Here
again Livius for a long time obstinately resisted the wish of his
fellow-senators. He said it was best for the State that he and Nero
should continue to hate one another. Each would do his duty better when
he knew that he was watched by an enemy in the person of his own
colleague. At last the entreaties of the senate prevailed, and Livius
consented to forego the feud, and to cooperate with Nero in preparing
for the coming struggle.
As soon as the winter snows were thawed, Hasdrubal commenced his march
from Auvergne to the Alps. He experienced none of the difficulties which
his brother had met with from the mountain tribes. Hannibal's army had
been the first body of regular troops that had ever traversed their
regions; and, as wild animals assail a traveller, the natives rose
against it instinctively, in imagined defence of their own habitations,
which they supposed to be the objects of Carthaginian ambition. But the
fame of the war, with which Italy had now been convulsed for twelve
years, had penetrated into the Alpine passes, and the mountaineers now
understood that a mighty city southward of the Alps was to be attacked
by the troops whom they saw marching among them.
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