They therefore suddenly threw open the gates and rushed out of the town, holding their shields before them, lest any weapons should be cast at them from a distance, and stretching out to view their bare right hands, that it might be seen they had thrown away their swords. Whether this was not observed, in consequence of the distance, or whether some deception was suspected, is not known; but an attack was made on the deserters, and they were put to death as a hostile force. Through this gate the enemy marched into the city in battle-array. The other gates were cut through and broken down with axes and sledges; and as each horseman entered, he galloped off to seize the forum, as had been ordered. A body of veteran troops were also added to the horse to support them. The legionary troops spread themselves in every part of the city, but neither killed nor plundered any, except such as defended themselves with arms. All the Carthaginians were put under guard, with more than three hundred of the inhabitants, who had shut the gates. The rest had the town put into their hands, and their property restored. About two thousand of the enemy fell in the assault on this city, and not more than ninety of the Romans. 4. As the taking of this town was a source of great joy to those who effected it, as well as to the general and the rest of the army, so their approach to their camp also presented a splendid spectacle, on account of the immense crowd of captives they drove before them. Scipio, having bestowed high commendations upon his brother, representing the capture of Orinx as equal in importance to the capture of Carthage by himself, led his forces back into hither Spain. He could not make an attempt on Gades, or pursue the army of Hasdrubal, now dispersed through all parts of the province, in consequence of the approach of winter. He therefore dismissed the legions into winter quarters, and sent his brother Lucius Scipio with Hanno, the enemy's general, and other distinguished prisoners, to Rome, while he retired himself to Tarraco. During the same year, the Roman fleet under Marcus Valerius Laevinus, the proconsul, sailing over from Sicily into Africa, devastated to a wide extent the fields about Utica and Carthage. They carried off plunder from the remotest borders of the Carthaginian territory around the very walls of Utica. On their return to Sicily they were met by a Carthaginian fleet of seventy ships of war, of which seventeen were taken and four sunk; the rest were dispersed and compelled to fly. The Romans, victorious both by land and sea, returned to Lilybaeum with immense booty of every kind. The ships of the enemy having thus been driven from the whole sea, large supplies of corn were conveyed to Rome.