Titus Livius (Livy), The History of Rome, Book 21
Rev. Canon Roberts, Ed.

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Hanno's proposal received but slight support, though almost all the best men in the council were with him, but as usual, numbers carried the day against reason. No sooner had Hannibal landed in Spain than he became a favourite with the whole army. [2] The veterans thought they saw Hamilcar restored to them as he was in his youth; they saw the same determined expression the same piercing eyes, the same cast of features. He soon showed, however, that it was not his father's memory that helped him most to win the affections of the army. [3] Never was there a character more capable of the two tasks so opposed to each other of commanding and obeying; you could not easily make out whether the army or its general were more attached to him. [4] Whenever courage and resolution were needed Hasdrubal never cared to entrust the command to any one else; and there was no leader in whom the soldiers placed more confidence or under whom they showed more daring. [5] He was fearless in exposing himself to danger and perfectly self-possessed in the presence of danger. No amount of exertion could cause him either bodily or mental fatigue; he was equally indifferent to heat and cold; his eating and drinking were measured by the needs of nature, not by appetite; [6] his hours of sleep were not determined by day or night, whatever time was not taken up with active duties [7??] was given to sleep and rest, but that rest was not wooed on a soft couch or in silence, men often saw him lying on the ground amongst the sentinels and outposts, wrapped in his military cloak. His dress was in no way superior to that of his comrades; what did make him conspicuous were his arms and horses. [8] He was by far the foremost both of the cavalry and the infantry, the first to enter the fight and the last to leave the field. [9] But these great merits were matched by great vices-inhuman cruelty, a perfidy worse than Punic, an utter absence of truthfulness, reverence, fear of the gods, respect for oaths, sense of religion. Such was his character, a compound of virtues and vices. [10] For three years he served under Hasdrubal, and during the whole time he never lost an opportunity of gaining by practice or observation the experience necessary for one who was to be a great leader of men.