The orders sent were that the walls should be destroyed and every house levelled to the ground. A curse was pronounced by Scipio on any one who should seek to build a town on the site. The curse did not prove effective. Julius Caesar afterwards projected a new Carthage, and Augustus built it. It grew to be a noble city, and in the third century A.D. became one of the principal cities of the Roman empire and an important seat of Western Christianity. It was finally destroyed by the Arabs. _THE GRACCHI AND THEIR FALL._ In the assault by the Roman forces on Megara, the suburb of Carthage, the first to mount the wall was a young man named Tiberius Gracchus, brother-in-law of Scipio, the commander, and grandson of the famous Scipio Africanus. This young man and his brother were to play prominent parts in Rome. One day when the great Scipio was feasting in the Capitol, with other senators of Rome, he was asked by some friends to give his daughter Cornelia in marriage to Tiberius Gracchus, a young plebeian. Proud patrician as he was, he consented, for Gracchus was highly esteemed for probity, and had done him a personal service. On his return home he told his wife that he had promised his daughter to a plebeian. The good woman, who had higher aims, blamed him severely for his folly, as she deemed it. But when she was told the name of her proposed son-in-law she changed her mind, saying that Gracchus was the only man worthy of the gift. Of Cornelia's children three became notable, a daughter, who became the wife of the younger Scipio, and two sons, Tiberius and Caius Gracchus, who are known in history as "The Gracchi." Their father became famous in war and peace, taking important steps in the needed movement of reform. He died, and after his death many sought the hand of the noble Cornelia in marriage, among them King Ptolemy of Egypt. But she refused them all, devoting her life to the education of her children, for which she was admirably fitted by her lofty spirit and high attainments. Concerning this lady, one of the greatest and noblest which Rome produced, there is an anecdote, often repeated, yet well worth repeating again. A Campanian lady who called upon her, and boastfully spoke of her wealth in gold and precious stones, asked Cornelia for the pleasure of seeing her jewels. Leading her visitor to another room, the noble matron pointed to her sleeping children, and said, "There are my jewels; the only ones of which I am proud."