الفصل الفصل 11 · IN THE TENT

. IN THE TENT

The man who guided Salammbô made her ascend again beyond the pharos

in the direction of the Catacombs, and then go down the long suburb of

Molouya, which was full of steep lanes. The sky was beginning to grow

grey. Sometimes palm-wood beams jutting out from the walls obliged them

to bend their heads. The two horses which were at the walk would often

slip; and thus they reached the Teveste gate.

Its heavy leaves were half open; they passed through, and it closed

behind them.

At first they followed the foot of the ramparts for a time, and at the

height of the cisterns they took their way along the Tænia, a narrow

strip of yellow earth separating the gulf from the lake and extending as

far as Rhades.

No one was to be seen around Carthage, whether on the sea or in the

country. The slate-coloured waves chopped softly, and the light wind

blowing their foam hither and thither spotted them with white rents.

In spite of all her veils, Salammbô shivered in the freshness of the

morning; the motion and the open air dazed her. Then the sun rose; it

preyed on the back of her head, and she involuntarily dozed a little.

The two animals rambled along side by side, their feet sinking into the

silent sand.

When they had passed the mountain of the Hot Springs, they went on at a

more rapid rate, the ground being firmer.

But although it was the season for sowing and ploughing, the fields were

as empty as the desert as far as the eye could reach. Here and there

were scattered heaps of corn; at other places the barley was shedding

its reddened ears. The villages showed black upon the clear horizon,

with shapes incoherently carved.

From time to time a half-calcined piece of wall would be found standing

on the edge of the road. The roofs of the cottages were falling in, and

in the interiors might be distinguished fragments of pottery, rags of

clothing, and all kinds of unrecognisable utensils and broken things.

Often a creature clothed in tatters, with earthy face and flaming eyes

would emerge from these ruins. But he would very quickly begin to run or

would disappear into a hole. Salammbô and her guide did not stop.

Deserted plains succeeded one another. Charcoal dust which was raised by

their feet behind them, stretched in unequal trails over large spaces

of perfectly white soil. Sometimes they came upon little peaceful spots,

where a brook flowed amid the long grass; and as they ascended the other

bank Salammbô would pluck damp leaves to cool her hands. At the corner

of a wood of rose-bays her horse shied violently at the corpse of a man

which lay extended on the ground.

The slave immediately settled her again on the cushions. He was one of

the servants of the Temple, a man whom Schahabarim used to employ on

perilous missions.

With extreme precaution he now went on foot beside her and between the

horses; he would whip the animals with the end of a leathern lace wound

round his arm, or would perhaps take balls made of wheat, dates, and

yolks of eggs wrapped in lotus leaves from a scrip hanging against his

breast, and offer them to Salammbô without speaking, and running all

the time.

In the middle of the day three Barbarians clad in animals’ skins

crossed their path. By degrees others appeared wandering in troops of

ten, twelve, or twenty-five men; many were driving goats or a limping

cow. Their heavy sticks bristled with brass points; cutlasses gleamed

in their clothes, which were savagely dirty, and they opened their eyes

with a look of menace and amazement. As they passed some sent them

a vulgar benediction; others obscene jests, and Schahabarim’s man

replied to each in his own idiom. He told them that this was a sick

youth going to be cured at a distant temple.

However, the day was closing in. Barkings were heard, and they

approached them.

Then in the twilight they perceived an enclosure of dry stones shutting

in a rambling edifice. A dog was running along the top of the wall. The

slave threw some pebbles at him and they entered a lofty vaulted hall.

A woman was crouching in the centre warming herself at a fire of

brushwood, the smoke of which escaped through the holes in the ceiling.

She was half hidden by her white hair which fell to her knees; and

unwilling to answer, she muttered with idiotic look words of vengeance

against the Barbarians and the Carthaginians.

The runner ferreted right and left. Then he returned to her and demanded

something to eat. The old woman shook her head, and murmured with her

eyes fixed upon the charcoal:

“I was the hand. The ten fingers are cut off. The mouth eats no

more.”

The slave showed her a handful of gold pieces. She rushed upon them, but

soon resumed her immobility.

At last he placed a dagger which he had in his girdle beneath her

throat. Then, trembling, she went and raised a large stone, and brought

back an amphora of wine with fish from Hippo-Zarytus preserved in honey.

Salammbô turned away from this unclean food, and fell asleep on the

horses’ caparisons which were spread in a corner of the hall.

He awoke her before daylight.

The dog was howling. The slave went up to it quietly, and struck off

its head with a single blow of his dagger. Then he rubbed the horses’

nostrils with blood to revive them. The old woman cast a malediction at

him from behind. Salammbô perceived this, and pressed the amulet which

she wore above her heart.

They resumed their journey.

From time to time she asked whether they would not arrive soon. The road

undulated over little hills. Nothing was to be heard but the grating of

the grasshoppers. The sun heated the yellowed grass; the ground was all

chinked with crevices which in dividing formed, as it were, monstrous

paving-stones. Sometimes a viper passed, or eagles flew by; the slave

still continued running. Salammbô mused beneath her veils, and in spite

of the heat did not lay them aside through fear of soiling her beautiful

garments.

At regular distances stood towers built by the Carthaginians for the

purpose of keeping watch upon the tribes. They entered these for the

sake of the shade, and then set out again.

For prudence sake they had made a wide detour the day before. But they

met with no one just now; the region being a sterile one, the Barbarians

had not passed that way.

Gradually the devastation began again. Sometimes a piece of mosaic would

be displayed in the centre of a field, the sole remnant of a vanished

mansion; and the leafless olive trees looked at a distance like large

bushes of thorns. They passed through a town in which houses were burnt

to the ground. Human skeletons might be seen along the walls. There were

some, too, of dromedaries and mules. Half-gnawed carrion blocked the

streets.

Night fell. The sky was lowering and cloudy.

They ascended again for two hours in a westerly direction, when suddenly

they perceived a quantity of little flames before them.

These were shining at the bottom of an ampitheatre. Gold plates, as they

displaced one another, glanced here and there. These were the cuirasses

of the Clinabarians in the Punic camp; then in the neighbourhood they

distinguished other and more numerous lights, for the armies of the

Mercenaries, now blended together, extended over a great space.

Salammbô made a movement as though to advance. But Schahabarim’s

man took her further away, and they passed along by the terrace which

enclosed the camp of the Barbarians. A breach became visible in it, and

the slave disappeared.

A sentry was walking upon the top of the entrenchment with a bow in his

hand and a pike on his shoulder.

Salammbô drew still nearer; the Barbarian knelt and a long arrow

pierced the hem of her cloak. Then as she stood motionless and

shrieking, he asked her what she wanted.

“To speak to Matho,” she replied. “I am a fugitive from

Carthage.”

He gave a whistle, which was repeated at intervals further away.

Salammbô waited; her frightened horse moved round and round, sniffing.

When Matho arrived the moon was rising behind her. But she had a yellow

veil with black flowers over her face, and so many draperies about her

person, that it was impossible to make any guess about her. From the top

of the terrace he gazed upon this vague form standing up like a phantom

in the penumbræ of the evening.

At last she said to him:

“Lead me to your tent! I wish it!”

A recollection which he could not define passed through his memory. He

felt his heart beating. The air of command intimidated him.

“Follow me!” he said.

The barrier was lowered, and immediately she was in the camp of the

Barbarians.

It was filled with a great tumult and a great throng. Bright fires were

burning beneath hanging pots; and their purpled reflections illuminating

some places left others completely in the dark. There was shouting and

calling; shackled horses formed long straight lines amid the tents; the

latter were round and square, of leather or of canvas; there were huts

of reeds, and holes in the sand such as are made by dogs. Soldiers were

carting faggots, resting on their elbows on the ground, or wrapping

themselves up in mats and preparing to sleep; and Salammbô’s horse

sometimes stretched out a leg and jumped in order to pass over them.

She remembered that she had seen them before; but their beards were

longer now, their faces still blacker, and their voices hoarser. Matho,

who walked before her, waved them off with a gesture of his arm which

raised his red mantle. Some kissed his hands; others bending their

spines approached him to ask for orders, for he was now veritable and

sole chief of the Barbarians; Spendius, Autaritus, and Narr’ Havas had

become disheartened, and he had displayed so much audacity and obstinacy

that all obeyed him.

Salammbô followed him through the entire camp. His tent was at the end,

three hundred feet from Hamilcar’s entrenchments.

She noticed a wide pit on the right, and it seemed to her that faces

were resting against the edge of it on a level with the ground, as

decapitated heads might have done. However, their eyes moved, and from

these half-opened mouths groanings escaped in the Punic tongue.

Two Negroes holding resin lights stood on both sides of the door. Matho

drew the canvas abruptly aside. She followed him.

It was a deep tent with a pole standing up in the centre. It was lighted

by a large lamp-holder shaped like a lotus and full of a yellow oil

wherein floated handfuls of burning tow, and military things might be

distinguished gleaming in the shade. A naked sword leaned against a

stool by the side of a shield; whips of hippopotamus leather,

cymbals, bells, and necklaces were displayed pell-mell on baskets of

esparto-grass; a felt rug lay soiled with crumbs of black bread; some

copper money was carelessly heaped upon a round stone in a corner, and

through the rents in the canvas the wind brought the dust from without,

together with the smell of the elephants, which might be heard eating

and shaking their chains.

“Who are you?” said Matho.

She looked slowly around her without replying; then her eyes were

arrested in the background, where something bluish and sparkling fell

upon a bed of palm-branches.

She advanced quickly. A cry escaped her. Matho stamped his foot behind

her.

“Who brings you here? why do you come?”

“To take it!” she replied, pointing to the zaïmph, and with the

other hand she tore the veils from her head. He drew back with his

elbows behind him, gaping, almost terrified.

She felt as if she were leaning on the might of the gods; and looking at

him face to face she asked him for the zaïmph; she demanded it in words

abundant and superb.

Matho did not hear; he was gazing at her, and in his eyes her garments

were blended with her body. The clouding of the stuffs, like the

splendour of her skin, was something special and belonging to her alone.

Her eyes and her diamonds sparkled; the polish of her nails continued

the delicacy of the stones which loaded her fingers; the two clasps of

her tunic raised her breasts somewhat and brought them closer together,

and he in thought lost himself in the narrow interval between them

whence there fell a thread holding a plate of emeralds which could be

seen lower down beneath the violet gauze. She had as earrings two little

sapphire scales, each supporting a hollow pearl filled with liquid

scent. A little drop would fall every moment through the holes in the

pearl and moisten her naked shoulder. Matho watched it fall.

He was carried away by ungovernable curiosity; and, like a child laying

his hand upon a strange fruit, he tremblingly and lightly touched

the top of her chest with the tip of his finger: the flesh, which was

somewhat cold, yielded with an elastic resistance.

This contact, though scarcely a sensible one, shook Matho to the very

depths of his nature. An uprising of his whole being urged him towards

her. He would fain have enveloped her, absorbed her, drunk her. His

bosom was panting, his teeth were chattering.

Taking her by the wrists he drew her gently to him, and then sat

down upon a cuirass beside the palm-tree bed which was covered with a

lion’s skin. She was standing. He looked up at her, holding her thus

between his knees, and repeating:

“How beautiful you are! how beautiful you are!”

His eyes, which were continually fixed upon hers, pained her; and the

uncomfortableness, the repugnance increased in so acute a fashion that

Salammbô put a constraint upon herself not to cry out. The thought of

Schahabarim came back to her, and she resigned herself.

Matho still kept her little hands in his own; and from time to time, in

spite of the priest’s command, she turned away her face and tried to

thrust him off by jerking her arms. He opened his nostrils the better

to breathe in the perfume which exhaled from her person. It was a fresh,

indefinable emanation, which nevertheless made him dizzy, like the smoke

from a perfuming-pan. She smelt of honey, pepper, incense, roses, with

another odour still.

But how was she thus with him in his tent, and at his disposal? Some one

no doubt had urged her. She had not come for the zaïmph. His arms fell,

and he bent his head whelmed in sudden reverie.

To soften him Salammbô said to him in a plaintive voice:

“What have I done to you that you should desire my death?”

“Your death!”

She resumed:

“I saw you one evening by the light of my burning gardens amid fuming

cups and my slaughtered slaves, and your anger was so strong that you

bounded towards me and I was obliged to fly! Then terror entered into

Carthage. There were cries of the devastation of the towns, the burning

of the country-seats, the massacre of the soldiery; it was you who had

ruined them, it was you who had murdered them! I hate you! Your very

name gnaws me like remorse! You are execrated more than the plague, and

the Roman war! The provinces shudder at your fury, the furrows are full

of corpses! I have followed the traces of your fires as though I were

travelling behind Moloch!”

Matho leaped up; his heart was swelling with colossal pride; he was

raised to the stature of a god.

With quivering nostrils and clenched teeth she went on:

“As if your sacrilege were not enough, you came to me in my sleep

covered with the zaïmph! Your words I did not understand; but I could

see that you wished to drag me to some terrible thing at the bottom of

an abyss.”

Matho, writhing his arms, exclaimed:

“No! no! it was to give it to you! to restore it to you! It seemed to

me that the goddess had left her garment for you, and that it belonged

to you! In her temple or in your house, what does it matter? are you not

all-powerful, immaculate, radiant and beautiful even as Tanith?” And

with a look of boundless adoration he added:

“Unless perhaps you are Tanith?”

“I, Tanith!” said Salammbô to herself.

They left off speaking. The thunder rolled in the distance. Some sheep

bleated, frightened by the storm.

“Oh! come near!” he went on, “come near! fear nothing!

“Formerly I was only a soldier mingled with the common herd of the

Mercenaries, ay, and so meek that I used to carry wood on my back for

the others. Do I trouble myself about Carthage! The crowd of its people

move as though lost in the dust of your sandals, and all its treasures,

with the provinces, fleets, and islands, do not raise my envy like the

freshness of your lips and the turn of your shoulders. But I wanted to

throw down its walls that I might reach you to possess you! Moreover,

I was revenging myself in the meantime! At present I crush men like

shells, and I throw myself upon phalanxes; I put aside the sarissæ with

my hands, I check the stallions by the nostrils; a catapult would

not kill me! Oh! if you knew how I think of you in the midst of war!

Sometimes the memory of a gesture or of a fold of your garment suddenly

seizes me and entwines me like a net! I perceive your eyes in the flames

of the phalaricas and on the gilding of the shields! I hear your voice

in the sounding of the cymbals. I turn aside, but you are not there! and

I plunge again into the battle!”

He raised his arms whereon his veins crossed one another like ivy on

the branches of a tree. Sweat flowed down his breast between his square

muscles; and his breathing shook his sides with his bronze girdle all

garnished with thongs hanging down to his knees, which were firmer than

marble. Salammbô, who was accustomed to eunuchs, yielded to amazement

at the strength of this man. It was the chastisement of the goddess or

the influence of Moloch in motion around her in the five armies. She was

overwhelmed with lassitude; and she listened in a state of stupor to the

intermittent shouts of the sentinels as they answered one another.

The flames of the lamp kindled in the squalls of hot air. There came

at times broad lightning flashes; then the darkness increased; and she

could only see Matho’s eyeballs like two coals in the night. However,

she felt that a fatality was surrounding her, that she had reached a

supreme and irrevocable moment, and making an effort she went up again

towards the zaïmph and raised her hands to seize it.

“What are you doing?” exclaimed Matho.

“I am going back to Carthage,” she placidly replied.

He advanced folding his arms and with so terrible a look that her heels

were immediately nailed, as it were, to the spot.

“Going back to Carthage!” He stammered, and, grinding his teeth,

repeated:

“Going back to Carthage! Ah! you came to take the zaïmph, to conquer

me, and then disappear! No, no! you belong to me! and no one now shall

tear you from here! Oh! I have not forgotten the insolence of your

large tranquil eyes, and how you crushed me with the haughtiness of your

beauty! ’Tis my turn now! You are my captive, my slave, my servant!

Call, if you like, on your father and his army, the Ancients, the

rich, and your whole accursed people! I am the master of three hundred

thousand soldiers! I will go and seek them in Lusitania, in the Gauls,

and in the depths of the desert, and I will overthrow your town and burn

all its temples; the triremes shall float on the waves of blood! I will

not have a house, a stone, or a palm tree remaining! And if men fail me

I will draw the bears from the mountains and urge on the lions! Seek not

to fly or I kill you!”

Pale and with clenched fists he quivered like a harp whose strings are

about to burst. Suddenly sobs stifled him, and he sank down upon his

hams.

“Ah! forgive me! I am a scoundrel, and viler than scorpions, than mire

and dust! Just now while you were speaking your breath passed across my

face, and I rejoiced like a dying man who drinks lying flat on the edge

of a stream. Crush me, if only I feel your feet! curse me, if only I

hear your voice! Do not go! have pity! I love you! I love you!”

He was on his knees on the ground before her; and he encircled her form

with both his arms, his head thrown back, and his hands wandering; the

gold discs hanging from his ears gleamed upon his bronzed neck; big

tears rolled in his eyes like silver globes; he sighed caressingly, and

murmured vague words lighter than a breeze and sweet as a kiss.

Salammbô was invaded by a weakness in which she lost all consciousness

of herself. Something at once inward and lofty, a command from the gods,

obliged her to yield herself; clouds uplifted her, and she fell back

swooning upon the bed amid the lion’s hair. The zaïmph fell, and

enveloped her; she could see Matho’s face bending down above her

breast.

“Moloch, thou burnest me!” and the soldier’s kisses, more

devouring than flames, covered her; she was as though swept away in a

hurricane, taken in the might of the sun.

He kissed all her fingers, her arms, her feet, and the long tresses of

her hair from one end to the other.

“Carry it off,” he said, “what do I care? take me away with it!

I abandon the army! I renounce everything! Beyond Gades, twenty days’

journey into the sea, you come to an island covered with gold dust,

verdure, and birds. On the mountains large flowers filled with smoking

perfumes rock like eternal censers; in the citron trees, which are

higher than cedars, milk-coloured serpents cause the fruit to fall upon

the turf with the diamonds in their jaws; the air is so mild that it

keeps you from dying. Oh! I shall find it, you will see. We shall live

in crystal grottoes cut out at the foot of the hills. No one dwells in

it yet, or I shall become the king of the country.”

He brushed the dust off her cothurni; he wanted her to put a quarter of

a pomegranate between her lips; he heaped up garments behind her head to

make a cushion for her. He sought for means to serve her, and to humble

himself, and he even spread the zaïmph over her feet as if it were a

mere rug.

“Have you still,” he said, “those little gazelle’s horns on

which your necklaces hang? You will give them to me! I love them!” For

he spoke as if the war were finished, and joyful laughs broke from him.

The Mercenaries, Hamilcar, every obstacle had now disappeared. The moon

was gliding between two clouds. They could see it through an opening in

the tent. “Ah, what nights have I spent gazing at her! she seemed to

me like a veil that hid your face; you would look at me through her;

the memory of you was mingled with her beams; then I could no longer

distinguish you!” And with his head between her breasts he wept

copiously.

“And this,” she thought, “is the formidable man who makes Carthage

tremble!”

He fell asleep. Then disengaging herself from his arm she put one foot

to the ground, and she perceived that her chainlet was broken.

The maidens of the great families were accustomed to respect these

shackles as something that was almost religious, and Salammbô,

blushing, rolled the two pieces of the golden chain around her ankles.

Carthage, Megara, her house, her room, and the country that she had

passed through, whirled in tumultuous yet distinct images through her

memory. But an abyss had yawned and thrown them far back to an infinite

distance from her.

The storm was departing; drops of water splashing rarely, one by one,

made the tent-roof shake.

Matho slept like a drunken man, stretched on his side, and with one arm

over the edge of the couch. His band of pearls was raised somewhat, and

uncovered his brow; his teeth were parted in a smile; they shone through

his black beard, and there was a silent and almost outrageous gaiety in

his half-closed eyelids.

Salammbô looked at him motionless, her head bent and her hands crossed.

A dagger was displayed on the table of cypress-wood at the head of the

bed; the sight of the gleaming blade fired her with a sanguinary desire.

Mournful voices lingered at a distance in the shade, and like a chorus

of geniuses urged her on. She approached it; she seized the steel by the

handle. At the rustling of her dress Matho half opened his eyes, putting

forth his mouth upon her hands, and the dagger fell.

Shouts arose; a terrible light flashed behind the canvas. Matho raised

the latter; they perceived the camp of the Libyans enveloped in great

flames.

Their reed huts were burning, and the twisting stems burst in the smoke

and flew off like arrows; black shadows ran about distractedly on the

red horizon. They could hear the shrieks of those who were in the

huts; the elephants, oxen, and horses plunged in the midst of the crowd

crushing it together with the stores and baggage that were being rescued

from the fire. Trumpets sounded. There were calls of “Matho! Matho!”

Some people at the door tried to get in.

“Come along! Hamilcar is burning the camp of Autaritus!”

He made a spring. She found herself quite alone.

Then she examined the zaïmph; and when she had viewed it well she was

surprised that she had not the happiness which she had once imagined to

herself. She stood with melancholy before her accomplished dream.

But the lower part of the tent was raised, and a monstrous form

appeared. Salammbô could at first distinguish only the two eyes and

a long white beard which hung down to the ground; for the rest of the

body, which was cumbered with the rags of a tawny garment, trailed along

the earth; and with every forward movement the hands passed into the

beard and then fell again. Crawling in this way it reached her feet, and

Salammbô recognised the aged Gisco.

In fact, the Mercenaries had broken the legs of the captive Ancients

with a brass bar to prevent them from taking to flight; and they were

all rotting pell-mell in a pit in the midst of filth. But the sturdiest

of them raised themselves and shouted when they heard the noise of

platters, and it was in this way that Gisco had seen Salammbô. He

had guessed that she was a Carthaginian woman by the little balls of

sandastrum flapping against her cothurni; and having a presentiment

of an important mystery he had succeeded, with the assistance of his

companions, in getting out of the pit; then with elbows and hands he had

dragged himself twenty paces further on as far as Matho’s tent. Two

voices were speaking within it. He had listened outside and had heard

everything.

“It is you!” she said at last, almost terrified.

“Yes, it is I!” he replied, raising himself on his wrists. “They

think me dead, do they not?”

She bent her head. He resumed:

“Ah! why have the Baals not granted me this mercy!” He approached

so close he was touching her. “They would have spared me the pain of

cursing you!”

Salammbô sprang quickly back, so much afraid was she of this unclean

being, who was as hideous as a larva and nearly as terrible as a

phantom.

“I am nearly one hundred years old,” he said. “I have seen

Agathocles; I have seen Regulus and the eagles of the Romans passing

over the harvests of the Punic fields! I have seen all the terrors of

battles and the sea encumbered with the wrecks of our fleets! Barbarians

whom I used to command have chained my four limbs like a slave that

has committed murder. My companions are dying around me, one after the

other; the odour of their corpses awakes me in the night; I drive away

the birds that come to peck out their eyes; and yet not for a single day

have I despaired of Carthage! Though I had seen all the armies of the

earth against her, and the flames of the siege overtop the height of the

temples, I should have still believed in her eternity! But now all is

over! all is lost! The gods execrate her! A curse upon you who have

quickened her ruin by your disgrace!”

She opened her lips.

“Ah! I was there!” he cried. “I heard you gurgling with love like

a prostitute; then he told you of his desire, and you allowed him to

kiss your hands! But if the frenzy of your unchastity urged you to

it, you should at least have done as do the fallow deer, which hide

themselves in their copulations, and not have displayed your shame

beneath your father’s very eyes!”

“What?” she said.

“Ah! you did not know that the two entrenchments are sixty cubits from

each other and that your Matho, in the excess of his pride, has posted

himself just in front of Hamilcar. Your father is there behind you; and

could I climb the path which leads to the platform, I should cry to him:

‘Come and see your daughter in the Barbarian’s arms! She has put on

the garment of the goddess to please him; and in yielding her body to

him she surrenders with the glory of your name the majesty of the gods,

the vengeance of her country, even the safety of Carthage!’” The

motion of his toothless mouth moved his beard throughout its length;

his eyes were riveted upon her and devoured her; panting in the dust he

repeated:

“Ah! sacrilegious one! May you be accursed! accursed! accursed!”

Salammbô had drawn back the canvas; she held it raised at arm’s

length, and without answering him she looked in the direction of

Hamilcar.

“It is this way, is it not?” she said.

“What matters it to you? Turn away! Begone! Rather crush your face

against the earth! It is a holy spot which would be polluted by your

gaze!”

She threw the zaïmph about her waist, and quickly picked up her veils,

mantle, and scarf. “I hasten thither!” she cried; and making her

escape Salammbô disappeared.

At first she walked through the darkness without meeting any one, for

all were betaking themselves to the fire; the uproar was increasing and

great flames purpled the sky behind; a long terrace stopped her.

She turned round to right and left at random, seeking for a ladder,

a rope, a stone, something in short to assist her. She was afraid of

Gisco, and it seemed to her that shouts and footsteps were pursuing her.

Day was beginning to break. She perceived a path in the thickness of the

entrenchment. She took the hem of her robe, which impeded her, in her

teeth, and in three bounds she was on the platform.

A sonorous shout burst forth beneath her in the shade, the same which

she had heard at the foot of the galley staircase, and leaning over she

recognised Schahabarim’s man with his coupled horses.

He had wandered all night between the two entrenchments; then disquieted

by the fire, he had gone back again trying to see what was passing in

Matho’s camp; and, knowing that this spot was nearest to his tent, he

had not stirred from it, in obedience to the priest’s command.

He stood up on one of the horses. Salammbô let herself slide down to

him; and they fled at full gallop, circling the Punic camp in search of

a gate.

Matho had re-entered his tent. The smoky lamp gave but little light, and

he also believed that Salammbô was asleep. Then he delicately touched

the lion’s skin on the palm-tree bed. He called but she did not

answer; he quickly tore away a strip of the canvas to let in some light;

the zaïmph was gone.

The earth trembled beneath thronging feet. Shouts, neighings, and

clashing of armour rose in the air, and clarion flourishes sounded

the charge. It was as though a hurricane were whirling around him.

Immoderate frenzy made him leap upon his arms, and he dashed outside.

The long files of the Barbarians were descending the mountain at a

run, and the Punic squares were advancing against them with a heavy

and regular oscillation. The mist, rent by the rays of the sun, formed

little rocking clouds which as they rose gradually discovered standards,

helmets, and points of pikes. Beneath the rapid evolutions portions of

the earth which were still in the shadow seemed to be displaced bodily;

in other places it looked as if huge torrents were crossing one

another, while thorny masses stood motionless between them. Matho could

distinguish the captains, soldiers, heralds, and even the serving-men,

who were mounted on asses in the rear. But instead of maintaining his

position in order to cover the foot-soldiers, Narr’ Havas turned

abruptly to the right, as though he wished himself to be crushed by

Hamilcar.

His horsemen outstripped the elephants, which were slackening their

speed; and all the horses, stretching out their unbridled heads,

galloped at so furious a rate that their bellies seemed to graze the

earth. Then suddenly Narr’ Havas went resolutely up to a sentry. He

threw away his sword, lance, and javelins, and disappeared among the

Carthaginians.

The king of the Numidians reached Hamilcar’s tent, and pointing to his

men, who were standing still at a distance, he said:

“Barca! I bring them to you. They are yours.”

Then he prostrated himself in token of bondage, and to prove his

fidelity recalled all his conduct from the beginning of the war.

First, he had prevented the siege of Carthage and the massacre of the

captives; then he had taken no advantage of the victory over Hanno after

the defeat at Utica. As to the Tyrian towns, they were on the frontiers

of his kingdom. Finally he had not taken part in the battle of the

Macaras; and he had even expressly absented himself in order to evade

the obligation of fighting against the Suffet.

Narr’ Havas had in fact wished to aggrandise himself by encroachments

upon the Punic provinces, and had alternately assisted and forsaken

the Mercenaries according to the chances of victory. But seeing that

Hamilcar would ultimately prove the stronger, he had gone over to him;

and in his desertion there was perhaps something of a grudge against

Matho, whether on account of the command or of his former love.

The Suffet listened without interrupting him. The man who thus presented

himself with an army where vengeance was his due was not an auxiliary to

be despised; Hamilcar at once divined the utility of such an alliance in

his great projects. With the Numidians he would get rid of the Libyans.

Then he would draw off the West to the conquest of Iberia; and, without

asking Narr’ Havas why he had not come sooner, or noticing any of his

lies, he kissed him, striking his breast thrice against his own.

It was to bring matters to an end and in despair that he had fired the

camp of the Libyans. This army came to him like a relief from the gods;

dissembling his joy he replied:

“May the Baals favour you! I do not know what the Republic will do for

you, but Hamilcar is not ungrateful.”

The tumult increased; some captains entered. He was arming himself as he

spoke.

“Come, return! You will use your horsemen to beat down their infantry

between your elephants and mine. Courage! exterminate them!”

And Narr’ Havas was rushing away when Salammbô appeared.

She leaped down quickly from her horse. She opened her ample cloak and

spreading out her arms displayed the zaïmph.

The leathern tent, which was raised at the corners, left visible the

entire circuit of the mountain with its thronging soldiers, and as

it was in the centre Salammbô could be seen on all sides. An immense

shouting burst forth, a long cry of triumph and hope. Those who were

marching stopped; the dying leaned on their elbows and turned round

to bless her. All the Barbarians knew now that she had recovered the

zaïmph; they saw her or believed that they saw her from a distance; and

other cries, but those of rage and vengeance, resounded in spite of the

plaudits of the Carthaginians. Thus did the five armies in tiers upon

the mountain stamp and shriek around Salammbô.

Hamilcar, who was unable to speak, nodded her his thanks. His eyes were

directed alternately upon the zaïmph and upon her, and he noticed that

her chainlet was broken. Then he shivered, being seized with a terrible

suspicion. But soon recovering his impassibility he looked sideways at

Narr’ Havas without turning his face.

The king of the Numidians held himself apart in a discreet attitude;

on his forehead he bore a little of the dust which he had touched when

prostrating himself. At last the Suffet advanced towards him with a look

full of gravity.

“As a reward for the services which you have rendered me, Narr’

Havas, I give you my daughter. Be my son,” he added, “and defend

your father!”

Narr’ Havas gave a great gesture of surprise; then he threw himself

upon Hamilcar’s hands and covered them with kisses.

Salammbô, calm as a statue, did not seem to understand. She blushed

a little as she cast down her eyelids, and her long curved lashes made

shadows upon her cheeks.

Hamilcar wished to unite them immediately in indissoluble betrothal. A

lance was placed in Salammbô’s hands and by her offered to Narr’

Havas; their thumbs were tied together with a thong of ox-leather; then

corn was poured upon their heads, and the grains that fell around them

rang like rebounding hail.