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Autaritus, he whom he had wounded at Hamilcar's palace, put questions to him, but was repelled by the slaves, and disappeared swearing he would be revenged. The demands and complaints multiplied. The most obstinate penetrated at night into the Suffet's tent; they took his hands and sought to move him by making him feel their toothless mouths, their wasted arms, and the scars of their wounds.

But they probably discerned only the immediate object of Hamilcar's plans, viz. to procure compensation in Spain for the tribute and the traffic of the islands which Carthage had lost; and they deemed an aggressive war on the part of the Carthaginians, and in particular an invasion of Italy from Spain as is evident both from express statements to that effect and from the whole state of the case as absolutely impossible.

"You are suffering?" said the slave to him. "What is the matter with you? Answer me?" And he shook him by the shoulder calling him several times, "Master! master!" At last Matho lifted large troubled eyes towards him. "Listen!" he said in a low voice, and with a finger on his lips. "It is the wrath of the Gods! Hamilcar's daughter pursues me! I am afraid of her, Spendius!"

The son miraculously escaped these red-handed reprisals; and Hamilcar's faithful slave smuggled him aboard ship for Athens. There, under the protection of relatives, he received the education of all young Greeks.

"The senators may be afraid, but Hamilcar's son is very young, and, for my part, I am afraid of these boys converted into chiefs, who forget wine and love to dream only of glory." The Greek could hear no more. The two artisans had disappeared among the huts, and the echo of their argument was lost in the distance. The stranger was alone in the unfamiliar port.

She was weary, and bleeding at every pore; and there seemed to be little hope of her escape, if the other hound of old Hamilcar's race should come up in time to aid his brother in the death-grapple. Hasdrubal had commanded the Carthaginian armies in Spain for some time, with varying but generally unpropitious fortune.

But Italy's turn came before Spain's; and all Hamilcar's haughty heroism, and Hannibal's magnanimous genius, went for nothing; and Rome, the admirable and unlovely, that had suffered the Caudine Forks, and then conquered Samnium and beheaded that noble generous Samnite Gaius Pontius, conquered in turn the conqueror at Cannae, and did for his reputation what she had done with the Samnite hero's person: chopped its head off, and dubbed him in perfect sincerity 'perfidus Hannibal. Over that corpse she stood, at the end of the third century B.C., mistress of Italy and the Italian islands; with proud Carthage at her feet; and the old cultured East, that had known of her existence since the time of Aristotle at least, now keenly aware of her as the strongest thing in the Mediterranean world.

The clamour redoubled; the wounded lions roared in the shade. In an instant the highest terrace of the palace was illuminated, the central door opened, and a woman, Hamilcar's daughter herself, clothed in black garments, appeared on the threshold.

But Rabetna, in jealousy, revenged herself for the virginity withdrawn from her sacrifices, and she tormented Salammbo with possessions, all the stronger for being vague, which were spread through this belief and excited by it. Unceasingly was Hamilcar's daughter disquieted about Tanith.

A group of officers were gathered on the quay as Hamilcar's ship, which was leading the fleet, neared it, and Hamilcar exclaimed, "There is Hannibal himself!" As the ship moored alongside the quay Hannibal came on board and warmly embraced his cousin, and then bestowed a cordial greeting upon Malchus.