576 AMPHlBIAJiA. 



waters with its blood, the Roman army was obliged to remove its 

 station : he also adds, that the skin of the monster, measuring 120 

 feet in length, was sent to Rome as a trophy." 



The learned Frienshemius, in his Supplementa Liviana, has at- 

 tempted a more ample and circumstantial narrative of the same 

 event, and it cannot be unacceptable to the reader to receive a 

 quotation from an author who has so happily imitated the manner 

 pf the great historian. 



. M In the mean time Regulus, every where victorious, led his 

 army into a region watered by the river Bragrada, near which an 

 unlooked-ior misfortune awaited them, and at once affected the 

 Roman camp with considerable loss, and with apprehensions still 

 more terrible ; for a serpent of prodigious size attacked the sol- 

 diers who were sent for water, and while they were overwhelmed 

 with terror, and unequal to the conflict, engulphed several of 

 them in its enormous mouth, and killed others by writhing round 

 them with its spires, and bruising them with the strokes of its tail : 

 and some were even destroyed by the pestilential effluvia proceed- 

 ing from its breath : it caused so much trouble to Regulus, that 

 he found it necessary to contest the possession of the river with it 

 by employing the whole force of his army, during which a consi- 

 derable number of soldiers were lost, while the serpent could 

 neither be vanquished nor wounded ; the strong armour of its 

 scales easily repelling the force of all the weapons that were di- 

 rected against it ; upon which recourse was had to battering en- 

 gines, with which the animal was attacked in the manner of a for- 

 tified tower, and was thus at length overpowered. Several dis- 

 charges were made against it without success, till its back being 

 broken by an immense stone, the formidable monster began to 

 lose its powers, and was yet with difficulty destroyed ; after hav- 

 ing diffused such a horror among the army, that they confessed 

 they would rather attack Carthage itself than such another mon- 

 ster : nor could the camp continue any longer in the same station , 

 but was obliged to fly ; the water, and the whole adjacent region, 

 being tainted with the pestiferous effluvia. A most mortifying hu- 

 miliation to human pride. Here, at least, was an instance of a 

 whole Roman army, under the command of Regulus, and univer- 

 sally victorious both by sea and land, opposed by a single snake, 

 which conflicted with it when living, and even when dead obliged 



