116 CYEENE. 



The foreign policy of Carthage was very different 

 from that of the mother land. The Phoenicians had 

 maintained an army of mercenaries, but had used 

 them only to protect their country from the robber 

 kings of Damascus and Jerusalem. They had many 

 ships of war, but had used them only to convoy their 

 round-bellied ships of trade, and to keep off the 

 attacks of the Greek and Etruscan pirates. Their 

 settlements were merely fortified factories ; they 

 made no attempt to reduce the natives of the land. 

 If their settlements grew into colonies they let them 

 go. But Carthage founded many colonies and never 

 lost a single one. Situated amongst them, possessing 

 a large fleet, it was able both to punish and protect : 

 it defended them in time of war ; it controlled them 

 in time of peace. 



A policy of concession had not saved the Phoenicians 

 from the Greeks : and now these same Greeks were 

 settling in west and displaying immense activity. 

 The Carthaginians saw that they must resist or be 

 ruined : and they went to war as a matter of business. 

 They first put down the Etruscan rovers, in which 

 undertaking they were assisted by the events which 

 occurred on the Italian main. They next put a stop 

 to the spread of the Greek power in Africa itself. 



Half-way between Algeria and Egypt, in the midst 

 of the dividing sea of sand, is a coast oasis formed 

 by a table land of .sufficient height to condense the 

 vapours which float over from the sea, and to chill 

 them into rain. There was a hole in the sky above 

 it, as the natives used to say. To this island-tract 

 came a band of Greeks, directed thither by the oracle at 

 Delphi, where geography was studied, as a part of the 

 system. They established a city and called it Cyrene. 



