e had the Greek phalanx in the center,
which was a close, compact body of many thousand troops, bristling
with long, iron-pointed spears, with which the men pressed forward,
bearing every thing before them. Regulus was, in a word, ready to meet
Carthaginians, but he was not prepared to encounter Greeks. His army
was put to flight, and he was taken prisoner. Nothing could exceed
the excitement and exultation in the city when they saw Regulus and
five hundred other Roman soldiers, brought captive in. A few days
before, they had been in consternation at the imminent danger of his
coming in as a ruthless and vindictive conqueror.

The Roman senate were not discouraged by this disaster. They fitted
out new armies, and the war went on, Regulus being kept all the time
at Carthage as a close prisoner. At last the Carthaginians authorized
him to go to Rome as a sort of commissioner, to propose to the Romans
to exchange prisoners and to make peace. They exacted from him a
solemn promise that if he was unsuccessful he would return. The Romans
had taken many of the Carthaginians prisoners in their naval combats,
and held them captive at Rome. It is customary, in such cases, for the
belligerent nations to make an exchange, and restore the captives on
both sides to their friends and home. It was such an exchange of
prisoners as this which Regulus was to propose.

When Regulus reached Rome he refused to enter the city, but he
appeared before the senate without the walls, in a very humble garb
and with the most subdued and unassuming demeanor. He was no longer,
he said, a Roman officer, or even citizen, but a Carthaginian
prisoner, and he disavowed all right to direct, or even to counsel,
the Roman authorities in respect to the proper course to be pursued.
His opinion was, however, he said, that the Romans ought not to make
peace or to exchange prisoners. He himself and the other Roman
prisoners were old and infirm, and not worth the exchange; and,
moreover, they had no claim whatever on their country, as they could
only have been made prisoners in consequence of want of courage or
patriotism to die in their country's cause. He said that the
Carthaginians were tired of the war, and that their resources were
exhausted, and that the Romans ought to press forward in it with
renewed vigor, and leave himself and the other prisoners to their
fate.

The senate came very slowly and reluctantly to the conclusion to
follow this advice. They,