The other persistent enemy of Carthage was M. Porcius Cato, commonly known as Cato the Censor or Cato the Elder. Born in 234 B.C., Cato was just of an age to serve in the army when Hannibal invaded Italy. We do not know whether he was present at any of the great battles, but he was certainly aide-de-camp to Fabius at the siege of Tarentum in 209. He never forgot the scenes which he witnessed when Hannibal was ravaging Italy; and when he had risen to a high place in the State, he devoted himself to obtaining what he considered a satisfactory vengeance. He lost no opportunity of impressing upon his countrymen his conviction that Carthage should not be permitted to exist. It is related of him that whatever the question before the Senate might be, he would add to his opinion,[25] "and I also think that Carthage ought to be blotted out." He died in 149 B.C., in his eighty-fifth year. It was in this year that the Third Punic War commenced. Cato had succeeded, it would seem, in the great object of his life. Rome was determined that Carthage should be blotted out. It is probable, indeed, that other motives besides the national and political were at work. The commercial interest was very powerful in Rome, and to this interest the destruction of a successful rival, which had long commanded most of the markets of the Mediterranean coast, seemed most desirable.[26] Anyhow, the terms proposed when the Carthaginian envoys were introduced into the Senate at Rome were such that it was manifest that war was determined upon. When the first conditions, onerous as they were, were accepted, then fresh severities were added. The ultimatum was that the Carthaginians must give up their city to be destroyed. They would themselves be spared, and might retain a portion of their property, but their new habitation must not be within ten miles of the sea. This was meant to be impossible, and it had the effect which was desired. When the envoys returned and related the terms which had been finally imposed, the popular fury burst out. Those who had been prominent in advising the negotiations for peace were massacred, and the envoys themselves shared their fate. The Senate, in the face of such a demonstration, could but come to one decision. It declared war against Carthage.