DID HANNIBAL KNOW THE USE OF GUNPOWDER? I. THE ROCK IN THE ALPS. As the march of Hannibal across the Alps is confessedly one of the most wonderful of military operations, we must not be astonished to find that it has been rendered still more wonderful by the addition of further marvels. Of these, the most famous is the blasting of the rock by fire and vinegar. It is now useless to look after the early authorities for the history of Rome. We have only scanty and dubious fragments of Fabius Pictor, and the others; and Titus Livius must represent them all to us. From this, our main fountain of Roman history, we learn that Hannibal, after surmounting many difficulties during his Alpine march, came at last to a rock which defied all ordinary efforts. In this emergency (Liv. lib. xxi. 37)— "Inde ad rupem muniendam, per quam unam via esse poterat, milites ducti quum cædendum esset saxum, arboribus circa immanibus dejectis detrumcatisque, struem ingentem lignorum faciunt; eamque (quum et vis venti apta faciendo igni co-orta esset) succendunt, ardentiaque saxa infuso aceto putrefaciunt. Ita torridam incendio rupem ferro pandunt, molliuntque anfractibus modicis clivos, ut non jumenta solum, sed elephanti etiam, deduci possent." Which is thus translated by George Baker: "The soldiers were then employed to make a way down the rock, through which alone it was possible to effect a passage; and as it was necessary to break the rock, they felled and lopped a number of large trees which stood near, with which they raised a vast pile of timber upon it; and as soon as a smart wind arose, to forward the kindling of it, set it on fire, and then, when the rocks were violently heated, they opened a way through it with iron instruments, and softened the descent by gentle windings, in such manner that not only the beasts of burden, but even the elephants could be brought down." Florus merely says, that "Punici belli vis et tempestas medias prefregit Alpes;" Eutropius, that "Alpes adhuc eâ parte invias patefecit;" Orosius, that "Invias rupes igni ferroque rescindit;" and Cornelius Nepos, that "Alpicos conantes prohibere transitum concidit, loca patefecit." Juvenal's "Et montem rumpit aceto" must be familiar to every reader. Silius Italicus introduces the incident of getting rid of the rock into his Punics, but without the aid of vinegar. He says: "Dum pandit seriam venturi Jupiter ævi, Atque aperit fessis antiqui regna Latini."-Punic. lib. iii. 630-'44. The author of the Punics has met with an English translator in the person of Thomas Ross and we shall adopt his version : "The second Punick War, between Hannibal and the Romans. The whole seventeen books Englished from the Latine of Silius Italicus. With a Continuation from the triumph of Scipio to the Death of Hannibal. By Tho. Ross, Esq., Keeper of his Majestie's Libraries, and Groom of his most Honorable Privy Chamber. Aut prodeste volunt, aut delectare poeta.—HORAT. London, printed by Tho. Roycroft, and are to be sold by Jo. Martin, Ja. Adestry, and Tho. Dicas, in St. Paul's Churchyard. 1661." It is a handsome folio, dedicated to Charles II., whose portrait adorns the volume, which is besides abundant in plates. Charles is preferred to Hannibal and Scipio in prose and verse. It is only fair to the loyal translator to say, that the original dedication is dated at Bruges, Nov. 18, 1657, when adulation to Charles might have been, at all events, disinterested. "While Jove the series of Times to come Doth thus infold the Libyan captain from Th' unequal hills, through wails perplexed descends, Whose prone and threatening cliffs obstruct the way; With rest their frozen limbs. They spend the night With speed the forests from the hills to bring. With flame the rocks; which, with a dreadful sound, And to the weary troops a passage makes Into Latinus' kingdom."-Ross's Translation, p 83. Of the Greeks, the most important testimony on every thing connected with the second Punic war, Polybius is silent, as to this demolition of the rock. So is Plutarch; but that, indeed, is of small consequence. Appian, in his Wars of Hannibal, gives the following version of the circumstance :— Χίονος τε πολλῆς οὔσης καὶ κρύους, τὴν μὲν ὕλην τέμνων τε, καὶ κατακαίων, τὴν δὲ τέφραν σβεννῆς ὕδατι καὶ ὄξει, καὶ τὴν πέφαν ἐκ τοῦδε ψαφαρὰν γιγνομένην, σφύραις σιδηραῖς θραύων kai ódоπоι@ν. In the not over-accurate version of his only English translator, J. D.: “And finding all the passages stopped with deep snow, and ice congealed together, thawing it by kindling mighty fires, and quenching the ashes with water and vinegar, and then breaking the scorched and cleaving rocks with iron hammers and wedges." Such is the principal weight of testimony upon this point. That a rock was burst by the process of first heating it by burning wood, and then by the application of vinegar, has been always considered a somewhat strange operation. We must ask 1. Where did Hannibal get the vinegar? Looking for vinegar in our sense of the word-the fluid called by the Latins acetum, by the Greeks öğos—on the top of the Alps, more than a couple of thousand years ago, must have been a hopeless quest; and we can hardly stretch our faith so far as to imagine that Hannibal carried with him from the Ebro the quantity of so perfectly needless an article sufficient to stew down the Alps. Another solution-not of the rock, but of the difficulty-has been attempted by some modern historians, and adopted, strange to say, by so sensible a man as Ernesti, that the acetum was no more than the sour wine which the soldiers used as their common drink. "Monet etiam Ernesti acetum fuisse potum militarem, et hinc non mirum esse, tantam ejus copiam Pœnis suppetiisse,” says Lemaire, in his note on this passage of Livius. Non mirum, indeed! What quantity of this wine was sufficient to cover a rock capable of defying the progress of an army under the command of such a general as Hannibal; or why he in his intensely rapid march, should have encumbered himself with any superfluous provision, solid or fluid, are questions which do not appear to have entered into the heads of these commentatorial quartermasters to inquire. Indeed, if they had taken the trouble of reading the books on which they were making notes, they would have found that, so far from there being any superfluity in the army of Hannibal, the Carthaginian troops were at times almost on the brink of starvation. 2. If Hannibal, however, had as much vinegar as would have flooded the Alps, another question occurs: Where did he get the wood? Livius boldly says, "Arboribus circa immanibus dejectis detruncatisque, struem ingentem lignorum faciunt.' But here the ingenious historian draws, as usual, upon his own imagination. In the snowy districts of the Alps, there are no "immanes arbores," no materials for making the "ingentem struem." Polybius, who, not long after the time, had visited the country, informs us that τῶν γὰρ Αλπεων τὰ μὲν ἄκρα, καὶ τὰ πρὸς τὰς ὑπερβολὰς ἀνήκοντα τελέως ἄδενδρα, καὶ ψιλὰ πάντ ̓ ἐστι. “The heights of the Alps, and the approaches to the ascents, are altogether treeless and bare." Polybius, we think, says this, with an express reference to the stories from which Livius afterward concocted his history, intending it as an oblique contradiction of the tale, in which immense trees and vast piles of timber are introduced, as auxiliary to Hannibal in his task of rock-melting. "There are no trees on that part of his line of march," says Polybius, quietly, but significantly, alluding to the story of those who had so liberally supplied the invader with timber. Schweighouser very properly remarks: "Quid quod, cap. 37, (Liv. lib. xxi.) in summis Alpium jugis, ubi ne virgulta quidem crescunt, et nil nisi nuda rupes est, nive plerumque, humo nusquam operta, immanes etiam arbores inducit, et lignorum ingentem struem; nempe his opus erat et ornandam fabulam, quam sicco pede pendens Polybius transit, de rupe incendio torrefacta, et infuso aceto putrefacta." 3. If there had been oceans of vinegar in the casks of Hannibal's baggage-wagons, and as much timber at hand as the Canadian forests supply, another and a very important question remains, and that is, Would all this timber heat, and all this vinegar dissolve, any rock towering some thousands of feet above the level of the sea? As for the particular rocks in question, we need only refer to De Luc or Saussure; and their works being read, ask any geological or chemical calculator to express the strength of wood-fire or of vinegar, requisite to melt the Alpine primary or secondary formations. J. B. F. Descuret, who describes himself as "Literarum, et Medicinæ, in Academia Parisiensi Doctor," in his edition of Cornelius Nepos, in the Bibliotheca Classica of N. P. Lemaire (let us pause for a moment to say, that, take Lemaire's collection as a whole, it is deserving of the highest praise for accuracy and learning, completeness and convenience)-will not listen to it. "Hunc vero modum," that of bursting the mountain with vinegar, he says, in his note on the passage of Cornelius Nepos, which we have already cited, "veteres inter fabulas adnumerandas censeo. Quippe 1°. Vix totum universæ Hispaniæ acetum ad aliquot, calcaria quidem natura, saxa solvendum satis Hannibali fuisset. 2o. Hic autem tantum pro calcaria terra stant immensi Sienitæ, qui aceto acetoso, imo acto acerrimo solvi negant." 66 Plinius (Nat. Hist. xxiii. 27) indeed makes no scruple in assuring us that the power of vinegar is such that it saxa rumpit infusum, quæ non ruperit ignis antecadens;" which may be true of soft calcareous formations; though, perhaps, rumpit is not the exact word to express the action of vinegar, and it may a false lection for rodit. Galen (De. Fac. Simp. Med. i. 22), testifies to |