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The Carthaginians, who take probability for their guide, give the
following account of this matter: Hamilcar, they say, during all the
time that the battle raged between the Greeks and the barbarians,
which was from early dawn till evening, remained in the camp,
sacrificing and seeking favourable omens, while he burned on a huge
pyre the entire bodies of the victims which he offered. Here, as he
poured libations upon the sacrifices, he saw the rout of his army;
whereupon he cast himself headlong into the flames, and so was consumed
and disappeared. But whether Hamilcar's disappearance happened, as
the Phoenicians tell us, in this way, or, as the Syracusans
maintain, in some other, certain it is that the Carthaginians offer
him sacrifice, and in all their colonies have monuments erected to his
honour, as well as one, which is the grandest of all, at Carthage.
Thus much concerning the affairs of Sicily.
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