been taken prisoner in the battle of Baecula), and partly to
show to his timid opponents at Rome how groundless their fears were.
He himself employed his time in Sicily most actively, in preparing and
disciplining his new army.

Massinissa, dissatisfied with the Carthaginians, was anxious for the
arrival of Scipio in Africa, but Syphax had altered his policy, and
again joined the Carthaginians. The enemies of Scipio at Rome at last
got an opportunity of attacking him, and they nearly succeeded in
depriving him of his post. Without being authorized by the Senate,
Scipio had taken part in the conquest