Outside the deserted outpost. Enter Roman troops with the body of Hannibal on a wooden carrier.
Alarum and Enter Scipio Africanus, Gaius Terentius Varro and Fabius Maximus and other troops.
Gaius Terentius
Varro: Behold Gentlemen! The reason of a thousand tears lies deceased in front
of thee; made weak by time and ferocious Roman onslaught and thereafter
relentless Roman quest! Though we couldst not catch him alive, but by Jove, we
have his corpse and so we have truly avenged our fallen comrades who didst fall
to his evil tactics.
Fabius Maximus:
‘Tis but sad that a general of his calibre had to meet such a shambolic end, he
didst deserve full accolades for his achievements, but they were ‘gainst us, so
I canst not confer him with any such honours! Although we all must truly admit
that even in death he doth seem to be one step ahead of us!
Gaius Terentius
Varro: ‘Twas his very nature to be deceitful, and aye, in that regard he was
the master, forever the elusive fox, who wouldst thrive in the thicket to deal
a deadly blow on his enemies by catching them unawares. Tried we to catch him
so and yet he hath defied us!
Fabius Maximus:
Aye, and he brought near disaster to us and now, as we speak, we take heavens
as the witness, and pray that the dead sons of Rome may now, truly, rest in
peace!
Scipio
Africanus: Aye, ‘tis true that horror to us Romans he didst bring, with his
strange and seemingly surreal touch and ingenious strategies; but aye, one fact
which none of us can deny, that an abler or more gifted general, the world at
this hour had never seen. ‘Twas a pity, even a cruel irony that he was not born
to the Romans, for those that he sought to bitterly destroy hath risen from the
ashes of his fire to be the phoenix! And those he sought to protect and uplift
hath fallen into bitter oblivion! Well gentlemen such is life, which mayst
raise thee to seventh heaven or drop thee deeper than the seventh hell! The
treacherous Carthage didst not supply him help during the height of his
conquests, which prevented him from marching on Rome! We were able to
consolidate, and quickly turn things around. He was, and will forever remain in
the hallowed halls of history as a high class general, inspite of being a
butcher of Roman souls! ‘Tis true that once even I wanted to think of him as
this barbarian beast who didst butcher the sons of Rome, to thus render an
entire generation fatherless, but aye, as it turned out, that I didst learn
much from his tactics, and in my mind he was, and always shallst remain my true
tutor, and mentor, who didst artfully guide me to victory! So Gentlemen, how
then should we respect my mentor, who was also my most hated foe? Being Romans,
we must rise above petty thoughts of exacting dire revenge on the dead, and
honour the greatest foe which made our Republic stronger than ever! Let us at
once say that Hannibal is at our gates when any calamity doth strike, only to
remind us how easily didst we “buy” ourselves out of that crisis! Then whenever
our great Republic be threatened, let us remember that it was on the very brink
of collapse, and how we, the Romans, took that as our “finest hour” and
heroically fought off the foreign invader! Mothers wouldst sooth their unruly
babes with the fear of Hannibal, to instill discipline from a very young age,
which wouldst bode well for our Republic! Statues of him shallst be erected to
remind us how we may easily overcome any foe, for we are favoured by the Gods!
So Gentlemen, let us not tarry, and build a grand mausoleum to this fallen
swordsman, general, and loyal son of Carthage, who fought us soulfully and solely
for loyalty to what he believed in, and may we remember, that since the
Republic is bigger than any of us, show the same loyalty and self-sacrifice as
we did to overcome him!
Others: Amen!
Let us proceed! All Hail Scipio! All Hail Hannibal!
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