who pushed southward
through Gaul and Spain, conquered the Carthaginian territory of northern
Africa, and there formed a permanent independent government in A.D. 439.
From this fixed place, he continued for years to make incursions upon
the bordering cities and islands, burning the cities, murdering the
inhabitants, and intercepting the commerce of the Mediterranean. During
his military career, 429-468, he became the terror of the inhabitants of
the empire, insomuch that historians designate him "the terrible
Genseric." The depredations committed by his followers were but a
repetition of such scenes of barbarity as have already been described in
the invasions of Alaric under the first trumpet, therefore I will not
devote much space to the historical facts in the case. Their deeds,
however, were such that the very term _Vandal_ has come to be used as a
designation of any man of ferocious character. Concerning the important
part that this chieftain acted in the downfall of the Western empire,
Gibbon uses this significant language: "Genseric, a name which, in the
destruction of the Roman empire, has deserved an equal rank with the
names of Alaric and Attila." Vol. III, p. 370.

In the year 454 the empress Eudoxia wished to be revenged on Maximus,
who had murdered her husband Valentinian and had grasped the throne, and
she secretly invited Genseric to attack Rome. That fierce general, who
is described by the Encyclopaedia Britannica as "cruel to
blood-thirstiness, cunning, unscrupulous, and grasping," was glad to
undertake the task, and he soon landed an army of Vandals and African
Moors at the gates of the city. It was soon taken and for fifteen days
given over to be sacked by the barbarous soldiery. When they had glutted
their savage instincts with the horrible deeds of murder and rapine,
loaded with the spoils of the imperial city, they returned to Africa,
taking with them an immense number of captives, including Eudoxia and
her two daughters. This desolating incursion left the empire weak and
tottering to its fall. Genseric "became the tyrant of the sea; the
coasts of Italy, Greece, and Asia, were again exposed to his revenge and
avarice. Tripoli and Sardinia returned to his obedience; he added Sicily
to the number of his provinces; and before he died, in the fulness of
years and glory, he beheld the FINAL EXTINCTION of the empire of the
West." Gibbon, Vol. III, pp. 497, 498.

By "the sea" into which this burning mount