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.

Salammbo 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. Salammbo 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. Salammbo 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.
Salammbo 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.
Salammbo 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.

Salammbo 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 penumbrae 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
Salammbo'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.
Salammbo 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 canvasabruptly 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 zaimph, 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 zaimph; 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