This was now a second blow for the Romans, and one from which they did not recover: they did not think of making peace, yet they tried to carry on the war at less expense. The Carthaginians were masters of the sea, and they made use of their superiority to lay waste the Italian coasts; but they managed the war in a wretched manner. The Romans remained unshaken in Sicily, and thus, although indeed they shunned a general engagement, they took several strong places under the very eyes of the enemy, and reduced the Carthaginians to the possession of the north-western part of Sicily. In the year 501 (according to Cato), fortune turned her back upon the Carthaginians: L. Cæcilius Metellus defeated Hasdrubal near Palermo. Hasdrubal had tried to take advantage of the great fear which the Romans had of the African cavalry, and to recover Palermo, very likely with the connivance of the inhabitants: he encamped in its beautiful plain about half a (German) mile from the town, and ravaged the fields. Metellus kept himself in his fortified camp ready to fight: he showed himself here to be a great general, and made it his particular object to render the elephants harmless. The Carthaginians advanced to attack the camp: Metellus drew up all his light troops on the edge of the ditch, with a good supply of missiles; the legions manœuvred on the flanks. The light infantry now sallied forth against the enemy, enticed them on, and then threw themselves into the ditch, and hurled an immense number of javelins and burning arrows against the Carthaginians and their elephants: the camp-followers were constantly bringing them fresh ammunition from the town, and at the same time, the soldiers from behind the breast-works discharged their _pila_. The Carthaginians now wished to sweep them down with one mighty onset; but the elephants were wounded, and thus became wild, and several of them plunged into the trenches, from whence the light-armed soldiers of the Romans jumped behind the fortified lines, and the maddened beasts turned against their own masters. This was the moment for which Metellus had waited all along: from the sidegates of the lines, the legions burst forth, routed the Carthaginian infantry, and put their whole army to flight. More than a hundred elephants were captured. These were brought to Rome on rafts built for the purpose, and killed by missiles in the circus, perhaps to give the people a representation of the battle in which they had been taken.