The highest estimate of the Numantine force falls short of 10,000 men. C. Hostilius Mancinus, consul A. U. 615 (B.C. 139), succeeding to the command of 30,000 men employed in besieging them, found his army so dispirited by a long train of reverses, that he judged it best to retire to some distance from the town. He intended to effect this secretly by a night march, but the besieged, getting notice of his design, fell upon the Roman rear, killed 10,000, it is said, and surrounded the rest in such a manner that escape was hopeless. Anxious only for peace and independence, they readily accepted the terms offered by Mancinus as a ransom for his army. What these were does not appear, but they were sworn to by the consul and chief officers. Mancinus, on the first rumour of his defeat, was recalled to Rome, and deputies from Numantia accompanied him, to obtain the ratification of the treaty. But the haughty senate, as once before in the celebrated surrender at the Caudine Forks, refused to admit terms humiliating to the dignity of the republic, though not to profit by the release of their countrymen. The war was continued; but to satisfy their notions of equity Mancinus was given up to the Numantines, a voluntary testimony, to do him justice, to his own good faith in the transaction. Returning to Spain with his successor, Furius, he was led naked to the waist, his hands tied behind him, to the gates of Numantia. But the Numantines refused to take vengeance on an innocent man; saying, that the breach of the public faith could not be expiated by the death of one person. Let the senate abide by the treaty, or deliver up those who have escaped under the shelter of it.