Then the chiefs exacted an oath of complete obedience from all the Barbarians.

Every day the captains inspected clothes and boots; the sentries were even forbidden to use a shield, for they would often lean it against their lance and fall asleep as they stood; those who had any baggage trailing after them were obliged to get rid of it; everything was to be carried, in Roman fashion, on the back.

As a precaution against the elephants Matho instituted a corps of cataphract cavalry, men and horses being hidden beneath cuirasses of hippopotamus skin bristling with nails; and to protect the horses' hoofs boots of plaited esparto-grass were made for them.
It was forbidden to pillage the villages, or to tyrannise over the inhabitants who were not of Punic race.

But as the country was becoming exhausted, Matho ordered the provisions to be served out to the soldiers individually, without troubling about the women.

At first the men shared with them.