voted to send Hannibal, and he set out to cross the sea
to Spain with a heart full of enthusiasm and joy.

A great deal of curiosity and interest was felt throughout the army to
see him on his arrival. The soldiers had been devotedly attached to
his father, and they were all ready to transfer this attachment at
once to the son, if he should prove worthy of it. It was very evident,
soon after he reached the camp, that he was going to prove himself
thus worthy. He entered at once into the duties of his position with a
degree of energy, patience, and self-denial which attracted universal
attention, and made him a universal favorite. He dressed plainly; he
assumed no airs; he sought for no pleasures or indulgences, nor
demanded any exemption from the dangers and privations which the
common soldiers had to endure. He ate plain food, and slept, often in
his military cloak, on the ground, in the midst of the soldiers on
guard; and in battle he was always foremost to press forward into the
contest, and the last to leave the ground when the time came for
repose. The Romans say that, in addition to these qualities, he was
inhuman and merciless when in open warfare with his foes, and cunning
and treacherous in every other mode of dealing with them. It is very
probable that he was so. Such traits of character were considered by
soldiers in those days, as they are now, virtues in themselves, though
vices in their enemies.

However this may be, Hannibal became a great and universal favorite in
the army. He went on for several years increasing his military
knowledge, and widening and extending his influence, when at length,
one day, Hasdrubal was suddenly killed by a ferocious native of the
country whom he had by some means offended. As soon as the first shock
of this occurrence was over, the leaders of the army went in pursuit
of Hannibal, whom they brought in triumph to the tent of Hasdrubal,
and instated him at once in the supreme command, with one consent and
in the midst of universal acclamations. As soon as news of this event
reached Carthage, the government there confirmed the act of the army,
and Hannibal thus found himself suddenly but securely invested with a
very high military command.

His eager and restless desire to try his strength with the Romans
received a new impulse by his finding that the power was now in his
hands. Still the two countries were at peace. They were bound by
solemn treaties to continue so. The Ri