me. So serious was it indeed that Fabius, now a very old man, went
to the two consuls, Livius and Claudius Nero, and begged them to act
together. They hated one another. Fabius had learned how dangerous such
quarrels might be to the State, and what harm his own advice had done
between Varro and Aemilius Paulus; he now used all his great influence
to get the consuls to put an end to personal strife. They agreed and
joined their armies. Together they were much stronger than Hasdrubal. On
the river Metaurus he was defeated (207). There Hasdrubal himself,
fighting like a lion, was killed with ten thousand of his men.

Unhappily the victorious Nero showed in his treatment of his dead enemy
a spirit very different from that of Hannibal. He threw the bloody head
of Hasdrubal in front of Hannibal's lines. It was the first news he had
of the fate of his brother. He had lost not only a man dearer to him
than any on earth but, with him, his last hope of success. He knew that
all was over; the fortune of Carthage was at an end. For a moment he hid
his face in his mantle. What deep bitterness and pain held his heart in
that moment none may guess.

Two later Roman writers, Livy and Horace, have described the battle of
the Metaurus, which was, indeed, the turning-point of the war: for
Hannibal a fatal turning.

_Metaurus, and After_

Hasdrubal had often shown himself a great leader, but never so
great as in this, his last battle. It was he who supported his men
in the fight by words of encouragement and by meeting danger at
their side; it was he who, with mingled entreaty and rebuke, fired
the spirit of his troops, weary and despairing of a hopeless
struggle; it was he who called back the fugitives and in many
places restored the broken ranks. At last, when fortune declared
itself in favour of the enemy, he would not survive the great host
that had followed him, but spurred his horse into the thickest of
the Roman legionaries. There he fell fighting, as became the son
of Hamilcar and the brother of Hannibal.

The consul, C. Claudius, on his return to the camp ordered the
head of Hasdrubal, which he had carefully brought with him, to be
thrown down in front of the enemy's sentries, and he exhibited
African prisoners in chains. Two of them he freed and sent to
Hannibal to inform him of everything that had happened. Hannibal,
stricken with grief at such public and personal loss, exclaimed,
as