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I whispered to him to go and claim his freedom and then look for me in the hills east of the city, and so he left me. When the amphitheater had cleared I crept stealthily to the top and as the great excavation lay far from the plaza and in an untenanted portion of the great dead city I had little trouble in reaching the hills beyond.
The description of "the odd-looking personages playing at nine-pins" whom he finds on entering the amphitheater, is a perfect picture in words; for the truly great writer is a painter of pictures quite as much as the great artist. "They were dressed in a quaint outlandish fashion; some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long knives in their belts.
The amphitheater of dusky faces, massed together and intently listening, with Christians on one side and heathen on the other, seemed like a reproduction of the days "when Jesus was here among men," and a prophecy of the great final Day when our Lord, the Judge, will separate the sheep from the goats.
Then, presently, as they gained the summit, it was no longer an amphitheater into which they looked, but a billowing sea of cloud, out of which rose steep and inhospitable shores. Then, everywhere, far and away, shone opal-shaded islands of mystery. "Oh," she said, with a little, sighing breath, "these are the Isles of the Blest. We have come through the Everlasting Door into the better country."
To the surprise of all, and especially of Lieutenant Procope, the line indicated a bottom at a nearly uniform depth of from four to five fathoms; and although the sounding was persevered with continuously for more than two hours over a considerable area, the differences of level were insignificant, not corresponding in any degree to what would be expected over the site of a city that had been terraced like the seats of an amphitheater.
Finally the telescopic screens picked up the spaceport, a huge oval amphitheater excavated out of a valley between two jagged mountain ranges. The language in the command room was just as bad, but the tone had changed. It was surprising what a wide range of emotions could be expressed by a few simple blasphemies and obscenities.
But, instantly regaining her composure, she looked around again upon the multitude, waving like an ocean over the whole amphitheater, with an air of majesty expressive of her superiority over all earthly ills. A few turns more of the wheels brought her to the foot of the guillotine. It was upon the same spot where her husband had fallen.
They pick their own players, usually the best of their own warriors and slaves, if they be powerful men who possess such, or their friends may volunteer, or they may obtain prisoners from the pits. These are games indeed the very best that are seen. Often the great chiefs themselves are slain." "It is within this amphitheater that the justice of Manator is meted, then?" asked Tara.
For a time the bulls pursued; but presently, as the swifter outdistanced the slower and found themselves separated from their fellows they abandoned the chase, standing roaring and screaming until the jungle reverberated to their hideous noises. Then they turned and retraced their way to the amphitheater. When Akut felt assured that they were no longer pursued he stopped and released Korak.
At length, their horses being tired and their lances broken, Zadig had recourse to this stratagem: He passes behind the blue prince; springs upon the buttocks of his horse; seizes him by the middle; throws him on the earth; places himself in the saddle; and wheels around Otamus as he lay extended on the ground. All the amphitheater cried out, "Victory to the white knight!"
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