INVASION
Sónnica feared that she had lost Actæon forever. His sudden departure seemed the caprice of a fickle Athenian—of an eternal wanderer, driven by the fever of seeing new lands. Only the gods could tell where that bird of passage might fly after his visit to Celtiberia! Perhaps he would remain with Alorcus; perhaps he would go to war along with those barbarians; perhaps, captivated by his knowledge and cleverness, they would go so far as to give him a kingdom.
Sónnica doubted that the Athenian would ever return. Her short springtime of love had been like the fugitive joy of the women adored by the gods when they had come down to earth. She who used to be so unfeeling as to mock at affection, now spent the days weeping on her couch, or wandering by night like a shade through the gardens, stopping in the grotto where the Greek had given her his first caress. The slaves wondered at the harsh and capricious temper of their mistress, who one moment groaned like a child, and the next, as if fired with sudden cruelty, ordered punishments for them all; but, without warning, Actæon presented himself before her villa one morning, riding a dusty, sweaty horse. He dismissed the ferocious featured barbarians who had served him as bodyguard, and ran with outstretched arms toward the tremulous Sónnica. The whole of her immense dominions seemed resuscitated; the mistress smiled; the garden bloomed more beautifully; on the terrace shone the plumage of the rare birds with greater splendor; the instruments of the flute players sounded more joyful, and to the slaves, freed now from punishment, the air seemed sweeter and the sky more blue.
Sónnica's villa reawoke to its merry life, as if its owner had risen from the dead. The nights were devoted to feasting in the great triclinium; Sónnica's friends, the young gallants, accepted her invitations, and even Euphobias, the philosopher, reached his place at the table without having to fight his way through the blows of her slaves.
Sónnica was radiant, clinging to Actæon and listening to his words as to sweet music. The guests urged him to relate the story of his adventures among the Celtiberians, wondering at the customs of the tribes over which Alorcus reigned. Euphobias, the parasite, did not conceal his satisfaction at possessing so powerful a friend, and he declared that he would go to his kingdom to live awhile in comfort, without having to beg his bread from the merchants of Saguntum. Love's springtime returned for the Athenian. He spent his days at the villa, lying at Sónnica's feet, watching her spin the bright colored wool from the distaff or give the finishing touches to her toilette, assisted by her slaves. At the close of day they strolled through the garden, and night surprised them in the grotto, in fond embrace, listening to the song of the water falling into the alabaster basin with sweet, monotonous melody.
Now and again Actæon went to the city in the morning to stroll through the porticos of the Forum listening to the newsmongers with the curiosity of a Greek accustomed to the grumblings in the Agora. He noticed extraordinary stir in the great Saguntine market-square. The idle talked of war; the more bellicose recounted with exaggeration their achievements on the last expedition against the Turdetani, and the tranquil merchants left their counters to ask for news, accepting with gestures of despair the possibility of a coming struggle. As Actæon came into Saguntum he saw on the wall hundreds of slaves repairing the merlons worn by time, and filled with cracks which many years of peace had opened in them.
Mopsus, the archer, put him in touch with the deliberations of the elders. Hannibal had sent an emissary with an ultimatum to return to the Turdetani the conquered territories and the booty taken during their last expedition. The African threatened with insufferable arrogance, and the Saguntine Republic had answered with scorn, refusing to listen to his commands. Saguntum would only obey its strong ally Rome, and, secure in her protection, she looked with indifference upon the threats of the Carthaginian. However, as war seemed inevitable, and as all stood in fear of the youth and audacious character of Hannibal, two senators had embarked some days before at the port of Saguntum, setting sail for the coasts of Italy to relate what had taken place, soliciting the protection of the Roman Senate.
This news circulated confusedly through the Forum, and the crowd jested at Hannibal as an impetuous youth who needed a lesson. He might come against Saguntum whenever he wished. These Carthaginians were the very same who had been driven out of Sicily, the same who had been compelled to abandon the coasts of Magna Grecia, being expelled by the Romans, who had then raised their own city beside the ruin! If they had achieved victories afterward in Iberia it was only against barbarian tribes ignorant of the art of warfare, who fell victims to their cunning! When they attacked Saguntum they would encounter a worthier enemy, and Rome, the powerful ally, would fall upon their rear and exterminate them!
These ideas infuriated the city.
News came that Hannibal had set forth upon his campaign and was slowly approaching, and with such tidings a gust of war seemed to sweep over Saguntum inflaming the minds of the most prudent. The peace-loving merchants with the mute choler of pacific-minded men who see their possessions endangered, stood in the doorways of their shops cleaning the rust from old arms, or they went down to the river bank to practise using them, mingling with the young men, who, since sunrise, had been making their horses caracole, gaining skill in the management of the lance, or improving themselves in archery under the direction of Mopsus.
Actæon now began to spend his days away from the villa, deaf to the prayers of Sónnica, who longed to have him ever near her. The Senate had given him command of the peltasts, the light infantry, and at the head of some hundreds of young men, barefooted and with no other defensive arm than a cuirass of wool and a shield of osiers, he ran along the river bank, teaching them to hurl darts without stopping in their race, to wound an enemy as they passed swiftly by his side, without giving him time to respond with another blow.
This exercise over, the perspiring youths dived into the river to refresh themselves with a swim, while the Greek slowly returned to the villa, lingering in the most smiling spots of the domain.
One afternoon the Athenian met Erotion, the potter, at the foot of an enormous cherry tree, gazing into the tallest branches, from which fell a shower of red fruit shaken down by an invisible hand. They had not met since the day when Actæon surprised him modeling before the nude shepherdess.
The youth greeted the Greek with a smile.
"Are you no longer busy?" asked Actæon with paternal kindness. "Have you finished your work?"
The boy answered with a gesture of indifference: "My work! Do not laugh at me, Greek. I have nothing to do."
"And where is Rhanto?"
"She is in the top of that tree, gathering the finest cherries for me. She climbs like a wood-nymph and she will not let me go with her. She is afraid I shall hurt myself."
The branches of the cherry tree shook, and the shepherdess descended, agile as a squirrel, her limbs bare, her skirt gathered up and filled with cherries. She and her lover devoured them amid laughter, their lips ruddy with the crimson fruit-juice, and they decorated each other's hair or hung yokes of cherries over their ears, forming picturesque ruby-colored earrings.
Actæon smiled at the strong, handsome young folks who ever sought each other's company and frolicked as if they were in the heart of the desert, giving no heed to the danger threatening the city.
"But what about your art?" he asked.
Erotion and Rhanto laughed at the recollection.
"I smashed the figure to pieces," said the boy. "I broke the clay into fragments, and I have decided to touch no other than that in the pottery—when I make up my mind to return there."
He flung his arms around the shepherdess and rested his head upon her shoulder, rubbing his cheek against her neck with an almost feline caress.
"Why should I work?" he added. "I spent many days kneeling before that accursed clay, struggling to make it take on the form of her body; but it is useless. Clay is clay, and it cannot become living substance. When the soft flesh of my Rhanto is within reach of my hand, it is folly to grow desperate trying to mold earth into a semblance of her life. I wish to dream no more, Athenian. I will be content with what I have."
With sublime indifference he caressed his playmate in Actæon's presence.
"One day," continued the boy, "I saw clearly, and I understood the truth. Rhanto stood before me. Blinded by ambition I had seen in her only the model, but that day I beheld the woman. Why seek glory when I had love before me! Even though I should mould a great statue, what should I gain? That people should say, after I am dead, 'Erotion the Saguntine made this.' I should not hear it—after having spent my life working and suffering. No; let us live and love. That day I kicked the statue to pieces, and I embraced Rhanto with an enthusiasm of joy. Loving each other is better than wasting time over clay puppets. Is not that so, Rhanto?"
They kissed each other again, heedless of the presence of the Greek. Actæon observed a transformation in the pair, both in the frank devotion of the boy, and in the glow in the eyes of the shepherdess. The ardor of love seemed to have made him more manly, and to have given her a suave and tender grace, a sweet abandon which she had lacked before.
"I have forgotten art, and now we are happy," continued the boy. "It would have been madness to have run off to Greece, leaving here a treasure which I had not fully appreciated. We spend our time wandering through the fields; we know mysterious corners in the groves sheltered by curtains of leaves, dark and perfumed hiding places which even Sónnica the rich might envy us. When we are hungry we milk Rhanto's goats and we rob a beehive; we climb trees in search of fruit; this is the glorious season of the year; the whole champaign is full of cherries."
He suddenly ceased speaking, fearing lest he had said too much. Perhaps Rhanto reproved him with a nudge. Then he added, in a supplicating tone:
"You are good, Athenian. Rhanto and I have looked upon you as an elder brother since that day we met you on the Road of the Serpent. Do not say anything to my father, nor to Sónnica. Let us be happy in this life of ours, which is worthy of the gods."
Actæon envied the felicity of these care-free youths, who loved each other frankly, living beneath the trees, strong and beautiful as wild creatures who had no thoughts beyond their companionship.
"Saguntum is about to be attacked. War is at our gates. Did you not know it?"
"We have not heard of it," said Erotion, with a scornful gesture. "I am interested in nothing but Rhanto."
"Are you not interested in the fate of your city?"
"I am more interested in the kisses of my shepherdess. As long as there be love, sunshine, and fruits, what does the rest of the world matter to me?"
"Have you no thought for your country, you truant?"
"Just now I have no thought for anything but these cherries, and for these red lips which are as fresh as they."
They parted, and Actæon long held the memory of the meeting. The light-heartedness of the loving couple filled him with envy.
The summer months passed. The vines of the domain ripened their clusters, the farmers rejoiced in the prospect of the coming crop hidden beneath the leaves, but from time to time, like a gloomy trumpet blast, came news of Hannibal, of his victories over the tribes of the interior who refused to recognize him, and of his imperious demands upon Saguntum.
Actæon scented the nearness of war, and this, which had ever been his principal occupation, now caused him only sorrow. He had grown to love this beautiful land as dearly as Greece. His soul, saturated with the sweet peace of the fertile fields, and of the rich industrious city, was saddened at the thought that this life was to be paralyzed. His existence had been spent amid struggles and adventures; and now, rich and happy, when he longed for peace in a corner where he hoped to end his days, war, like a forgotten mistress who presents herself inopportunely, returned unbidden, forcing him anew to cruelty and destruction.
One afternoon, at the end of summer, he was pondering these things as he was riding toward the city. In the oblique rays of the sun the industrious bees, searching out the wild flowers, glistened like golden buttons. The vintagers were singing in the vineyards, stooping over their baskets. Actæon saw one of the slaves whom Sónnica kept in her warehouses in Saguntum come running from the direction of the city.
He stopped panting before Actæon. He was almost speechless from fatigue, and his broken words revealed his alarm. Hannibal was coming from the direction of Sætabis! The people from the country were crowding into the city in terror, driving their flocks before them. They had not seen the invader but they ran, horrified by the tales of the fugitives who were fleeing from the frontiers of the Saguntine territory. The Carthaginians had crossed the border; they were people of ferocious aspect, who bore strange arms, who looted the villages, and set them on fire. He was running to tell his mistress that she might take refuge in the city.
He rushed on toward Sónnica's villa. The Greek hesitated a moment; he deliberated whether he should go back in search of his beloved, but he ended by setting out on a gallop toward the city, and as he neared it, he rode at full speed around the walls. He went for a look at the highway from the mountains which gave Saguntum communication with the towns by a branch which led to Sætatis and Denia. As he approached he began to meet the refugees of whom the slave had told him.
They flooded the road like an inundation. The flocks and herds were bleating and lowing under the lash, crowding in between the wagons; women were running, carrying great bundles on their heads, and dragging along the children clutching at the folds of their tunics; boys were driving horses laden with furniture and clothing thrown together haphazard in the precipitation of flight, and ewes leaped to the sides of the road to escape the wheels which, catching their dragging fleece, almost crushed them.
The Greek, riding into the stream of fugitives, opened passage with his horse through the seething wave of wagons and animals, rustics and slaves, in which people of different towns were confusedly mingled, while members of scattered families were calling to one another desperately through the clouds of dust.
The fleeing multitude was clearing away. Actæon was beginning to meet the stragglers; poor old women traveling with vacillating step, bearing on their shoulders some lamb which constituted their entire fortune; old men crushed by the weight of pots and clothing; sick people dragging themselves along by the aid of a staff; abandoned animals wandering among the olive trees near the highway, that suddenly darted forward at full speed through the fields as if scenting their masters; children seated on a stone weeping, abandoned by their kindred.
Soon the road was empty. The last of the refugees were left behind, and Actæon saw before him only the narrow tongue of red earth winding along the mountain slopes, without a solitary being to break the monotony of the road with his shadow.
The gallop of his horse resounded like distant thunder through the profound silence. It seemed as if Nature had expired as she guessed the approach of war. Even the ancient trees, the twisted olives which had stood for centuries, the great fig trees which rose like green cupolas against the mountain slopes, remained motionless, as if terrified at the approach of that something which caused the people to abandon their homes and to flee into the city.
Actæon rode through a village. Closed doors! Silent streets! From the interior of a cabin he thought he heard a faint groan—some sick person forsaken by his kindred in their haste to escape. Then he passed a great closed villa. Behind the high mud walls a dog was howling in despair.
Then once more solitude, silence, absence of life, a paralysis that seemed to creep over the fields. Night began to fall. From afar, as if diffused and mellowed by the distance, he heard a muffled booming; something like the surging of an invisible sea, the swelling roar of an inundation.
The Greek left the road; his horse began to climb a cultivated hill, his hoofs sinking into the red soil of the vineyards. From the height he could dominate the landscape for a great distance.
The sun's last rays dyed the mountain slopes a brilliant orange. On the winding red road shone like a rivulet of sparks the cuirasses of a group of horsemen approaching cautiously on a trot, as if exploring the way. Actæon recognized them; they were the Numidian cavalry with white and floating mantles, while, mingled with them galloped other warriors of less imposing stature, waving lances and making their small horses caracole. The Greek smiled as he recognized Hannibal's Amazons, the famous squadron he had seen in New Carthage, formed of the wives and daughters of soldiers, commanded by the valorous Asbyte, daughter of Iarbas, the Garamantan of Fezzan.
Behind this group, the road was deserted for some distance. Against the background, like a dark monster moving with serpentine undulations, loomed the army, an immense girdle upon which glittered the lances like a line of fire broken at intervals by square bulks, which advanced like moving towers. These were the elephants.
Suddenly a new sun seemed to rise behind the army, illuminating its footsteps. A lurid light filled the horizon, and upon this ruddy background the serrated outlines of an immense mass were traced. A village was in flames. Hannibal's troops, composed of mercenaries from all countries, and from barbarian tribes in the interior, intended to terrify the hostile city, hence immediately upon entering Saguntine territory they laid waste the fields and set fire to the dwellings. Actæon feared to become surrounded by the Numidians and the Amazons, and riding down from the height he started toward Saguntum at a desperate gallop.
It was after dark when he reached the city, and he had to call his friend Mopsus and make himself known before the gate would open to him.
"Have you seen them?" asked the archer.
"Before the cock crows they will be before our walls."
The city presented an extraordinary aspect. The streets were illuminated with bonfires. Pine torches burned in doorways and windows, and the multitude of fugitives huddled in the public squares, filling the porticos, and lying on the thresholds. All the Saguntines had streamed into the city.
The Forum was a camp. The flocks and herds were crowded between the four colonnades without space to move, stamping and bellowing; sheep sprang about on the steps of the temples; families of rustics boiled pots on the Attic bases of the marble columns, and the glow of so many fires, flickering on the façades of the houses, seemed to communicate a thrill of alarm to the entire city. The magistrates ordered the fugitives lying in the streets obstructing traffic to get up, and lodged them in the slaves' quarters of the dwellings of the rich, or had them conducted to the Acropolis to camp in its innumerable buildings. The herds also were driven thither by the light of torches, between a double row of almost naked men who beat the oxen when they tried to escape down the sides of the sacred mountain.
Rising above the murmur of the multitude sounded blasts from trumpets and conch shells calling the citizens to form ready for defending the walls. Merchants, dressed in bronze loricas, their faces covered by the Grecian helmet crested with an enormous brush of horsehair, issued from their houses, tearing themselves from the arms of wives and children, and strode majestically through the crowds of rustics, bow in hand, their spears over their shoulders, and their swords clanking against their nude thighs, their limbs covered to the knees with the copper greaves. The young men dragged to the walls enormous stones to hurl down upon the besiegers, and they laughed on being assisted by the women who were eager to take part in the combat. Old men with venerable beards, rich members of the Senate, opened passage, followed by slaves with great bundles of spears and swords, distributing the arms among the strongest country people, first making sure if they were freemen.
The city seemed to rejoice. Hannibal was coming! The more enthusiastic had actually been anxious lest the African would not dare to present himself before their walls; but there he was, and all laughed, thinking that Carthage would perish in the fall of Hannibal here at the feet of Saguntum, as soon as Rome should rally to the aid of the city.
The Saguntine ambassadors were already in Rome, and her legions would soon arrive and crush the besiegers at a blow. Some, in their enthusiastic optimism, inclined to the marvelous, believing that, by a miracle of the gods, the great deed would happen within a few hours, and that as soon as day should dawn, at the very instant when Hannibal's army had begun to invest Saguntum, a countless galaxy of sails would appear on the blue of the Sucronian gulf—the fleet convoying the invincible veterans of Rome.
Nearly the entire city was on the walls. The multitude crowded upon them until many had to catch hold of the merlons to keep from falling.
Outside the ramparts darkness reigned absolute. The frogs that inhabited the pools along the river were hushed as if terrified; the dogs that wandered vagabond through the champaign barked ceaselessly; they sensed the presence of hidden beings moving in the shadows surrounding the city.
Obscurity augmented the anxious uncertainty of the watchers on the walls. Suddenly a point of light pierced the darkness of the plain; another and then another flash, in different places at a distance from the city. They were torches guiding the steps of the approaching army. Before the ruddy spot of light silhouettes of men and horses were seen to pass. Far off on the hilltops gleamed bonfires, serving as signals to straggling troops.
These lights exasperated the more impatient. Some of the younger men could no longer remain inactive, and drawing their bows, began to shoot their arrows. Promptly came response from out the darkness. A whistling passed over the heads of the crowd, and from the houses near the wall some tiles flew off with a crash. Sling-shots from the enemy!
Thus the night passed. When the cocks crowed announcing dawn a great part of the multitude had fallen asleep, wearied with straining their eyes into the darkness where buzzed the invisible foe.
When the sun rose the Saguntines saw Hannibal's entire army before their walls, on the side toward the river. Actæon, as he noted the location of the troops, could not repress a smile.
"He well knows the lay of the land. His visit to the city has stood him in good stead. Even in the dark he has chosen the only point from which Saguntum can be attacked."
The whole side of the mountain was free of besiegers. His army had encamped between the river and the lower part of the city, occupying the orchards, the gardens of the villas, the beautiful section of which the rich of Saguntum were so proud.
Soldiers came and went through the luxurious villas, preparing their morning meal; they made kindling of sumptuous furniture to light their camp fires; they wrapped themselves in garments they had found, and they cut down trees to make room for setting up their tents. Across the river, over the immense domain, groups of horsemen scattered out to take possession of villages, of villas, of the innumerable buildings which rose above the verdure of the plain, abandoned to the mercy of the enemy.
The first things to attract the attention of the Saguntines, exciting a childish curiosity, were the elephants. They stood in a row on the opposite side of the river, enormous, ashen-hued, like tumescences uprisen from the earth within the night, their green-painted ears drooping like fans, from time to time waving their trunks which seemed like gigantic leeches, trying to suck in the blue of the sky. Their drivers, assisted by the soldiers, unbound the square towers resting on their backs, and rolled up the heavy trappings which covered their flanks when engaged in battle. They set them free, as if the fertile plain were to them an immense stable, their drivers being convinced that the siege would be a lengthy undertaking, and that while it lasted they would not need the assistance of the terrible beasts, so appreciated in battle.
Near the elephants, along the river bank, stood the engines of war, the catapults, the battering-rams, the movable towers, complicated structures of wood and bronze, drawn by rosaries of double yokes of oxen having enormous backward curving horns.
As if suffering from an eruption the fields were covered with pustules of diverse colors, tents of cloth, of straw, or of skins, some conical, others square, the majority mound-shaped like ant hills, around which swarmed the armed multitude.
The Saguntines, from the top of the walls, examined the besieging army that seemed to fill the whole plain, and which was being joined by a ceaseless stream of new crowds on foot and on horseback, flowing in from every road, and seeming to roll down from the crests of the surrounding mountains. It was an agglomeration of diverse races, of different peoples; a bizarre collection of costumes, colors, and types, and those Saguntines who had been taught by travel recognized the different nations, and were pointing them out to their absorbed fellow citizens.
Some horsemen who seemed to fly, lying stretched along the backs of their swift barbs, were Numidians, Africans of feminine aspect, covered with white veils, wearing women's earrings and slippers, perfumed, with eyes painted black, but who were impetuous in combat and fought in full career using their lances with great skill. Around the camp fires in the gardens stalked athletic negroes from Libya, with kinky hair and glistening teeth, smiling in stupid satisfaction as they wrapped their naked limbs in garments of rich weave which they had just stolen, shivering with cold as soon as they drew away from the fire, as if suffering martyrdom in the cool morning air. These dark, shiny-skinned men, so seldom seen in Saguntum, excited the curiosity of the citizens almost as much as the Amazons who audaciously passed on a gallop close to the walls to obtain a better view of the city. They were young women, slender, their skins bronzed by exposure. Their hair floated behind their helmets like a barbaric decoration, and they wore no other clothing than a broad tunic open on the left side, displaying sinewy limbs clinging to their horses' ribs. Over the breast some wore corselets of bronze-scales, also open on the left side to give greater freedom in fighting, displaying the roundness of their small breasts made firm and hard by fatiguing exercise. They rode their wild nervous horses bareback, guiding them with a delicate bridle, and as they galloped in groups the ferocious animals bit and kicked each other, thus enlivening the desperate race. The Amazons approached close to the walls, laughing and hurling insults which the Saguntines did not understand; they waved their lances and shields; and when a cloud of arrows and stones was flung after them, they dashed away, with wind-swept drapery, turning their heads to repeat their mocking gestures.
The besieged distinguished in the dark crowd of soldiers the cuirasses of certain horsemen which shone like plates of gold. They were the Carthaginian captains, some rich men of Carthage who followed Hannibal, sons of opulent merchants who marched with the army more like shepherds than like chiefs, covered with metal from head to foot for protection against blows, and, with the genius of their race, more devoted to administering the conquests and in sharing the booty than in seeking glory in combat.
In addition to these people, those on the walls who were familiar with them pointed out the other troops of the besieging army. Some with skin the color of milk, with faded mustaches, and red horsehair tied to the crowns of their heads, who laid aside their military cloaks and tall boots of untanned leather to bathe in the river, were Gauls. The others, bronzed and so thin that their skeletons were outlined as if they would push through the skin, were Africans from the oases of the great desert, mysterious people, who with the beating of their small drums caused the moon to descend, and by playing the flute forced venomous serpents to dance. Mingling with them were the bulky Lusitanians, with limbs as strong as columns, and broad rock-like chests; those from Bætica, united to their horses day and night by a love which lasted all their lives; the hostile Celtiberians, bushy-haired and dirty, wearing their rags with arrogance; tribes from the North, who worshipped solitary menhirs as gods, and in the moonlight sought mysterious herbs for charms and philters; men of ferocious customs, in perpetual battle with hunger; barbarian people of whom horrifying tales were told, believed to devour the bodies of the conquered after a victory.
The Balearic slingers provoked laughter in spite of their ferocious aspect. From the walls the observers commented on the extravagant customs which prevailed in their island home, and the multitude burst into laughter contemplating the almost naked youths, carrying sticks with charred points which served them as lances, and having three slings, one wound around the forehead, another about the waist, and the third held in the hand. One of these slings was of horsehair, one of esparto, and the third of bull tendon, and one or the other was used according to the distance they had to throw.
They lived on their islands in caves or in the hollow spaces between huge masses of rock, and they were taught to use the sling while mere children. Their fathers set their bread some distance from them, and would not let them eat it until they had brought it down with a pebble. Their passion was drunkenness, and woman their strongest appetite. In combat they turned with scorn from prisoners who would bring high ransom to capture the women, and they not infrequently would exchange six strong slave men for a single slave woman. On the islands they were unfamiliar with gold and silver; the elders divining the evils of money, had prohibited the importation of coins, and the Balearic slingers in the service of Carthage, unable to carry their earnings to their country, spent their wages in drink or flung them generously into the hands of the loose and wretched women who followed the army. Their traditional customs amused the Saguntines. At their weddings, so said those who had visited the islands, it was customary for all the guests to embrace the bride in advance of the husband, and at funerals the corpse was beaten until the bones were crushed and converted into a shapeless mass which they forced into a narrow urn and buried under a heap of stones. Their slings were terrible. They hurled to great distances balls of sun-baked clay, conical at their ends, and bearing grotesque inscriptions dedicated to the one who received the blow, and in battle they flung stones weighing a pound with such force that the highest tempered armor failed to resist them.
In the rear of this warlike crowd ragged women of all colors scattered through the champaign; lean, naked children who did not know their parents; the parasites of war, who marched at the tail of the army to revel in the spoils of victory; females who at night lay down in one extreme of the camp and arose on the opposite in the morning, and, aged in the prime of their youth by fatigue and blows, died forsaken by the roadside; youngsters who looked upon all the soldiers of their race as their fathers, bearing on their backs on long marches the firewood or the flesh-pot of the warriors, and, in moments of fiercest struggle, when the fighting was hand to hand, they slipped between the adversaries' legs and bit them like rabid cur-dogs.
Actæon found Sónnica on the wall, gazing at the hostile camp in the first streak of dawn. The beautiful Greek had taken refuge in Saguntum the night before, followed by slaves and flocks, moving part of her riches from the villa to her warehouse. She had left behind rooms filled with paintings and mosaics; rich furniture, sumptuous table-service, all which would fall into the hands of the victor. And she and her fellow Greek saw peeping through the distant foliage the terrace of the villa with its statues, the tower of the doves and the roofs of the houses of the slaves, over which men, barely discernible, were running like insects. The invaders were there; perhaps they would amuse themselves by shooting their arrows at the brilliantly plumaged Asiatic birds, and by beating the old and sick slaves abandoned in the flight. Between the banana trees in the garden rose the smoke of a bonfire. The Greek woman and her lover guessed the destruction and rapine that were taking place. Sónnica grew sad, not at the loss of a part of her riches, but because they were rending her heart through destroying a place which had been witness to her first outbursts of love for the Athenian.
Some time after sunrise the Saguntine people cried out with indignation. Along the Road of the Serpent appeared groups of drunken and shouting women embracing soldiers. They were the lupas of the port, the miserable harlots who thronged around the temple of Aphrodite by night, and who were denied entrance to the city. When the first Carthaginian horsemen passed through the port these creatures had followed them with enthusiasm. Accustomed to the coarse blandishments of men of all countries, the presence of these soldiers, so different in dress and nationality, did not seem strange to them. The 'wolves' of the land were the same as those of the sea. They adored strong men, birds of prey which could destroy them with their talons, and they followed the Carthaginians to their camp, rejoicing in their hearts at the chance to approach the city without fear of punishment, and at being able to mock the besieged inhabitants with the concentrated odium of long years of humiliation.
They sang like mad women, flitting from one pair of greedy and trembling hands to the next which disputed for them as if in their eagerness they would tear them to pieces. They drank to intoxication from amphoræ of rich wines sacked from the villas; around their shoulders they flung cloths with threads of gold, stolen but a moment before; the Numidians with their moist gazelle-like eyes, looked upon them admiringly, bedecking them with crowns of grass, and they in turn bursting into bacchanal laughter, petted the kinky hair of the Ethiopians, who giggled like children, displaying their sharp cannibal teeth.
They gave themselves up to all manner of ribaldry near the long line of horses staked out in front of the tents, displaying their wantonness as a shameless insult to the besieged city, and the Saguntines who had witnessed undaunted the approach of the long defile of the enemy trembled with ire behind their merlons as they witnessed this offense of their courtesans.
"The wretches! Caninæ!"
The women of the city hissed and reviled them, pale with fury, leaning over the walls ready to spring into the camp to lay hold upon the strumpets, while they, as if the anger of the city only stimulated them, redoubled their laughter, adding insult to insult, and exciting the whole army to join with them.
A fresh cause of indignation infuriated anew the minds of the Saguntines. Some thought they saw something familiar in the appearance of one of the Celtiberian warriors riding at the head of a troop of cavalry. His gallant bearing on his horse, the arrogance with which he galloped with firm seat in the saddle, recalled to many the sightly procession of the Panathenaic festival. When he dismounted and removed his helmet, wiping away the sweat, all recognized him, and raised a shout of resentment. Alorcus! Even he! Another ingrate, faithless to the city which had overwhelmed him with honors and distinctions! His duty as chieftain compelled him to ignore his fraternal reception in Saguntum.
Blind with rage they drew their bows against him but the arrows fell short of the spot where the Celtiberians were encamped. The maddened crowd experienced one slight consolation. The groups along the wall made way for Theron, the priest of Hercules, who advanced with the majesty of a god, his eyes fixed on the enemy, insensible to the general adoration which surrounded him.
The Saguntines persuaded themselves that they beheld Hercules himself, who perhaps had abandoned his temple on the Acropolis to come down to their walls. He was nude; an enormous lion skin covered his back. The wild beast's claws were crossed over his breast, and his head was covered by the cranium of the animal, with bristling whiskers, sharp teeth, and yellow glass eyes which shone between the tossed golden mane. His right hand clutched without visible effort the entire trunk of an oak tree which served him as a cudgel in imitation of the mace of the god. His shoulders towered above all other heads. His breasts were round and strong as shields, on which the veins and sinews were traced like tendrils winding round the muscles, and his columnar limbs, all excited admiration. His virility was the very type of sovereign power. He was so enormous that his head seemed small between his great shoulders, exaggerated in size by the cushion of his muscles; his chest heaved like a bellows, and instinctively all took a step backward, fearing contact with that machine of flesh created for strength.
Sónnica's friends, the young gallants, who, even on this extraordinary occasion had not forgotten to paint their faces, followed and admired him, ordering the crowd, to give them passage.
"Hail, Theron!" shouted Lachares. "We will see what Hannibal will do when he meets you in battle."
"Hail to the Saguntine Hercules!" replied the other youths, leaning weakly on the backs of their little slave boys.
The giant looked over the encampment, in which trumpets began to sound, and the soldiers ran to form in rank. The slingers cautiously advanced, sheltering themselves behind buildings and hummocks. The attack was about to begin. On the walls the bowmen drew their bows, and the boys piled up stones to hurl with their slings. The old men compelled the women to retire. At the head of the stairway leading up to the top of the wall, Euphobias the philosopher stood haranguing in the midst of a group, paying no heed to the indignation of his hearers.
"Blood is going to flow," he shouted; "you will all perish, and for what? I ask you what do you gain by not obeying Hannibal? You will always have a master, and it is just as well to be friends of Carthage as of Rome. The siege will be prolonged, and you will die of hunger; I shall outlive you all, because I know hunger from of old like a faithful friend. But again I ask you, what more does it profit you to be Romans than Carthaginians? Live and enjoy! Leave shedding of blood to the butchers, and before you think of putting another man to death, study your own selves. If you would give heed to my wisdom, if instead of scorning me, you would feed me in exchange for my advice, you would not be shut up in your city like foxes in a trap."
A chorus of imprecations and a row of threatening fists answered the philosopher.
"Parasite! Slave of poverty!" they shouted. "You are worse than those lupas who throw themselves at the barbarians."
Euphobias, whose insolence increased as the indignation blazed higher, opened his mouth to reply; but he hesitated, beholding a dark mass which shut out the sunlight. The gigantic Theron was before him, looking at him as scornfully as would one of those elephants that the besiegers had near the river. He raised his left hand carelessly, as if he were going to flip off an insect; he barely grazed the insolent face when the philosopher tumbled down the steps from the wall, his head bleeding, silent, bumping from step to step without a groan, like a man accustomed to such caresses, and convinced that pain is but a figment of the imagination.
At the same moment a cloud of black arrows whistled over the walls like a flock of birds. Tiles flew off, bits of plaster sprang from the merlons, and some fell from the wall with broken heads. From between the merlons stones and arrows leaped as an impetuous answer.
The defense of the city had begun!