recruits. From
Tibur he moved to Praeneste, and by cross roads to the Latin way.
Thence, after very careful scouting, he led his army against the
enemy, determined not to risk an engagement anywhere if he could
avoid it. On the day that Fabius first encamped within view of the
enemy, not far from Arpi, Hannibal at once formed his army into
line and offered battle; but when he saw no movement of troops and
no stir in the camp, he retired exclaiming that the ancestral
spirit of the Romans was broken, that they were finally conquered,
and that they admitted their inferiority in valour and renown. But
an unspoken anxiety invaded his mind that he would now have to
deal with a general very unlike Flaminius and Sempronius, and that
the Romans, taught by their disasters, had at last sought out a
leader equal to himself.

Thus Hannibal at once saw reason to fear the wariness of the new
dictator, but as he had not yet put his determination to the
proof, he began to worry and harass him by constantly moving his
camp and pillaging the lands of the allies actually before his
eyes. Sometimes he would hurriedly march out of sight, sometimes
he would wait concealed beyond a bend of the road, in the hope
that he might catch him on the level. Fabius, however, led his
troops along the high ground, neither losing touch with his enemy
nor giving him battle. The soldiers were kept in the camp unless
some necessary service called them out. If fodder and wood were
wanted, they went in strong parties that did not scatter. A force
of cavalry and light-armed infantry, formed and posted to meet
sudden attacks, protected their own comrades and threatened the
scattered plunderers of the enemy. The safety of the army was
never staked on one pitched battle, while small successes in
trivial engagements, begun without risk and with a retreat at
hand, taught the soldiers, demoralized by previous disasters, to
think better of their own valour and the chances of victory. But
he did not find Hannibal such a formidable enemy of this sound
strategy as the master of the horse, who was only prevented by his
subordinate position from ruining the country, being headstrong
and rash in action and unrestrained in speech. First with a few
listeners, afterwards openly among the soldiers, he described the
deliberation of his commander as indolence and his caution as
cowardice, attributing to