It fell the whole night plentifully1, in floods; the thunder growled2; it was the voice of Moloch; he had vanquished3 Tanith; and she, being now fecundated, opened up her vast bosom5 in heaven’s heights. Sometimes she could be seen in a clear and luminous6 spot stretched upon cushions of cloud; and then the darkness would close in again as though she were still too weary and wished to sleep again; the Carthaginians, all believing that water is brought forth7 by the moon, shouted to make her travail8 easy.
The rain beat upon the terraces and overflowed9 them, forming lakes in the courts, cascades11 on the staircases, and eddies12 at the corners of the streets. It poured in warm heavy masses and urgent streams; big frothy jets leaped from the corners of all the buildings; and it seemed as though whitish cloths hung dimly upon the walls, and the washed temple-roofs shone black in the gleam of the lightning. Torrents13 descended14 from the Acropolis by a thousand paths; houses suddenly gave way, and small beams, plaster, rubbish, and furniture passed along in streams which ran impetuously over the pavement.
Amphoras, flagons, and canvases had been placed out of doors; but the torches were extinguished; brands were taken from the funeral-pile of the Baal, and the Carthaginians bent16 back their necks and opened their mouths to drink. Others by the side of the miry pools, plunged18 their arms into them up to the armpits, and filled themselves so abundantly with water that they vomited19 it forth like buffaloes20. The freshness gradually spread; they breathed in the damp air with play of limb, and in the happiness of their intoxication21 boundless22 hope soon arose. All their miseries23 were forgotten. Their country was born anew.
They felt the need, as it were, of directing upon others the extravagant24 fury which they had been unable to employ against themselves. Such a sacrifice could not be in vain; although they felt no remorse25 they found themselves carried away by the frenzy26 which results from complicity in irreparable crimes.
The Barbarians28 had encountered the storm in their ill-closed tents; and they were still quite chilled on the morrow as they tramped through the mud in search of their stores and weapons, which were spoiled and lost.
Hamilcar went himself to see Hanno, and, in virtue29 of his plenary powers, intrusted the command to him. The old Suffet hesitated for a few minutes between his animosity and his appetite for authority, but he accepted nevertheless.
Hamilcar next took out a galley30 armed with a catapult at each end. He placed it in the gulf32 in front of the raft; then he embarked33 his stoutest34 troops on board such vessels35 as were available. He was apparently36 taking to flight; and running northward37 before the wind he disappeared into the mist.
But three days afterwards, when the attack was about to begin again, some people arrived tumultuously from the Libyan coast. Barca had come among them. He had carried off provisions everywhere, and he was spreading through the country.
Then the Barbarians were indignant as though he were betraying them. Those who were most weary of the siege, and especially the Gauls, did not hesitate to leave the walls in order to try and rejoin him. Spendius wanted to reconstruct the helepolis; Matho had traced an imaginary line from his tent to Megara, and inwardly swore to follow it, and none of their men stirred. But the rest, under the command of Autaritus, went off, abandoning the western part of the rampart, and so profound was the carelessness exhibited that no one even thought of replacing them.
Narr’ Havas spied them from afar in the mountains. During the night he led all his men along the sea-shore on the outer side of the Lagoon39, and entered Carthage.
He presented himself as a saviour40 with six thousand men all carrying meal under their cloaks, and forty elephants laden41 with forage42 and dried meat. The people flocked quickly around them; they gave them names. The sight of these strong animals, sacred to Baal, gave the Carthaginians even more joy than the arrival of such relief; it was a token of the tenderness of the god, a proof that he was at last about to interfere43 in the war to defend them.
Narr’ Havas received the compliments of the Ancients. Then he ascended44 to Salammbo’s palace.
He had not seen her again since the time when in Hamilcar’s tent amid the five armies he had felt her little, cold, soft hand fastened to his own; she had left for Carthage after the betrothal46. His love, which had been diverted by other ambitions, had come back to him; and now he expected to enjoy his rights, to marry her, and take her.
Salammbo did not understand how the young man could ever become her master! Although she asked Tanith every day for Matho’s death, her horror of the Libyan was growing less. She vaguely47 felt that the hate with which he had persecuted48 her was something almost religious — and she would fain have seen in Narr’ Havas’s person a reflection, as it were, of that malice49 which still dazzled her. She desired to know him better, and yet his presence would have embarrassed her. She sent him word that she could not receive him.
Moreover, Hamilcar had forbidden his people to admit the King of the Numidians to see her; by putting off his reward to the end of the war he hoped to retain his devotion; — and, through dread50 of the Suffet, Narr’ Havas withdrew.
But he bore himself haughtily51 towards the Hundred. He changed their arrangements. He demanded privileges for his men, and placed them on important posts; thus the Barbarians stared when they perceived Numidians on the towers.
The surprise of the Carthaginians was greater still when three hundred of their own people, who had been made prisoners during the Sicilian war, arrived on board an old Punic trireme. Hamilcar, in fact, had secretly sent back to the Quirites the crews of the Latin vessels, taken before the defection of the Tyrian towns; and, to reciprocate52 the courtesy, Rome was now sending him back her captives. She scorned the overtures53 of the Mercenaries in Sardinian, and would not even recognise the inhabitants of Utica as subjects.
Hiero, who was ruling at Syracuse, was carried away by this example. For the preservation54 of his own States it was necessary that an equilibrium55 should exist between the two peoples; he was interested, therefore, in the safety of the Chanaanites, and he declared himself their friend, and sent them twelve hundred oxen, with fifty-three thousand nebels of pure wheat.
A deeper reason prompted aid to Carthage. It was felt that if the Mercenaries triumphed, every one, from soldier to plate-washer, would rise, and that no government and no house could resist them.
Meanwhile Hamilcar was scouring56 the eastern districts. He drove back the Gauls, and all the Barbarians found that they were themselves in something like a state of siege.
Then he set himself to harass57 them. He would arrive and then retire, and by constantly renewing this manoeuvre58, he gradually detached them from their encampments. Spendius was obliged to follow them, and in the end Matho yielded in like manner.
He did not pass beyond Tunis. He shut himself up within its walls. This persistence59 was full of wisdom, for soon Narr’ Havas was to be seen issuing from the gate of Khamon with his elephants and soldiers. Hamilcar was recalling him, but the other Barbarians were already wandering about in the provinces in pursuit of the Suffet.
The latter had received three thousand Gauls from Clypea. He had horses brought to him from Cyrenaica, and armour60 from Brutium, and began the war again.
Never had his genius been so impetuous and fertile. For five moons he dragged his enemies after him. He had an end to which he wished to guide them.
The Barbarians had at first tried to encompass61 him with small detachments, but he always escaped them. They ceased to separate then. Their army amounted to about forty thousand men, and several times they enjoyed the sight of seeing the Carthaginians fall back.
The horsemen of Narr’ Havas were what they found most tormenting62. Often, at times of the greatest weariness, when they were advancing over the plains, and dozing63 beneath the weight of their arms, a great line of dust would suddenly rise on the horizon; there would be a galloping64 up to them, and a rain of darts65 would pour from the bosom of a cloud filled with flaming eyes. The Numidians in their white cloaks would utter loud shouts, raise their arms, press their rearing stallions with their knees, and, wheeling them round abruptly66, would then disappear. They had always supplies of javelins68 and dromedaries some distance off, and they would return more terrible than before, howl like wolves, and take to flight like vultures. The Barbarians posted at the extremities69 of the files fell one by one; and this would continue until evening, when an attempt would be made to enter the mountains.
Although they were perilous71 for elephants, Hamilcar made his way in among them. He followed the long chain which extends from the promontory72 of Hermaeum to the top of Zagouan. This, they believed, was a device for hiding the insufficiency of his troops. But the continual uncertainty73 in which he kept them exasperated74 them at last more than any defeat. They did not lose heart, and marched after him.
At last one evening they surprised a body of velites amid some big rocks at the entrance of a pass between the Silver Mountain and the Lead Mountain; the entire army was certainly in front of them, for a noise of footsteps and clarions could be heard; the Carthaginians immediately fled through the gorge76. It descended into a plain, and was shaped like an iron hatchet77 with a surrounding of lofty cliffs. The Barbarians dashed into it in order to overtake the velites; quite at the bottom other Carthaginians were running tumultuously amid galloping oxen. A man in a red cloak was to be seen; it was the Suffet; they shouted this to one another; and they were carried away with increased fury and joy. Several, from laziness or prudence78, had remained on the threshold of the pass. But some cavalry79, debouching from a wood, beat them down upon the rest with blows of pike and sabre; and soon all the Barbarians were below in the plain.
Then this great human mass, after swaying to and fro for some time, stood still; they could discover no outlet80.
Those who were nearest to the pass went back again, but the passage had entirely81 disappeared. They hailed those in front to make them go on; they were being crushed against the mountain, and from a distance they inveighed82 against their companions, who were unable to find the route again.
In fact the Barbarians had scarcely descended when men who had been crouching84 behind the rocks raised the latter with beams and overthrew85 them, and as the slope was steep the huge blocks had rolled down pell-mell and completely stopped up the narrow opening.
At the other extremity86 of the plain stretched a long passage, split in gaps here and there, and leading to a ravine which ascended to the upper plateau, where the Punic army was stationed. Ladders had been placed beforehand in this passage against the wall of cliff; and, protected by the windings87 of the gaps, the velites were able to seize and mount them before being overtaken. Several even made their way to the bottom of the ravine; they were drawn88 up with cables, for the ground at this spot was of moving sand, and so much inclined that it was impossible to climb it even on the knees. The Barbarians arrived almost immediately. But a portcullis, forty cubits high, and made to fit the intervening space exactly, suddenly sank before them like a rampart fallen from the skies.
The Suffet’s combinations had therefore succeeded. None of the Mercenaries knew the mountain, and, marching as they did at the head of their columns, they had drawn on the rest. The rocks, which were somewhat narrow at the base, had been easily cast down; and, while all were running, his army had raised shouts, as of distress89, on the horizon. Hamilcar, it is true, might have lost his velites, only half of whom remained, but he would have sacrificed twenty times as many for the success of such an enterprise.
The Barbarians pressed forward until morning, in compact files, from one end of the plain to the other. They felt the mountain with their hands, seeking to discover a passage.
At last day broke; and they perceived all about them a great white wall hewn with the pick. And no means of safety, no hope! The two natural outcomes from this blind alley31 were closed by the portcullis and the heaps of rocks.
Then they all looked at one another without speaking. They sank down in collapse90, feeling an icy coldness in their loins, and an overwhelming weight upon their eyelids91.
They rose, and bounded against the rocks. But the lowest were weighted by the pressure of the others, and were immovable. They tried to cling to them so as to reach the top, but the bellying92 shape of the great masses rendered all hold impossible. They sought to cleave94 the ground on both sides of the gorge, but their instruments broke. They made a large fire with the tent poles, but the fire could not burn the mountain.
They returned to the portcullis; it was garnished95 with long nails as thick as stakes, as sharp as the spines96 of a porcupine97, and closer than the hairs of a brush. But they were animated98 by such rage that they dashed themselves against it. The first were pierced to the backbone99, those coming next surged over them, and all fell back, leaving human fragments and bloodstained hair on those horrible branches.
When their discouragement was somewhat abated100, they made an examination of the provisions. The Mercenaries, whose baggage was lost, possessed101 scarcely enough for two days; and all the rest found themselves destitute102 — for they had been awaiting a convoy103 promised by the villages of the South.
However, some bulls were roaming about, those which the Carthaginians had loosed in the gorge to attract the Barbarians. They killed them with lance thrusts and ate them, and when their stomachs were filled their thoughts were less mournful.
The next day they slaughtered105 all the mules106 to the number of about forty; then they scraped the skins, boiled the entrails, pounded the bones, and did not yet despair; the army from Tunis had no doubt been warned, and was coming.
But on the evening of the fifth day their hunger increased; they gnawed107 their sword-belts, and the little sponges which bordered the bottom of their helmets.
These forty thousand men were massed into the species of hippodrome formed by the mountain about them. Some remained in front of the portcullis, or at the foot of the rocks; the rest covered the plain confusedly. The strong shunned108 one another, and the timid sought out the brave, who, nevertheless, were unable to save them.
To avoid infection, the corpses109 of the velites had been speedily buried; and the position of the graves was no longer visible.
All the Barbarians lay drooping111 on the ground. A veteran would pass between their lines here and there; and they would howl curses against the Carthaginians, against Hamilcar, and against Matho, although he was innocent of their disaster; but it seemed to them that their pains would have been less if he had shared them. Then they groaned112, and some wept softly like little children.
They came to the captains and besought113 them to grant them something that would alleviate114 their sufferings. The others made no reply; or, seized with fury, would pick up a stone and fling it in their faces.
Several, in fact, carefully kept a reserve of food in a hole in the ground — a few handfuls of dates, or a little meal; and they ate this during the night, with their heads bent beneath their cloaks. Those who had swords kept them naked in their hands, and the most suspicious remained standing115 with their backs against the mountain.
They accused their chiefs and threatened them. Autaritus was not afraid of showing himself. With the Barbaric obstinacy116 which nothing could discourage, he would advance twenty times a day to the rocks at the bottom, hoping every time to find them perchance displaced; and swaying his heavy fur-covered shoulders, he reminded his companions of a bear coming forth from its cave in springtime to see whether the snows are melted.
Spendius, surrounded by the Greeks, hid himself in one of the gaps; as he was afraid, he caused a rumour117 of his death to be spread.
They were now hideously119 lean; their skin was overlaid with bluish marblings. On the evening of the ninth day three Iberians died.
Their frightened companions left the spot. They were stripped, and the white, naked bodies lay in the sunshine on the sand.
Then the Garamantians began to prowl slowly round about them. They were men accustomed to existence in solitude120, and they reverenced121 no god. At last the oldest of the band made a sign, and bending over the corpses they cut strips from them with their knives, then squatted122 upon their heels and ate. The rest looked on from a distance; they uttered cries of horror; — many, nevertheless, being, at the bottom of their souls, jealous of such courage.
In the middle of the night some of these approached, and, dissembling their eagerness, asked for a small mouthful, merely to try, they said. Bolder ones came up; their number increased; there was soon a crowd. But almost all of them let their hands fall on feeling the cold flesh on the edge of their lips; others, on the contrary, devoured123 it with delight.
That they might be led away by example, they urged one another on mutually. Such as had at first refused went to see the Garamantians, and returned no more. They cooked the pieces on coals at the point of the sword; they salted them with dust, and contended for the best morsels125. When nothing was left of the three corpses, their eyes ranged over the whole plain to find others.
But were they not in possession of Carthaginians — twenty captives taken in the last encounter, whom no one had noticed up to the present? These disappeared; moreover, it was an act of vengeance126. Then, as they must live, as the taste for this food had become developed, and as they were dying, they cut the throats of the water-carriers, grooms127, and all the serving-men belonging to the Mercenaries. They killed some of them every day. Some ate much, recovered strength, and were sad no more.
Soon this resource failed. Then the longing128 was directed to the wounded and sick. Since they could not recover, it was as well to release them from their tortures; and, as soon as a man began to stagger, all exclaimed that he was now lost, and ought to be made use of for the rest. Artifices129 were employed to accelerate their death; the last remnant of their foul130 portion was stolen from them; they were trodden on as though by inadvertence; those in the last throes wishing to make believe that they were strong, strove to stretch out their arms, to rise, to laugh. Men who had swooned came to themselves at the touch of a notched131 blade sawing off a limb; — and they still slew132, ferociously133 and needlessly, to sate134 their fury.
A mist heavy and warm, such as comes in those regions at the end of winter, sank on the fourteenth day upon the army. This change of temperature brought numerous deaths with it, and corruption135 was developed with frightful136 rapidity in the warm dampness which was kept in by the sides of the mountain. The drizzle137 that fell upon the corpses softened138 them, and soon made the plain one broad tract104 of rottenness. Whitish vapours floated overhead; they pricked139 the nostrils140, penetrated141 the skin, and troubled the sight; and the Barbarians thought that through the exhalations of the breath they could see the souls of their companions. They were overwhelmed with immense disgust. They wished for nothing more; they preferred to die.
Two days afterwards the weather became fine again, and hunger seized them once more. It seemed to them that their stomachs were being wrenched143 from them with tongs144. Then they rolled about in convulsions, flung handfuls of dust into their mouths, bit their arms, and burst into frantic145 laughter.
They were still more tormented146 by thirst, for they had not a drop of water, the leathern bottles having been completely dried up since the ninth day. To cheat their need they applied147 their tongues to the metal plates on their waist-belts, their ivory pommels, and the steel of their swords. Some former caravan-leaders tightened148 their waists with ropes. Others sucked a pebble149. They drank urine cooled in their brazen150 helmets.
And they still expected the army from Tunis! The length of time which it took in coming was, according to their conjectures151, an assurance of its early arrival. Besides, Matho, who was a brave fellow, would not desert them. “’Twill be to-morrow!” they would say to one another; and then to-morrow would pass.
At the beginning they had offered up prayers and vows152, and practised all kinds of incantations. Just now their only feeling to their divinities was one of hatred153, and they strove to revenge themselves by believing in them no more.
Men of violent disposition154 perished first; the Africans held out better than the Gauls. Zarxas lay stretched at full length among the Balearians, his hair over his arm, inert155. Spendius found a plant with broad leaves filled abundantly with juice, and after declaring that it was poisonous, so as to keep off the rest, he fed himself upon it.
They were too weak to knock down the flying crows with stones. Sometimes when a gypaetus was perched on a corpse110, and had been mangling156 it for a long time, a man would set himself to crawl towards it with a javelin67 between his teeth. He would support himself with one hand, and after taking a good aim, throw his weapon. The white-feathered creature, disturbed by the noise, would desist and look about in tranquil157 fashion like a cormorant158 on a rock, and would then again thrust in its hideous118, yellow beak159, while the man, in despair, would fall flat on his face in the dust. Some succeeded in discovering chameleons160 and serpents. But it was the love of life that kept them alive. They directed their souls to this idea exclusively, and clung to existence by an effort of the will that prolonged it.
The most stoical kept close to one another, seated in a circle here and there, among the dead in the middle of the plain; and wrapped in their cloaks they gave themselves up silently to their sadness.
Those who had been born in towns recalled the resounding161 streets, the taverns162, theatres, baths, and the barbers’ shops where there are tales to be heard. Others could once more see country districts at sunset, when the yellow corn waves, and the great oxen ascend45 the hills again with the ploughshares on their necks. Travellers dreamed of cisterns163, hunters of their forests, veterans of battles; and in the somnolence164 that benumbed them their thoughts jostled one another with the precipitancy and clearness of dreams. Hallucinations came suddenly upon them; they sought for a door in the mountain in order to flee, and tried to pass through it. Others thought that they were sailing in a storm and gave orders for the handling of a ship, or else fell back in terror, perceiving Punic battalions165 in the clouds. There were some who imagined themselves at a feast, and sang.
Many through a strange mania166 would repeat the same word or continually make the same gesture. Then when they happened to raise their heads and look at one another they were choked with sobs167 on discovering the horrible ravages168 made in their faces. Some had ceased to suffer, and to while away the hours told of the perils169 which they had escaped.
Death was certain and imminent170 to all. How many times had they not tried to open up a passage! As to implore171 terms from the conqueror172, by what means could they do so? They did not even know where Hamilcar was.
The wind was blowing from the direction of the ravine. It made the sand flow perpetually in cascades over the portcullis; and the cloaks and hair of the Barbarians were being covered with it as though the earth were rising upon them and desirous of burying them. Nothing stirred; the eternal mountain seemed still higher to them every morning.
Sometimes flights of birds darted173 past beneath the blue sky in the freedom of the air. The men closed their eyes that they might not see them.
At first they felt a buzzing in their ears, their nails grew black, the cold reached to their breasts; they lay upon their sides and expired without a cry.
On the nineteenth day two thousand Asiatics were dead, with fifteen hundred from the Archipelago, eight thousand from Libya, the youngest of the Mercenaries and whole tribes — in all twenty thousand soldiers, or half of the army.
Autaritus, who had only fifty Gauls left, was going to kill himself in order to put an end to this state of things, when he thought he saw a man on the top of the mountain in front of him.
Owing to his elevation174 this man did not appear taller than a dwarf175. However, Autaritus recognised a shield shaped like a trefoil on his left arm. “A Carthaginian!” he exclaimed, and immediately throughout the plain, before the portcullis and beneath the rocks, all rose. The soldier was walking along the edge of the precipice176; the Barbarians gazed at him from below.
Spendius picked up the head of an ox; then having formed a diadem177 with two belts, he fixed178 it on the horns at the end of a pole in token of pacific intentions. The Carthaginian disappeared. They waited.
At last in the evening a sword-belt suddenly fell from above like a stone loosened from the cliff. It was made of red leather covered with embroidery179, with three diamond stars, and stamped in the centre, it bore the mark of the Great Council: a horse beneath a palm-tree. This was Hamilcar’s reply, the safe-conduct that he sent them.
They had nothing to fear; any change of fortune brought with it the end of their woes180. They were moved with extravagant joy, they embraced one another, they wept. Spendius, Autaritus, and Zarxas, four Italiotes, a Negro and two Spartans181 offered themselves as envoys182. They were immediately accepted. They did not know, however, by what means they should get away.
But a cracking sounded in the direction of the rocks; and the most elevated of them, after rocking to and fro, rebounded183 to the bottom. In fact, if they were immovable on the side of the Barbarians — for it would have been necessary to urge them up an incline plane, and they were, moreover, heaped together owing to the narrowness of the gorge — on the others, on the contrary, it was sufficient to drive against them with violence to make them descend15. The Carthaginians pushed them, and at daybreak they projected into the plain like the steps of an immense ruined staircase.
The Barbarians were still unable to climb them. Ladders were held out for their assistance; all rushed upon them. The discharge of a catapult drove the crowd back; only the Ten were taken away.
They walked amid the Clinabarians, leaning their hands on the horses’ croups for support.
Now that their first joy was over they began to harbour anxieties. Hamilcar’s demands would be cruel. But Spendius reassured184 them.
“I will speak!” And he boasted that he knew excellent things to say for the safety of the army.
Behind all the bushes they met with ambushed185 sentries186, who prostrated187 themselves before the sword-belt which Spendius had placed over his shoulder.
When they reached the Punic camp the crowd flocked around them, and they thought that they could hear whisperings and laughter. The door of a tent opened.
Hamilcar was at the very back of it seated on a stool beside a table on which there shone a naked sword. He was surrounded by captains, who were standing.
He started back on perceiving these men, and then bent over to examine them.
Their pupils were strangely dilated188, and there was a great black circle round their eyes, which extended to the lower parts of their ears; their bluish noses stood out between their hollow cheeks, which were chinked with deep wrinkles; the skin of their bodies was too large for their muscles, and was hidden beneath a slate-coloured dust; their lips were glued to their yellow teeth; they exhaled189 an infectious odour; they might have been taken for half-opened tombs, for living sepulchres.
In the centre of the tent, on a mat on which the captains were about to sit down, there was a dish of smoking gourds190. The Barbarians fastened their eyes upon it with a shivering in all their limbs, and tears came to their eyelids; nevertheless they restrained themselves.
Hamilcar turned away to speak to some one. Then they all flung themselves upon it, flat on the ground. Their faces were soaked in the fat, and the noise of their deglutition was mingled191 with the sobs of joy which they uttered. Through astonishment192, doubtless, rather than pity, they were allowed to finish the mess. Then when they had risen Hamilcar with a sign commanded the man who bore the sword-belt to speak. Spendius was afraid; he stammered193.
Hamilcar, while listening to him, kept turning round on his finger a big gold ring, the same which had stamped the seal of Carthage upon the sword-belt. He let it fall to the ground; Spendius immediately picked it up; his servile habits came back to him in the presence of his master. The others quivered with indignation at such baseness.
But the Greek raised his voice and spoke194 for a long time in rapid, insidious195, and even violent fashion, setting forth the crimes of Hanno, whom he knew to be Barca’s enemy, and striving to move Hamilcar’s pity by the details of their miseries and the recollection of their devotion; in the end he became forgetful of himself, being carried away by the warmth of his temper.
Hamilcar replied that he accepted their excuses. Peace, then, was about to be concluded, and now it would be a definitive196 one! But he required that ten Mercenaries, chosen by himself, should be delivered up to him without weapons or tunics197.
They had not expected such clemency198; Spendius exclaimed: “Ah! twenty if you wish, master!”
“No! ten will suffice,” replied Hamilcar quietly.
They were sent out of the tent to deliberate. As soon as they were alone, Autaritus protested against the sacrifice of their companions, and Zarxas said to Spendius:
“Why did you not kill him? his sword was there beside you!”
“Him!” said Spendius. “Him! him!” he repeated several times, as though the thing had been impossible, and Hamilcar were an immortal199.
They were so overwhelmed with weariness that they stretched themselves on their backs on the ground, not knowing at what resolution to arrive.
Spendius urged them to yield. At last they consented, and went in again.
Then the Suffet put his hand into the hands of the ten Barbarians in turn, and pressed their thumbs; then he rubbed it on his garment, for their viscous200 skin gave a rude, soft impression to the touch, a greasy201 tingling202 which induced horripilation. Afterwards he said to them:
“You are really all the chiefs of the Barbarians, and you have sworn for them?”
“Yes!” they replied.
“Without constraint203, from the bottom of your souls, with the intention of fulfilling your promises?”
They assured him that they were returning to the rest in order to fulfil them.
“Well!” rejoined the Suffet, “in accordance with the convention concluded between myself, Barca, and the ambassadors of the Mercenaries, it is you whom I choose and shall keep!”
Spendius fell swooning upon the mat. The Barbarians, as though abandoning him, pressed close together; and there was not a word, not a complaint.
Their companions, who were waiting for them, not seeing them return, believed themselves betrayed. The envoys had no doubt given themselves up to the Suffet.
They waited for two days longer; then on the morning of the third, their resolution was taken. With ropes, picks, and arrows, arranged like rungs between strips of canvas, they succeeded in scaling the rocks; and leaving the weakest, about three thousand in number, behind them, they began their march to rejoin the army at Tunis.
Above the gorge there stretched a meadow thinly sown with shrubs204; the Barbarians devoured the buds. Afterwards they found a field of beans; and everything disappeared as though a cloud of grasshoppers205 had passed that way. Three hours later they reached a second plateau bordered by a belt of green hills.
Among the undulations of these hillocks, silvery sheaves shone at intervals206 from one another; the Barbarians, who were dazzled by the sun, could perceive confusedly below great black masses supporting them; these rose, as though they were expanding. They were lances in towers on elephants terribly armed.
Besides the spears on their breasts, the bodkin tusks207, the brass208 plates which covered their sides, and the daggers209 fastened to their knee-caps, they had at the extremity of their tusks a leathern bracelet210, in which the handle of a broad cutlass was inserted; they had set out simultaneously211 from the back part of the plain, and were advancing on both sides in parallel lines.
The Barbarians were frozen with a nameless terror. They did not even try to flee. They already found themselves surrounded.
The elephants entered into this mass of men; and the spurs on their breasts divided it, the lances on their tusks upturned it like ploughshares; they cut, hewed212, and hacked213 with the scythes214 on their trunks; the towers, which were full of phalaricas, looked like volcanoes on the march; nothing could be distinguished215 but a large heap, whereon human flesh, pieces of brass and blood made white spots, grey sheets and red fuses. The horrible animals dug out black furrows216 as they passed through the midst of it all.
The fiercest was driven by a Numidian who was crowned with a diadem of plumes217. He hurled218 javelins with frightful quickness, giving at intervals a long shrill219 whistle. The great beasts, docile220 as dogs, kept an eye on him during the carnage.
The circle of them narrowed by degrees; the weakened Barbarians offered no resistance; the elephants were soon in the centre of the plain. They lacked space; they thronged221 half-rearing together, and their tusks clashed against one another. Suddenly Narr’ Havas quieted them, and wheeling round they trotted222 back to the hills.
Two syntagmata, however, had taken refuge on the right in a bend of ground, had thrown away their arms, and were all kneeling with their faces towards the Punic tents imploring223 mercy with uplifted arms.
Their legs and hands were tied; then when they were stretched on the ground beside one another the elephants were brought back.
Their breasts cracked like boxes being forced; two were crushed at every step; the big feet sank into the bodies with a motion of the haunches which made the elephants appear lame224. They went on to the very end.
The level surface of the plain again became motionless. Night fell. Hamilcar was delighting himself with the spectacle of his vengeance, but suddenly he started.
He saw, and all saw, some more Barbarians six hundred paces to the left on the summit of a peak! In fact four hundred of the stoutest Mercenaries, Etruscans, Libyans, and Spartans had gained the heights at the beginning, and had remained there in uncertainty until now. After the massacre225 of their companions they resolved to make their way through the Carthaginians; they were already descending226 in serried227 columns, in a marvellous and formidable fashion.
A herald228 was immediately despatched to them. The Suffet needed soldiers; he received them unconditionally229, so greatly did he admire their bravery. They could even, said the man of Carthage, come a little nearer, to a place, which he pointed230 out to them, where they would find provisions.
The Barbarians ran thither231 and spent the night in eating. Then the Carthaginians broke into clamours against the Suffet’s partiality for the Mercenaries.
Did he yield to these outbursts of insatiable hatred or was it a refinement232 of treachery? The next day he came himself, without a sword and bare-headed, with an escort of Clinabarians, and announced to them that having too many to feed he did not intend to keep them. Nevertheless, as he wanted men and he knew of no means of selecting the good ones, they were to fight together to the death; he would then admit the conquerors233 into his own body-guard. This death was quite as good as another; — and then moving his soldiers aside (for the Punic standards hid the horizon from the Mercenaries) he showed them the one hundred and ninety-two elephants under Narr’ Havas, forming a single straight line, their trunks brandishing234 broad steel blades like giant arms holding axes above their heads.
The Barbarians looked at one another silently. It was not death that made them turn pale, but the horrible compulsion to which they found themselves reduced.
The community of their lives had brought about profound friendship among these men. The camp, with most, took the place of their country; living without a family they transferred the needful tenderness to a companion, and they would fall asleep in the starlight side by side under the same cloak. And then in their perpetual wanderings through all sorts of countries, murders, and adventures, they had contracted affections, one for the other, in which the stronger protected the younger in the midst of battles, helped him to cross precipices236, sponged the sweat of fevers from his brow, and stole food for him, and the weaker, a child perhaps, who had been picked up on the roadside, and had then become a Mercenary, repaid this devotion by a thousand kindnesses.
They exchanged their necklaces and earrings237, presents which they had made to one another in former days, after great peril70, or in hours of intoxication. All asked to die, and none would strike. A young fellow might be seen here and there, saying to another whose beard was grey: “No! no! you are more robust238! you will avenge239 us, kill me!” and the man would reply: “I have fewer years to live! Strike to the heart, and think no more about it!” Brothers gazed on one another with clasped hands, and friend bade friend eternal farewells, standing and weeping upon his shoulder.
They threw off their cuirasses that the sword-points might be thrust in the more quickly. Then there appeared the marks of the great blows which they had received for Carthage, and which looked like inscriptions240 on columns.
They placed themselves in four equal ranks, after the fashion of gladiators, and began with timid engagements. Some had even bandaged their eyes, and their swords waved gently through the air like blind men’s sticks. The Carthaginians hooted242, and shouted to them that they were cowards. The Barbarians became animated, and soon the combat as general, headlong, and terrible.
Sometimes two men all covered with blood would stop, fall into each other’s arms, and die with mutual124 kisses. None drew back. They rushed upon the extended blades. Their delirium243 was so frenzied244 that the Carthaginians in the distance were afraid.
At last they stopped. Their breasts made a great hoarse245 noise, and their eyeballs could be seen through their long hair, which hung down as though it had come out of a purple bath. Several were turning round rapidly, like panthers wounded in the forehead. Others stood motionless looking at a corpse at their feet; then they would suddenly tear their faces with their nails, take their swords with both hands, and plunge17 them into their own bodies.
There were still sixty left. They asked for drink. They were told by shouts to throw away their swords, and when they had done so water was brought to them.
While they were drinking, with their faces buried in the vases, sixty Carthaginians leaped upon them and killed them with stiletos in the back.
Hamilcar had done this to gratify the instincts of his army, and, by means of this treachery, to attach it to his own person.
The war, then, was ended; at least he believed that it was; Matho would not resist; in his impatience246 the Suffet commanded an immediate75 departure.
His scouts247 came to tell him that a convoy had been descried248, departing towards the Lead Mountain. Hamilcar did not trouble himself about it. The Mercenaries once annihilated249, the Nomads250 would give him no further trouble. The important matter was to take Tunis. He advanced by forced marches upon it.
He had sent Narr’ Havas to Carthage with the news of his victory; and the King of the Numidians, proud of his success, visited Salammbo.
She received him in her gardens under a large sycamore tree, amid pillows of yellow leather, and with Taanach beside her. Her face was covered with a white scarf, which, passing over her mouth and forehead, allowed only her eyes to be seen; but her lips shone in the transparency of the tissue like the gems252 on her fingers, for Salammbo had both her hands wrapped up, and did not make a gesture during the whole conversation.
Narr’ Havas announced the defeat of the Barbarians to her. She thanked him with a blessing253 for the services which he had rendered to her father. Then he began to tell her about the whole campaign.
The doves on the palm trees around them cooed softly, and other birds fluttered amid the grass: ring-necked glareolas, Tartessus quails254 and Punic guinea-fowl. The garden, long uncultivated, had multiplied its verdure; coloquintidas mounted into the branches of cassias, the asclepias was scattered255 over fields of roses, all kinds of vegetation formed entwinings and bowers256; and here and there, as in the woods, sun-rays, descending obliquely257, marked the shadow of a leaf upon the ground. Domestic animals, grown wild again, fled at the slightest noise. Sometimes a gazelle might be seen trailing scattered peacocks’ feathers after its little black hoofs258. The clamours of the distant town were lost in the murmuring of the waves. The sky was quite blue, and not a sail was visible on the sea.
Narr’ Havas had ceased speaking; Salammbo was looking at him without replying. He wore a linen259 robe with flowers painted on it, and with gold fringes at the hem10; two silver arrows fastened his plaited hair at the tips of his ears; his right hand rested on a pike-staff adorned260 with circles of electrum and tufts of hair.
As she watched him a crowd of dim thoughts absorbed her. This young man, with his gentle voice and feminine figure, captivated her eyes by the grace of his person, and seemed to her like an elder sister sent by the Baals to protect her. The recollection of Matho came upon her, nor did she resist the desire to learn what had become of him.
Narr’ Havas replied that the Carthaginians were advancing towards Tunis to take it. In proportion as he set forth their chances of success and Matho’s weaknesses, she seemed to rejoice in extraordinary hope. Her lips trembled, her breast panted. When he finally promised to kill him himself, she exclaimed: “Yes! kill him! It must be so!”
The Numidian replied that he desired this death ardently261, since he would be her husband when the war was over.
Salammbo started, and bent her head.
But Narr’ Havas, pursuing the subject, compared his longings262 to flowers languishing263 for rain, or to lost travellers waiting for the day. He told her, further, that she was more beautiful than the moon, better than the wind of morning or than the face of a guest. He would bring for her from the country of the Blacks things such as there were none in Carthage, and the apartments in their house should be sanded with gold dust.
Evening fell, and odours of balsam were exhaled. For a long time they looked at each other in silence, and Salammbo’s eyes, in the depths of her long draperies, resembled two stars in the rift264 of a cloud. Before the sun set he withdrew.
The Ancients felt themselves relieved of a great anxiety, when he left Carthage. The people had received him with even more enthusiastic acclamations than on the first occasion. If Hamilcar and the King of the Numidians triumphed alone over the Mercenaries it would be impossible to resist them. To weaken Barca they therefore resolved to make the aged241 Hanno, him whom they loved, a sharer in the deliverance of Carthage.
He proceeded immediately towards the western provinces, to take his vengeance in the very places which had witnessed his shame. But the inhabitants and the Barbarians were dead, hidden, or fled. Then his anger was vented265 upon the country. He burnt the ruins of the ruins, he did not leave a single tree nor a blade of grass; the children and the infirm, that were met with, were tortured; he gave the women to his soldiers to be violated before they were slaughtered.
Often, on the crests266 of the hills, black tents were struck as though overturned by the wind, and broad, brilliantly bordered discs, which were recognised as being chariot-wheels, revolved267 with a plaintive268 sound as they gradually disappeared in the valleys. The tribes, which had abandoned the siege of Carthage, were wandering in this way through the provinces, waiting for an opportunity, or for some victory to be gained by the Mercenaries, in order to return. But, whether from terror or famine, they all took the roads to their native lands, and disappeared.
Hamilcar was not jealous of Hanno’s successes. Nevertheless he was in a hurry to end matters; he commanded him to fall back upon Tunis; and Hanno, who loved his country, was under the walls of the town on the appointed day.
For its protection it had its aboriginal269 population, twelve thousand Mercenaries, and, in addition, all the Eaters of Uncleanness, for like Matho they were riveted270 to the horizon of Carthage, and plebs and schalischim gazed at its lofty walls from afar, looking back in thought to boundless enjoyments271. With this harmony of hatred, resistance was briskly organised. Leathern bottles were taken to make helmets; all the palm-trees in the gardens were cut down for lances; cisterns were dug; while for provisions they caught on the shores of the lake big white fish, fed on corpses and filth272. Their ramparts, kept in ruins now by the jealousy273 of Carthage, were so weak that they could be thrown down with a push of the shoulder. Matho stopped up the holes in them with the stones of the houses. It was the last struggle; he hoped for nothing, and yet he told himself that fortune was fickle274.
As the Carthaginians approached they noticed a man on the rampart who towered over the battlements from his belt upwards275. The arrows that flew about him seemed to frighten him no more than a swarm276 of swallows. Extraordinary to say, none of them touched him.
Hamilcar pitched his camp on the south side; Narr’ Havas, to his right, occupied the plain of Rhades, and Hanno the shore of the lake; and the three generals were to maintain their respective positions, so as all to attack the walls simultaneously.
But Hamilcar wished first to show the Mercenaries that he would punish them like slaves. He had the ten ambassadors crucified beside one another on a hillock in front of the town.
At the sight of this the besieged277 forsook278 the rampart.
Matho had said to himself that if he could pass between the walls and Narr’ Havas’s tents with such rapidity that the Numidians had not time to come out, he could fall upon the rear of the Carthaginian infantry279, who would be caught between his division and those inside. He dashed out with his veterans.
Narr’ Havas perceived him; he crossed the shore of the lake, and came to warn Hanno to dispatch men to Hamilcar’s assistance. Did he believe Barca too weak to resist the Mercenaries? Was it a piece of treachery or folly280? No one could ever learn.
Hanno, desiring to humiliate281 his rival, did not hesitate. He shouted orders to sound the trumpets282, and his whole army rushed upon the Barbarians. The latter returned, and ran straight against the Carthaginians; they knocked them down, crushed them under their feet, and, driving them back in this way, reached the tent of Hanno, who was then surrounded by thirty Carthaginians, the most illustrious of the Ancients.
He appeared stupefied by their audacity283; he called for his captains. Every one thrust his fist under his throat, vociferating abuse. The crowd pressed on; and those who had their hands on him could scarce retain their hold. However, he tried to whisper to them: “I will gave you whatever you want! I am rich! Save me!” They dragged him along; heavy as he was his feet did not touch the ground. The Ancients had been carried off. His terror increased. “You have beaten me! I am your captive! I will ransom284 myself! Listen to me, my friends!” and borne along by all those shoulders which were pressed against his sides, he repeated: “What are you going to do? What do you want? You can see that I am not obstanite! I have always been good-natured!”
A gigantic cross stood at the gate. The Barbarians howled: “Here! here!” But he raised his voice still higher; and in the names of their gods he called upon them to lead him to the schalischim, because he wished to confide285 to him something on which their safety depended.
They paused, some asserting that it was right to summon Matho. He was sent for.
Hanno fell upon the grass; and he saw around him other crosses also, as though the torture by which he was about to perish had been multiplied beforehand; he made efforts to convince himself that he was mistaken, that there was only one, and even to believe that there were none at all. At last he was lifted up.
“Speak!” said Matho.
He offered to give up Hamilcar; then they would enter Carthage and both be kings.
Matho withdrew, signing to the others to make haste. It was a stratagem286, he thought, to gain time.
The Barbarian27 was mistaken; Hanno was in an extremity when consideration is had to nothing, and, moreover, he so execrated287 Hamilcar that he would have sacrificed him and all his soldiers on the slightest hope of safety.
The Ancients were languishing on the ground at the foot of the crosses; ropes had already been passed beneath their armpits. Then the old Suffet, understanding that he must die, wept.
They tore off the clothes that were still left on him — and the horror of his person appeared. Ulcers288 covered the nameless mass; the fat on his legs hid the nails on his feet; from his fingers there hung what looked like greenish strips; and the tears streaming through the tubercles on his cheeks gave to his face an expression of frightful sadness, for they seemed to take up more room than on another human face. His royal fillet, which was half unfastened, trailed with his white hair in the dust.
They thought that they had no ropes strong enough to haul him up to the top of the cross, and they nailed him upon it, after the Punic fashion, before it was erected289. But his pride awoke in his pain. He began to overwhelm them with abuse. He foamed292 and twisted like a marine293 monster being slaughtered on the shore, and predicted that they would all end more horribly still, and that he would be avenged294.
He was. On the other side of the town, whence there now escaped jets of flame with columns of smoke, the ambassadors from the Mercenaries were in their last throes.
Some who had swooned at first had just revived in the freshness of the wind; but their chins still rested upon their breasts, and their bodies had fallen somewhat, in spite of the nails in their arms, which were fastened higher than their heads; from their heels and hands blood fell in big, slow drops, as ripe fruit falls from the branches of a tree — and Carthage, gulf, mountains, and plains all appeared to them to be revolving295 like an immense wheel; sometimes a cloud of dust, rising from the ground, enveloped296 them in its eddies; they burned with horrible thirst, their tongues curled in their mouths, and they felt an icy sweat flowing over them with their departing souls.
Nevertheless they had glimpses, at an infinite depth, of streets, marching soldiers, and the swinging of swords; and the tumult38 of battle reached them dimly like the noise of the sea to shipwrecked men dying on the masts of a ship. The Italiotes, who were sturdier than the rest, were still shrieking297. The Lacedaemonians were silent, with eyelids closed; Zarxas, once so vigorous, was bending like a broken reed; the Ethiopian beside him had his head thrown back over the arms of the cross; Autaritus was motionless, rolling his eyes; his great head of hair, caught in a cleft298 in the wood, fell straight upon his forehead, and his death-rattle seemed rather to be a roar of anger. As to Spendius, a strange courage had come to him; he despised life now in the certainty which he possessed of an almost immediate and an eternal emancipation299, and he awaited death with impassibility.
Amid their swooning, they sometimes started at the brushing of feathers passing across their lips. Large wings swung shadows around them, croakings sounded in the air; and as Spendius’s cross was the highest, it was upon his that the first vulture alighted. Then he turned his face towards Autaritus, and said slowly to him with an unaccountable smile:
“Do you remember the lions on the road to Sicca?”
“They were our brothers!” replied the Gaul, as he expired.
The Suffet, meanwhile, had bored through the walls and reached the citadel300. The smoke suddenly disappeared before a gust142 of wind, discovering the horizon as far as the walls of Carthage; he even thought that he could distinguish people watching on the platform of Eschmoun; then, bringing back his eyes, he perceived thirty crosses of extravagant size on the shore of the Lake, to the left.
In fact, to render them still more frightful, they had been constructed with tent-poles fastened end to end, and the thirty corpses of the Ancients appeared high up in the sky. They had what looked like white butterflies on their breasts; these were the feathers of the arrows which had been shot at them from below.
A broad gold ribbon shone on the summit of the highest; it hung down to the shoulder, there being no arm on that side, and Hamilcar had some difficulty in recognising Hanno. His spongy bones had given way under the iron pins, portions of his limbs had come off, and nothing was left on the cross but shapeless remains301, like the fragments of animals that are hung up on huntsmen’s doors.
The Suffet could not have known anything about it; the town in front of him masked everything that was beyond and behind; and the captains who had been successively sent to the two generals had not re-appeared. Then fugitives302 arrived with the tale of the rout83, and the Punic army halted. This catastrophe303, falling upon them as it did in the midst of their victory, stupefied them. Hamilcar’s orders were no longer listened to.
Matho took advantage of this to continue his ravages among the Numidians.
Hanno’s camp having been overthrown304, he had returned against them. The elephants came out; but the Mercenaries advanced through the plain shaking about flaming firebrands, which they had plucked from the walls, and the great beasts, in fright, ran headlong into the gulf, where they killed one another in their struggles, or were drowned beneath the weight of their cuirasses. Narr’ Havas had already launched his cavalry; all threw themselves face downwards305 upon the ground; then, when the horses were within three paces of them, they sprang beneath their bellies306, ripped them open with dagger-strokes, and half the Numidians had perished when Barca came up.
The exhausted307 Mercenaries could not withstand his troops. They retired308 in good order to the mountain of the Hot Springs. The Suffet was prudent309 enough not to pursue them. He directed his course to the mouths of the Macaras.
Tunis was his; but it was now nothing but a heap of smoking rubbish. The ruins fell through the breaches311 in the walls to the centre of the plain; quite in the background, between the shores of the gulf, the corpses of the elephants drifting before the wind conflicted, like an archipelago of black rocks floating on the water.
Narr’ Havas had drained his forests of these animals, taking young and old, male and female, to keep up the war, and the military force of his kingdom could not repair the loss. The people who had seen them perishing at a distance were grieved at it; men lamented312 in the streets, calling them by their names like deceased friends: “Ah! the Invincible313! the Victory! the Thunderer! the Swallow!” On the first day, too, there was no talk except of the dead citizens. But on the morrow the tents of the Mercenaries were seen on the mountain of the Hot Springs. Then so deep was the despair that many people, especially women, flung themselves headlong from the top of the Acropolis.
Hamilcar’s designs were not known. He lived alone in his tent with none near him but a young boy, and no one ever ate with them, not even excepting Narr’ Havas. Nevertheless he showed great deference314 to the latter after Hanno’s defeat; but the king of the Numidians had too great an interest in becoming his son not to distrust him.
This inertness315 veiled skilful316 manoeuvres. Hamilcar seduced317 the heads of the villages by all sorts of artifices; and the Mercenaries were hunted, repulsed318, and enclosed like wild beasts. As soon as they entered a wood, the trees caught fire around them; when they drank of a spring it was poisoned; the caves in which they hid in order to sleep were walled up. Their old accomplices319, the populations who had hitherto defended them, now pursued them; and they continually recognised Carthaginian armour in these bands.
Many had their faces consumed with red tetters; this, they thought, had come to them through touching320 Hanno. Others imagined that it was because they had eaten Salammbo’s fishes, and far from repenting321 of it, they dreamed of even more abominable322 sacrileges, so that the abasement323 of the Punic Gods might be still greater. They would fain have exterminated324 them.
In this way they lingered for three months along the eastern coast, and then behind the mountain of Selloum, and as far as the first sands of the desert. They sought for a place of refuge, no matter where. Utica and Hippo-Zarytus alone had not betrayed them; but Hamilcar was encompassing325 these two towns. Then they went northwards at haphazard326 without even knowing the various routes. Their many miseries had confused their understandings.
The only feeling left them was one of exasperation327, which went on developing; and one day they found themselves again in the gorges328 of Cobus and once more before Carthage!
Then the actions multiplied. Fortune remained equal; but both sides were so wearied that they would willingly have exchanged these skirmishes for a great battle, provided that it were really the last.
Matho was inclined to carry this proposal himself to the Suffet. One of his Libyans devoted329 himself for the purpose. All were convinced as they saw him depart that he would not return.
He returned the same evening.
Hamilcar accepted the challenge. The encounter should take place the following day at sunrise, in the plain of Rhades.
The Mercenaries wished to know whether he had said anything more, and the Libyan added:
“As I remained in his presence, he asked me what I was waiting for. ‘To be killed!’ I replied. Then he rejoined: ‘No! begone! that will be to-morrow with the rest.’”
This generosity330 astonished the Barbarians; some were terrified by it, and Matho regretted that the emissary had not been killed.
He had still remaining three thousand Africans, twelve hundred Greeks, fifteen hundred Campanians, two hundred Iberians, four hundred Etruscans, five hundred Samnites, forty Gauls, and a troop of Naffurs, nomad251 bandits met with in the date region — in all seven thousand two hundred and nineteen soldiers, but not one complete syntagmata. They had stopped up the holes in their cuirasses with the shoulder-blades of quadrupeds, and replaced their brass cothurni with worn sandals. Their garments were weighted with copper331 or steel plates; their coats of mail hung in tatters about them, and scars appeared like purple threads through the hair on their arms and faces.
The wraiths332 of their dead companions came back to their souls and increased their energy; they felt, in a confused way, that they were the ministers of a god diffused333 in the hearts of the oppressed, and were the pontiffs, so to speak, of universal vengeance! Then they were enraged334 with grief at what was extravagant injustice335, and above all by the sight of Carthage on the horizon. They swore an oath to fight for one another until death.
The beasts of burden were killed, and as much as possible was eaten so as to gain strength; afterwards they slept. Some prayed, turning towards different constellations336.
The Carthaginians arrived first in the plain. They rubbed the edges of their shields with oil to make the arrows glide337 off them easily; the foot-soldiers who wore long hair took the precaution of cutting it on the forehead; and Hamilcar ordered all bowls to be inverted338 from the fifth hour, knowing that it is disadvantageous to fight with the stomach too full. His army amounted to fourteen thousand men, or about double the number of the Barbarians. Nevertheless, he had never felt such anxiety; if he succumbed339 it would mean the annihilation of the Republic, and he would perish on the cross; if, on the contrary, he triumphed, he would reach Italy by way of the Pyrenees, the Gauls, and the Alps, and the empire of the Barcas would become eternal. Twenty times during the night he rose to inspect everything himself, down to the most trifling340 details. As to the Carthaginians, they were exasperated by their lengthened341 terror. Narr’ Havas suspected the fidelity342 of his Numidians. Moreover, the Barbarians might vanquish4 them. A strange weakness had come upon him; every moment he drank large cups of water.
But a man whom he did not know opened his tent and laid on the ground a crown of rock-salt, adorned with hieratic designs formed with sulphur, and lozenges of mother-of-pearl; a marriage crown was sometimes sent to a betrothed343 husband; it was a proof of love, a sort of invitation.
Nevertheless Hamilcar’s daughter had no tenderness for Narr’ Havas.
The recollection of Matho disturbed her in an intolerable manner; it seemed to her that the death of this man would unburden her thoughts, just as people to cure themselves of the bite of a viper344 crush it upon the wound. The king of the Numidians was depending upon her; he awaited the wedding with impatience, and, as it was to follow the victory, Salammbo made him this present to stimulate345 his courage. Then his distress vanished, and he thought only of the happiness of possessing so beautiful a woman.
The same vision had assailed346 Matho; but he cast it from him immediately, and his love, that he thus thrust back, was poured out upon his companions in arms. He cherished them like portions of his own person, of his hatred — and he felt his spirit higher, and his arms stronger; everything that he was to accomplish appeared clearly before him. If sighs sometimes escaped him, it was because he was thinking of Spendius.
He drew up the Barbarians in six equal ranks. He posted the Etruscans in the centre, all being fastened to a bronze chain; the archers347 were behind, and on the wings he distributed the Naffurs, who were mounted on short-haired camels, covered with ostrich348 feathers.
The Suffet arranged the Carthaginians in similar order. He placed the Clinabarians outside the infantry next to the velites, and the Numidians beyond; when day appeared, both sides were thus in line face to face. All gazed at each other from a distance, with round fierce eyes. There was at first some hesitation349; at last both armies moved.
The Barbarians advanced slowly so as not to become out of breath, beating the ground with their feet; the centre of the Punic army formed a convex curve. Then came the burst of a terrible shock, like the crash of two fleets in collision. The first rank of the Barbarians had quickly opened up, and the marksmen, hidden behind the others, discharged their bullets, arrows, and javelins. The curve of the Carthaginians, however, flattened350 by degrees, became quite straight, and then bent inwards; upon this, the two sections of the velites drew together in parallel lines, like the legs of a compass that is being closed. The Barbarians, who were attacking the phalanx with fury, entered the gap; they were being lost; Matho checked them — and while the Carthaginian wings continued to advance, he drew out the three inner ranks of his line; they soon covered his flanks, and his army appeared in triple array.
But the Barbarians placed at the extremities were the weakest, especially those on the left, who had exhausted their quivers, and the troop of velites, which had at last come up against them, was cutting them up greatly.
Matho made them fall back. His right comprised Campanians, who were armed with axes; he hurled them against the Carthaginian left; the centre attacked the enemy, and those at the other extremity, who were out of peril, kept the velites at a distance.
Then Hamilcar divided his horsemen into squadrons, placed hoplites between them, and sent them against the Mercenaries.
Those cone-shaped masses presented a front of horses, and their broader sides were filled and bristling351 with lances. The Barbarians found it impossible to resist; the Greek foot-soldiers alone had brazen armour, all the rest had cutlasses on the end of poles, scythes taken from the farms, or swords manufactured out of the fellies of wheels; the soft blades were twisted by a blow, and while they were engaged in straightening them under their heels, the Carthaginians massacred them right and left at their ease.
But the Etruscans, riveted to their chain, did not stir; those who were dead, being prevented from falling, formed an obstruction352 with their corpses; and the great bronze line widened and contracted in turn, as supple353 as a serpent, and as impregnable as a wall. The Barbarians would come to re-form behind it, pant for a minute, and then set off again with the fragments of their weapons in their hands.
Many already had none left, and they leaped upon the Carthaginians, biting their faces like dogs. The Gauls in their pride stripped themselves of the sagum; they showed their great white bodies from a distance, and they enlarged their wounds to terrify the enemy. The voice of the crier announcing the orders could no longer be heard in the midst of the Punic syntagmata; their signals were being repeated by the standards, which were raised above the dust, and every one was swept away in the swaying of the great mass that surrounded him.
Hamilcar commanded the Numidians to advance. But the Naffurs rushed to meet them.
Clad in vast black robes, with a tuft of hair on the top of the skull354, and a shield of rhinoceros355 leather, they wielded356 a steel which had no handle, and which they held by a rope; and their camels, which bristled357 all over with feathers, uttered long, hoarse cluckings. Each blade fell on a precise spot, then rose again with a smart stroke carrying off a limb with it. The fierce beasts galloped358 through the syntagmata. Some, whose legs were broken, went hopping359 along like wounded ostriches360.
The Punic infantry turned in a body upon the Barbarians, and cut them off. Their maniples wheeled about at intervals from one another. The more brilliant Carthaginian weapons encircled them like golden crowns; there was a swarming361 movement in the centre, and the sun, striking down upon the points of the swords, made them glitter with white flickering362 gleams. However, files of Clinabarians lay stretched upon the plain; some Mercenaries snatched away their armour, clothed themselves in it, and then returned to the fray363. The deluded364 Carthaginians were several times entangled365 in their midst. They would stand stupidly motionless, or else would back, surge again, and triumphant366 shouts rising in the distance seemed to drive them along like derelicts in a storm. Hamilcar was growing desperate; all was about to perish beneath the genius of Matho and the invincible courage of the Mercenaries.
But a great noise of tabourines burst forth on the horizon. It was a crowd of old men, sick persons, children of fifteen years of age, and even women, who, being unable to withstand their distress any longer, had set out from Carthage, and, for the purpose of placing themselves under the protection of something formidable, had taken from Hamilcar’s palace the only elephant that the Republic now possessed — that one, namely, whose trunk had been cut off.
Then it seemed to the Carthaginians that their country, forsaking367 its walls, was coming to command them to die for her. They were seized with increased fury, and the Numidians carried away all the rest.
The Barbarians had set themselves with their backs to a hillock in the centre of the plain. They had no chance of conquering, or even of surviving; but they were the best, the most intrepid368, and the strongest.
The people from Carthage began to throw spits, larding-pins and hammers, over the heads of the Numidians; those whom consuls369 had feared died beneath sticks hurled by women; the Punic populace was exterminating370 the Mercenaries.
The latter had taken refuge on the top of the hill. Their circle closed up after every fresh breach310; twice it descended to be immediately repulsed with a shock; and the Carthaginians stretched forth their arms pell-mell, thrusting their pikes between the legs of their companions, and raking at random371 before them. They slipped in the blood; the steep slope of the ground made the corpses roll to the bottom. The elephant, which was trying to climb the hillock, was up to its belly93; it seemed to be crawling over them with delight; and its shortened trunk, which was broad at the extremity, rose from time to time like an enormous leech372.
Then all paused. The Carthaginians ground their teeth as they gazed at the hill, where the Barbarians were standing.
At last they dashed at them abruptly, and the fight began again. The Mercenaries would often let them approach, shouting to them that they wished to surrender; then, with frightful sneers373, they would kill themselves at a blow, and as the dead fell, the rest would mount upon them to defend themselves. It was a kind of pyramid, which grew larger by degrees.
Soon there were only fifty, then only twenty, only three, and lastly only two — a Samnite armed with an axe235, and Matho who still had his sword.
The Samnite with bent hams swept his axe alternately to the right and left, at the same time warning Matho of the blows that were being aimed at him. “Master, this way! that way! stoop down!”
Matho had lost his shoulder-pieces, his helmet, his cuirass; he was completely naked, and more livid than the dead, with his hair quite erect290, and two patches of foam291 at the corners of his lips — and his sword whirled so rapidly that it formed an aureola around him. A stone broke it near the guard; the Samnite was killed and the flood of Carthaginians closed in, they touched Matho. Then he raised both his empty hands towards heaven, closed his eyes, and, opening out his arms like a man throwing himself from the summit of a promontory into the sea, hurled himself among the pikes.
They moved away before him. Several times he ran against the Carthaginians. But they always drew back and turned their weapons aside.
His foot struck against a sword. Matho tried to seize it. He felt himself tied by the wrists and knees, and fell.
Narr’ Havas had been following him for some time, step by step, with one of the large nets used for capturing wild beasts, and, taking advantage of the moment when he stooped down, had involved him in it.
Then he was fastened on the elephants with his four limbs forming a cross; and all those who were not wounded escorted him, and rushed with great tumult towards Carthage.
The news of the victory had arrived in some inexplicable374 way at the third hour of the night; the clepsydra of Khamon had just completed the fifth as they reached Malqua; then Matho opened his eyes. There were so many lights in the houses that the town appeared to be all in flames.
An immense clamour reached him dimly; and lying on his back he looked at the stars.
Then a door closed and he was wrapped in darkness.
On the morrow, at the same hour, the last of the men left in the Pass of the Hatchet expired.
On the day that their companions had set out, some Zuaeces who were returning had tumbled the rocks down, and had fed them for some time.
The Barbarians constantly expected to see Matho appear — and from discouragement, from languor375, and from the obstinacy of sick men who object to change their situation, they would not leave the mountain; at last the provisions were exhausted and the Zuaeces went away. It was known that they numbered scarcely more than thirteen hundred men, and there was no need to employ soldiers to put an end to them.
Wild beasts, especially lions, had multiplied during the three years that the war had lasted. Narr’ Havas had held a great battue, and — after tying goats at intervals — had run upon them and so driven them towards the Pass of the Hatchet; — and they were now all living in it when a man arrived who had been sent by the Ancients to find out what there was left of the Barbarians.
Lions and corpses were lying over the tract of the plain, and the dead were mingled with clothes and armour. Nearly all had the face or an arm wanting; some appeared to be still intact; others were completely dried up, and their helmets were filled with powdery skulls376; feet which had lost their flesh stood out straight from the knemides; skeletons still wore their cloaks; and bones, cleaned by the sun, made gleaming spots in the midst of the sand.
The lions were resting with their breasts against the ground and both paws stretched out, winking377 their eyelids in the bright daylight, which was heightened by the reflection from the white rocks. Others were seated on their hind-quarters and staring before them, or else were sleeping, rolled into a ball and half hidden by their great manes; they all looked well fed, tired, and dull. They were as motionless as the mountain and the dead. Night was falling; the sky was striped with broad red bands in the west.
In one of the heaps, which in an irregular fashion embossed the plain, something rose up vaguer than a spectre. Then one of the lions set himself in motion, his monstrous378 form cutting a black shadow on the background of the purple sky, and when he was quite close to the man, he knocked him down with a single blow of his paw.
Then, stretching himself flat upon him, he slowly drew out the entrails with the edge of his teeth.
Afterwards he opened his huge jaws379, and for some minutes uttered a lengthened roar which was repeated by the echoes in the mountain, and was finally lost in the solitude.
Suddenly some small gravel380 rolled down from above. The rustling381 of rapid steps was heard, and in the direction of the portcullis and of the gorge there appeared pointed muzzles382 and straight ears, with gleaming, tawny383 eyes. These were the jackals coming to eat what was left.
The Carthaginian, who was leaning over the top of the precipice to look, went back again.
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1
plentifully
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| adv. 许多地，丰饶地 | |
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2
growled
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| v.（动物）发狺狺声， （雷）作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 )；低声咆哮着说 | |
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vanquished
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| v.征服( vanquish的过去式和过去分词 )；战胜；克服；抑制 | |
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vanquish
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| v.征服，战胜；克服；抑制 | |
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bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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luminous
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| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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travail
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| n.阵痛；努力 | |
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overflowed
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| 溢出的 | |
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hem
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| n.贴边，镶边；vt.缝贴边；(in)包围，限制 | |
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cascades
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| 倾泻( cascade的名词复数 )； 小瀑布（尤指一连串瀑布中的一支）； 瀑布状物； 倾泻（或涌出）的东西 | |
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eddies
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| （水、烟等的）漩涡，涡流( eddy的名词复数 ) | |
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torrents
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| n.倾注；奔流( torrent的名词复数 )；急流；爆发；连续不断 | |
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14
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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15
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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17
plunge
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| v.跳入，(使)投入，(使)陷入；猛冲 | |
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18
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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19
vomited
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20
buffaloes
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| n.水牛（分非洲水牛和亚洲水牛两种）( buffalo的名词复数 )；（南非或北美的）野牛；威胁；恐吓 | |
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21
intoxication
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| n.wild excitement;drunkenness；poisoning | |
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22
boundless
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| adj.无限的；无边无际的；巨大的 | |
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23
miseries
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| n.痛苦( misery的名词复数 )；痛苦的事；穷困；常发牢骚的人 | |
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24
extravagant
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| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
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25
remorse
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| n.痛恨，悔恨，自责 | |
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26
frenzy
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| n.疯狂，狂热，极度的激动 | |
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27
barbarian
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| n.野蛮人；adj.野蛮(人)的；未开化的 | |
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barbarians
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| n.野蛮人( barbarian的名词复数 )；外国人；粗野的人；无教养的人 | |
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29
virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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30
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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31
alley
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| n.小巷，胡同；小径，小路 | |
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32
gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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33
embarked
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| 乘船( embark的过去式和过去分词 )； 装载； 从事 | |
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34
stoutest
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| 粗壮的( stout的最高级 )； 结实的； 坚固的； 坚定的 | |
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35
vessels
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| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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36
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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37
northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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38
tumult
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| n.喧哗；激动，混乱；吵闹 | |
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39
lagoon
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| n.泻湖，咸水湖 | |
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40
saviour
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| n.拯救者，救星 | |
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41
laden
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| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
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42
forage
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| n.(牛马的)饲料，粮草；v.搜寻，翻寻 | |
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43
interfere
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| v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰 | |
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44
ascended
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| v.上升，攀登( ascend的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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45
ascend
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| vi.渐渐上升，升高；vt.攀登，登上 | |
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46
betrothal
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| n. 婚约, 订婚 | |
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47
vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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48
persecuted
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| （尤指宗教或政治信仰的）迫害(~sb. for sth.)( persecute的过去式和过去分词 )； 烦扰，困扰或骚扰某人 | |
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49
malice
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| n.恶意，怨恨，蓄意；[律]预谋 | |
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50
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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51
haughtily
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| adv. 傲慢地, 高傲地 | |
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52
reciprocate
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| v.往复运动；互换；回报，酬答 | |
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53
overtures
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| n.主动的表示，提议；（向某人做出的）友好表示、姿态或提议( overture的名词复数 )；（歌剧、芭蕾舞、音乐剧等的）序曲，前奏曲 | |
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54
preservation
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| n.保护，维护，保存，保留，保持 | |
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55
equilibrium
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| n.平衡，均衡，相称，均势，平静 | |
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56
scouring
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| 擦[洗]净，冲刷，洗涤 | |
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57
harass
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| vt.使烦恼，折磨，骚扰 | |
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58
manoeuvre
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| n.策略，调动；v.用策略，调动 | |
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59
persistence
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| n.坚持，持续，存留 | |
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60
armour
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| （=armor）n.盔甲；装甲部队 | |
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61
encompass
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| vt.围绕，包围；包含，包括；完成 | |
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62
tormenting
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| 使痛苦的，使苦恼的 | |
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63
dozing
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| v.打瞌睡,假寐 n.瞌睡 | |
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64
galloping
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| adj. 飞驰的, 急性的 动词gallop的现在分词形式 | |
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65
darts
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| n.掷飞镖游戏；飞镖( dart的名词复数 )；急驰，飞奔v.投掷，投射( dart的第三人称单数 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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66
abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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67
javelin
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| n.标枪，投枪 | |
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68
javelins
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| n.标枪( javelin的名词复数 ) | |
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69
extremities
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| n.端点( extremity的名词复数 )；尽头；手和足；极窘迫的境地 | |
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70
peril
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| n.(严重的)危险；危险的事物 | |
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71
perilous
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| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
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72
promontory
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| n.海角；岬 | |
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73
uncertainty
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| n.易变，靠不住，不确知，不确定的事物 | |
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74
exasperated
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| adj.恼怒的 | |
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75
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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76
gorge
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| n.咽喉，胃，暴食，山峡；v.塞饱，狼吞虎咽地吃 | |
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77
hatchet
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| n.短柄小斧；v.扼杀 | |
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78
prudence
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| n.谨慎，精明，节俭 | |
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79
cavalry
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| n.骑兵；轻装甲部队 | |
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80
outlet
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| n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄 | |
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81
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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82
inveighed
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| v.猛烈抨击，痛骂，谩骂( inveigh的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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83
rout
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| n.溃退，溃败；v.击溃，打垮 | |
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84
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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85
overthrew
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| overthrow的过去式 | |
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86
extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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87
windings
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| （道路、河流等）蜿蜒的，弯曲的( winding的名词复数 )； 缠绕( wind的现在分词 )； 卷绕； 转动（把手） | |
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88
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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89
distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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90
collapse
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| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
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91
eyelids
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| n.眼睑( eyelid的名词复数 )；眼睛也不眨一下；不露声色；面不改色 | |
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92
bellying
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| 鼓出部；鼓鼓囊囊 | |
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93
belly
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| n.肚子，腹部；(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分，膛 | |
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94
cleave
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| v．(clave；cleaved)粘着，粘住；坚持；依恋 | |
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95
garnished
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| v.给（上餐桌的食物）加装饰( garnish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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96
spines
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| n.脊柱( spine的名词复数 )；脊椎；（动植物的）刺；书脊 | |
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97
porcupine
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| n.豪猪， 箭猪 | |
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98
animated
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| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
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99
backbone
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| n.脊骨，脊柱，骨干；刚毅，骨气 | |
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100
abated
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| 减少( abate的过去式和过去分词 )； 减去； 降价； 撤消（诉讼） | |
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101
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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102
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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103
convoy
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| vt.护送，护卫，护航；n.护送；护送队 | |
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104
tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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105
slaughtered
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| v.屠杀，杀戮，屠宰( slaughter的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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106
mules
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| 骡( mule的名词复数 )； 拖鞋； 顽固的人； 越境运毒者 | |
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107
gnawed
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| 咬( gnaw的过去式和过去分词 )； （长时间） 折磨某人； （使）苦恼； （长时间）危害某事物 | |
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108
shunned
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| v.避开，回避，避免( shun的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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109
corpses
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| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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110
corpse
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| n.尸体，死尸 | |
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111
drooping
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| adj. 下垂的，无力的 动词droop的现在分词 | |
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112
groaned
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| v.呻吟( groan的过去式和过去分词 )；发牢骚；抱怨；受苦 | |
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113
besought
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| v.恳求，乞求（某事物）( beseech的过去式和过去分词 )；(beseech的过去式与过去分词) | |
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114
alleviate
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| v.减轻，缓和，缓解(痛苦等) | |
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115
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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116
obstinacy
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| n.顽固；（病痛等）难治 | |
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117
rumour
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| n.谣言，谣传，传闻 | |
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118
hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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119
hideously
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| adv.可怕地，非常讨厌地 | |
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120
solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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121
reverenced
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| v.尊敬，崇敬( reverence的过去式和过去分词 )；敬礼 | |
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122
squatted
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| v.像动物一样蹲下( squat的过去式和过去分词 )；非法擅自占用（土地或房屋）；为获得其所有权；而占用某片公共用地。 | |
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123
devoured
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| 吞没( devour的过去式和过去分词 )； 耗尽； 津津有味地看； 狼吞虎咽地吃光 | |
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124
mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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125
morsels
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| n.一口( morsel的名词复数 )；（尤指食物）小块，碎屑 | |
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126
vengeance
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| n.报复，报仇，复仇 | |
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127
grooms
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| n.新郎( groom的名词复数 )；马夫v.照料或梳洗（马等）( groom的第三人称单数 )；使做好准备；训练；（给动物）擦洗 | |
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128
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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129
artifices
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| n.灵巧( artifice的名词复数 )；诡计；巧妙办法；虚伪行为 | |
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130
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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131
notched
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| a.有凹口的，有缺口的 | |
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132
slew
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| v.（使）旋转；n.大量，许多 | |
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133
ferociously
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| 野蛮地，残忍地 | |
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134
sate
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| v.使充分满足 | |
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135
corruption
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| n.腐败，堕落，贪污 | |
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136
frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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137
drizzle
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| v.下毛毛雨；n.毛毛雨，蒙蒙细雨 | |
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138
softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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139
pricked
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| 刺，扎，戳( prick的过去式和过去分词 )； 刺伤； 刺痛； 使剧痛 | |
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140
nostrils
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| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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141
penetrated
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| adj. 击穿的，鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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142
gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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143
wrenched
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| v.（猛力地）扭( wrench的过去式和过去分词 )；扭伤；使感到痛苦；使悲痛 | |
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144
tongs
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| n.钳；夹子 | |
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145
frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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146
tormented
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| 饱受折磨的 | |
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147
applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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148
tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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149
pebble
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| n.卵石，小圆石 | |
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150
brazen
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| adj.厚脸皮的，无耻的，坚硬的 | |
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151
conjectures
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| 推测，猜想( conjecture的名词复数 ) | |
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152
vows
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| 誓言( vow的名词复数 )； 郑重宣布，许愿 | |
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153
hatred
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| n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨 | |
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154
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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155
inert
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| adj.无活动能力的，惰性的；迟钝的 | |
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156
mangling
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| 重整 | |
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157
tranquil
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| adj. 安静的, 宁静的, 稳定的, 不变的 | |
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158
cormorant
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| n.鸬鹚，贪婪的人 | |
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159
beak
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| n.鸟嘴，茶壶嘴，钩形鼻 | |
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160
chameleons
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| n.变色蜥蜴，变色龙( chameleon的名词复数 ) | |
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161
resounding
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| adj. 响亮的 | |
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162
taverns
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| n.小旅馆，客栈，酒馆( tavern的名词复数 ) | |
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163
cisterns
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| n.蓄水池，储水箱( cistern的名词复数 )；地下储水池 | |
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164
somnolence
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| n.想睡，梦幻；欲寐；嗜睡；嗜眠 | |
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165
battalions
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| n.（陆军的）一营（大约有一千兵士）( battalion的名词复数 )；协同作战的部队；军队；（组织在一起工作的）队伍 | |
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166
mania
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| n.疯狂；躁狂症，狂热，癖好 | |
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167
sobs
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| 啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 ) | |
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168
ravages
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| 劫掠后的残迹，破坏的结果，毁坏后的残迹 | |
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169
perils
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| 极大危险( peril的名词复数 )； 危险的事（或环境） | |
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170
imminent
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| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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171
implore
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| vt.乞求，恳求，哀求 | |
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172
conqueror
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| n.征服者，胜利者 | |
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173
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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174
elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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175
dwarf
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| n.矮子，侏儒，矮小的动植物；vt.使…矮小 | |
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176
precipice
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| n.悬崖，危急的处境 | |
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177
diadem
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| n.王冠，冕 | |
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178
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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179
embroidery
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| n.绣花，刺绣；绣制品 | |
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180
woes
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| 困境( woe的名词复数 )； 悲伤； 我好苦哇； 某人就要倒霉 | |
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181
spartans
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| n.斯巴达（spartan的复数形式） | |
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182
envoys
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| 使节( envoy的名词复数 )； 公使； 谈判代表； 使节身份 | |
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183
rebounded
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| 弹回( rebound的过去式和过去分词 )； 反弹； 产生反作用； 未能奏效 | |
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184
reassured
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| adj.使消除疑虑的；使放心的v.再保证，恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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185
ambushed
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| v.埋伏( ambush的过去式和过去分词 )；埋伏着 | |
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186
sentries
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| 哨兵，步兵( sentry的名词复数 ) | |
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187
prostrated
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| v.使俯伏，使拜倒( prostrate的过去式和过去分词 )；（指疾病、天气等）使某人无能为力 | |
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188
dilated
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| adj.加宽的，扩大的v.（使某物）扩大，膨胀，张大( dilate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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189
exhaled
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| v.呼出，发散出( exhale的过去式和过去分词 )；吐出（肺中的空气、烟等），呼气 | |
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190
gourds
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| n.葫芦( gourd的名词复数 ) | |
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191
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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192
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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193
stammered
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| v.结巴地说出( stammer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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194
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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195
insidious
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| adj.阴险的，隐匿的，暗中为害的，（疾病）不知不觉之间加剧 | |
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196
definitive
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| adj.确切的，权威性的；最后的，决定性的 | |
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197
tunics
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| n.（动植物的）膜皮( tunic的名词复数 )；束腰宽松外衣；一套制服的短上衣；（天主教主教等穿的）短祭袍 | |
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198
clemency
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| n.温和，仁慈，宽厚 | |
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199
immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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200
viscous
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| adj.粘滞的，粘性的 | |
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201
greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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202
tingling
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| v.有刺痛感( tingle的现在分词 ) | |
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203
constraint
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| n.(on)约束，限制；限制(或约束)性的事物 | |
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204
shrubs
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| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
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205
grasshoppers
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| n.蚱蜢( grasshopper的名词复数 )；蝗虫；蚂蚱；（孩子）矮小的 | |
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206
intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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207
tusks
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| n.（象等动物的）长牙( tusk的名词复数 )；獠牙；尖形物；尖头 | |
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208
brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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209
daggers
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| 匕首，短剑( dagger的名词复数 ) | |
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210
bracelet
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| n.手镯，臂镯 | |
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211
simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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212
hewed
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| v.（用斧、刀等）砍、劈( hew的过去式和过去分词 )；砍成；劈出；开辟 | |
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213
hacked
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| 生气 | |
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214
scythes
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| n.（长柄）大镰刀( scythe的名词复数 )v.（长柄）大镰刀( scythe的第三人称单数 ) | |
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215
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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216
furrows
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| n.犁沟( furrow的名词复数 )；（脸上的）皱纹v.犁田，开沟( furrow的第三人称单数 ) | |
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217
plumes
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| 羽毛( plume的名词复数 )； 羽毛饰； 羽毛状物； 升上空中的羽状物 | |
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218
hurled
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| v.猛投，用力掷( hurl的过去式和过去分词 )；大声叫骂 | |
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219
shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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220
docile
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| adj.驯服的，易控制的，容易教的 | |
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221
thronged
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| v.成群，挤满( throng的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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222
trotted
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| 小跑，急走( trot的过去分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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223
imploring
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| 恳求的，哀求的 | |
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224
lame
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| adj.跛的，(辩解、论据等)无说服力的 | |
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225
massacre
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| n.残杀，大屠杀；v.残杀，集体屠杀 | |
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226
descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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227
serried
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| adj.拥挤的；密集的 | |
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228
herald
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| vt.预示...的来临，预告，宣布，欢迎 | |
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229
unconditionally
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| adv.无条件地 | |
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230
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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231
thither
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| adv.向那里；adj.在那边的，对岸的 | |
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232
refinement
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| n.文雅；高尚；精美；精制；精炼 | |
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233
conquerors
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| 征服者，占领者( conqueror的名词复数 ) | |
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234
brandishing
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| v.挥舞( brandish的现在分词 )；炫耀 | |
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235
axe
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| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
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236
precipices
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| n.悬崖，峭壁( precipice的名词复数 ) | |
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237
earrings
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| n.耳环( earring的名词复数 )；耳坠子 | |
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238
robust
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| adj.强壮的，强健的，粗野的，需要体力的，浓的 | |
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239
avenge
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| v.为...复仇，为...报仇 | |
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240
inscriptions
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| （作者）题词( inscription的名词复数 )； 献词； 碑文； 证劵持有人的登记 | |
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241
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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242
hooted
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| （使）作汽笛声响，作汽车喇叭声( hoot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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243
delirium
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| n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
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244
frenzied
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| a.激怒的；疯狂的 | |
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245
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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246
impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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247
scouts
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| 侦察员[机，舰]( scout的名词复数 )； 童子军； 搜索； 童子军成员 | |
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248
descried
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| adj.被注意到的，被发现的，被看到的 | |
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249
annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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250
nomads
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| n.游牧部落的一员( nomad的名词复数 )；流浪者；游牧生活；流浪生活 | |
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251
nomad
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| n.游牧部落的人，流浪者，游牧民 | |
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252
gems
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| growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长 | |
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253
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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254
quails
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| 鹌鹑( quail的名词复数 )； 鹌鹑肉 | |
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255
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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256
bowers
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| n.（女子的）卧室( bower的名词复数 )；船首锚；阴凉处；鞠躬的人 | |
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257
obliquely
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| adv.斜； 倾斜； 间接； 不光明正大 | |
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258
hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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259
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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260
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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261
ardently
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| adv.热心地，热烈地 | |
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262
longings
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| 渴望，盼望( longing的名词复数 ) | |
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263
languishing
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| a. 衰弱下去的 | |
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264
rift
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| n.裂口，隙缝，切口；v.裂开，割开，渗入 | |
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265
vented
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| 表达，发泄（感情，尤指愤怒）( vent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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266
crests
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| v.到达山顶（或浪峰）( crest的第三人称单数 )；到达洪峰，达到顶点 | |
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267
revolved
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| v.（使）旋转( revolve的过去式和过去分词 )；细想 | |
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268
plaintive
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| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
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269
aboriginal
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| adj.（指动植物）土生的，原产地的，土著的 | |
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270
riveted
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| 铆接( rivet的过去式和过去分词 )； 把…固定住； 吸引； 引起某人的注意 | |
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271
enjoyments
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| 愉快( enjoyment的名词复数 )； 令人愉快的事物； 享有； 享受 | |
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272
filth
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| n.肮脏，污物，污秽；淫猥 | |
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273
jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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274
fickle
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| adj.(爱情或友谊上)易变的，不坚定的 | |
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275
upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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276
swarm
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| n.(昆虫)等一大群；vi.成群飞舞；蜂拥而入 | |
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277
besieged
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| 包围，围困，围攻( besiege的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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278
forsook
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| forsake的过去式 | |
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279
infantry
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| n.[总称]步兵(部队) | |
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280
folly
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| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
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281
humiliate
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| v.使羞辱，使丢脸[同]disgrace | |
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282
trumpets
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| 喇叭( trumpet的名词复数 )； 小号； 喇叭形物； （尤指）绽开的水仙花 | |
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283
audacity
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| n.大胆，卤莽，无礼 | |
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284
ransom
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| n.赎金，赎身；v.赎回，解救 | |
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285
confide
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| v.向某人吐露秘密 | |
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286
stratagem
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| n.诡计，计谋 | |
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287
execrated
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| v.憎恶( execrate的过去式和过去分词 )；厌恶；诅咒；咒骂 | |
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288
ulcers
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| n.溃疡( ulcer的名词复数 )；腐烂物；道德败坏；腐败 | |
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289
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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290
erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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291
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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292
foamed
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| 泡沫的 | |
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293
marine
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| adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵 | |
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294
avenged
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| v.为…复仇，报…之仇( avenge的过去式和过去分词 )；为…报复 | |
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295
revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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296
enveloped
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| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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297
shrieking
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| v.尖叫( shriek的现在分词 ) | |
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298
cleft
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| n.裂缝；adj.裂开的 | |
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299
emancipation
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| n.（从束缚、支配下）解放 | |
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300
citadel
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| n.城堡；堡垒；避难所 | |
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301
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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302
fugitives
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| n.亡命者，逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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303
catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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304
overthrown
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| adj. 打翻的，推倒的，倾覆的 动词overthrow的过去分词 | |
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305
downwards
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| adj./adv.向下的（地），下行的（地） | |
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306
bellies
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| n.肚子( belly的名词复数 )；腹部；（物体的）圆形或凸起部份；腹部…形的 | |
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307
exhausted
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| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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308
retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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309
prudent
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| adj.谨慎的，有远见的，精打细算的 | |
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310
breach
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| n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破 | |
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311
breaches
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| 破坏( breach的名词复数 )； 破裂； 缺口； 违背 | |
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312
lamented
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| adj.被哀悼的，令人遗憾的v.（为…）哀悼，痛哭，悲伤( lament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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313
invincible
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| adj.不可征服的，难以制服的 | |
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314
deference
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| n.尊重，顺从；敬意 | |
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315
inertness
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| n.不活泼，没有生气；惰性；惯量 | |
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316
skilful
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| (=skillful)adj.灵巧的，熟练的 | |
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317
seduced
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| 诱奸( seduce的过去式和过去分词 )； 勾引； 诱使堕落； 使入迷 | |
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318
repulsed
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| v.击退( repulse的过去式和过去分词 )；驳斥；拒绝 | |
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319
accomplices
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| 从犯，帮凶，同谋( accomplice的名词复数 ) | |
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320
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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321
repenting
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| 对（自己的所为）感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的现在分词 ) | |
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322
abominable
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| adj.可厌的，令人憎恶的 | |
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323
abasement
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| n.滥用 | |
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324
exterminated
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| v.消灭，根绝( exterminate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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325
encompassing
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| v.围绕( encompass的现在分词 )；包围；包含；包括 | |
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326
haphazard
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| adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的 | |
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327
exasperation
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| n.愤慨 | |
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328
gorges
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| n.山峡，峡谷( gorge的名词复数 )；咽喉v.（用食物把自己）塞饱，填饱( gorge的第三人称单数 )；作呕 | |
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329
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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330
generosity
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| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
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331
copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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332
wraiths
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| n.幽灵( wraith的名词复数 )；（传说中人在将死或死后不久的）显形阴魂 | |
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333
diffused
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| 散布的，普及的，扩散的 | |
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334
enraged
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| 使暴怒( enrage的过去式和过去分词 )； 歜； 激愤 | |
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335
injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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336
constellations
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| n.星座( constellation的名词复数 )；一群杰出人物；一系列（相关的想法、事物）；一群（相关的人） | |
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337
glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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338
inverted
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| adj.反向的，倒转的v.使倒置，使反转( invert的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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339
succumbed
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| 不再抵抗（诱惑、疾病、攻击等）( succumb的过去式和过去分词 )； 屈从； 被压垮； 死 | |
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340
trifling
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| adj.微不足道的；没什么价值的 | |
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341
lengthened
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| （时间或空间）延长，伸长( lengthen的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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342
fidelity
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| n.忠诚，忠实；精确 | |
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343
betrothed
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| n. 已订婚者 动词betroth的过去式和过去分词 | |
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344
viper
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| n.毒蛇；危险的人 | |
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345
stimulate
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| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
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346
assailed
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| v.攻击( assail的过去式和过去分词 )；困扰；质问；毅然应对 | |
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347
archers
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| n.弓箭手，射箭运动员( archer的名词复数 ) | |
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348
ostrich
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| n.鸵鸟 | |
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349
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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350
flattened
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| [医]（水）平扁的，弄平的 | |
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351
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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352
obstruction
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| n.阻塞，堵塞；障碍物 | |
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353
supple
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| adj.柔软的，易弯的，逢迎的，顺从的，灵活的；vt.使柔软，使柔顺，使顺从；vi.变柔软，变柔顺 | |
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354
skull
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| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
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355
rhinoceros
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| n.犀牛 | |
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356
wielded
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| 手持着使用（武器、工具等）( wield的过去式和过去分词 )； 具有； 运用（权力）； 施加（影响） | |
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357
bristled
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| adj. 直立的，多刺毛的 动词bristle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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358
galloped
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| （使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事 | |
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359
hopping
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| n. 跳跃 动词hop的现在分词形式 | |
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360
ostriches
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| n.鸵鸟( ostrich的名词复数 )；逃避现实的人，不愿正视现实者 | |
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361
swarming
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| 密集( swarm的现在分词 )； 云集； 成群地移动； 蜜蜂或其他飞行昆虫成群地飞来飞去 | |
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362
flickering
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| adj.闪烁的，摇曳的，一闪一闪的 | |
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363
fray
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| v.争吵；打斗；磨损，磨破；n.吵架；打斗 | |
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364
deluded
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| v.欺骗，哄骗( delude的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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365
entangled
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| adj.卷入的；陷入的；被缠住的；缠在一起的v.使某人（某物/自己）缠绕，纠缠于（某物中），使某人（自己）陷入（困难或复杂的环境中）( entangle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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366
triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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367
forsaking
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| 放弃( forsake的现在分词 )； 弃绝； 抛弃； 摒弃 | |
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368
intrepid
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| adj.无畏的，刚毅的 | |
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369
consuls
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| 领事( consul的名词复数 )； （古罗马共和国时期）执政官 （古罗马共和国及其军队的最高首长，同时共有两位，每年选举一次） | |
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370
exterminating
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| v.消灭，根绝( exterminate的现在分词 ) | |
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371
random
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| adj.随机的；任意的；n.偶然的(或随便的)行动 | |
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372
leech
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| n.水蛭，吸血鬼，榨取他人利益的人；vt.以水蛭吸血；vi.依附于别人 | |
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373
sneers
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| 讥笑的表情（言语）( sneer的名词复数 ) | |
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374
inexplicable
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| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
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375
languor
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| n.无精力，倦怠 | |
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376
skulls
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| 颅骨( skull的名词复数 )； 脑袋； 脑子； 脑瓜 | |
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377
winking
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| n.瞬眼，目语v.使眼色( wink的现在分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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378
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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379
jaws
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| n.口部；嘴 | |
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380
gravel
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| n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石 | |
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381
rustling
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| n. 瑟瑟声，沙沙声 adj. 发沙沙声的 | |
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382
muzzles
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| 枪口( muzzle的名词复数 )； （防止动物咬人的）口套； （四足动物的）鼻口部； （狗）等凸出的鼻子和口 | |
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383
tawny
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| adj.茶色的，黄褐色的；n.黄褐色 | |
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