The statement, that the military talent of Xanthippus was the primary means of saving Carthage, is probably coloured; the officers of Carthage can hardly have waited for foreigners to teach them that the light African cavalry could be more appropriately employed on the plain than among hills and forests.

From such stories, the echo of the talk of Greek guardrooms, even Polybius is not free.

The statement that Xanthippus was put to death by the Carthaginians after the victory, is a fiction; he departed voluntarily, perhaps to enter the Egyptian service.
7.

Nothing further is known with certainty as to the end of Regulus; even his mission to Rome--which is sometimes placed in 503, sometimes in 513--is very ill attested.

The later Romans, who sought in the fortunes and misfortunes of their forefathers mere materials for school themes, made Regulus the prototype of heroic misfortune as they made Fabricius the prototype of heroic poverty, and put into circulation in his name a number of anecdotes invented by way of due accompaniment--incongruous embellishments, contrasting ill with serious and sober history.
8.