tum prensans passim, cuicumque est nomen in armis: dedecus hoc defende manu; cur perfida et urbi altera Carthago nostrae post foedera rupta et missum ad portas Poenum, post iura petita consulis alterni stat adhuc, et turribus altis Hannibalem ac Libycas expectat lenta cohortes? miscebat dictis facta et nunc robore celsas educi turres, quis vinceret ardua muri, cogebat, nunc coniunctas astringere nodis instabat ferroque trabes, quo frangeret altos portarum postes quateretque morantia claustra.
He grasped the hand of every man famous in arms, and said: Fight, to repel this disgrace. Why is treacherous Capua, a second Carthage to our state, still standing, after breaking her treaty and sending Hannibal against Rome, and after her claim to hold one of the consulships? Why does she, at ease behind her lofty towers, look out for the arrival of Hannibal and his Libyan host? His words he backed up with deeds. He made his men rear high wooden towers, to rise above the top of the walls; or again he made haste to bind together beams with clamps of iron, that he might break the tall gate-posts and batter down the barriers of defence.
final_alignments\Silius_Italicus_Punica_Book13.json