The reverses of Rome by sea were a second time the cause of her giving up her naval establishments, and she sold her marine equipments to the dealers in marine stores, at a ruinous sacrifice. Carthage, therefore, became mistress of the seas; but the mistress being unable to pay the wages she owed, began borrowing money of her neighbours. Ptolemy of Egypt was applied to, but he civilly laid his hand on his heart, declaring he had nothing to lend, and kept his money--if he had any--in his pocket. In this dilemma, the command of the Carthaginians fell upon Hamilcar, surnamed Barca, or the lightning, from his being one of the fastest men of the day; and though any general, equal to the general run, might head a force with plenty of money to pay the troops, a genius was required to keep an army going, or rather to keep up a standing army, with empty pockets. He found the mercenaries in a state of insubordination for want of their customary emolument; but, having no money of his own, he made Bruttium and Locri his bankers, and gave his soldiers a general authority to draw, with their swords, for whatever they required. Taking his position on Mount Hercte, now the Monte Pelegrino, he maintained himself and his army for three years, enabling his troops to carry out the principle of spending half-a-crown out of sixpence a day--the sixpence being their own, and the half-crown being anybody else's, from whom it could be most conveniently taken. After remaining three years at Hercte, he removed to the town of Eryx, intending to tire the Romans out; but like many others who attempt to exhaust the patience of others, he found his own stock rapidly diminishing. He was drawn into an engagement, in which he lost so many of his soldiers, that he was obliged to ask for a truce to bury the dead; but the Roman general would give him no undertaking not to proceed during the funerals. A short time afterwards, when the fortune of war had changed, Hamilcar was asked to give a similar permission, and, by allowing the burials to proceed, he has raised a monument to his own magnanimity.