f the protecting Mother! This King of Battles and his
war-loving nation are what the terrible star announced. For many, many
years, and tens of years, all who oppose them will be lost; the armies
of Rome and the galleys of Constantinople will be swept away by these
giants from the North, like the clouds which seek to oppose the star.'
And so it came to pass. The sons of our tribe, though they would far
rather have discharged their long arrows at the fair-haired giants,
obeyed the old man's counsel, and we escaped into the sheltering
desert. Bonifacius, the Roman General, fell. Our ancestor had foretold
it in the prophetic saying: 'G will destroy B. But,' he added, 'some
day, after more than a hundred years, a star will rise in the east, and
then B will overthrow G. Other tribes of our race who, with the
imperial troops, tried to resist the invaders, were mowed down like
them by Genseric, the son of darkness. And when they came howling to
our tents, raising the death-wail, and summoned us to a war of
vengeance, my grandfather and afterwards my father refused, saying:
'Not yet! They cannot yet be conquered. More than two or three
generations of men will pass, and no one will be able to stand before
the giants from the North, neither the Romans by sea, nor we sons of
the desert. But the children of the North cannot remain permanently in
the land of the sun! Many of those who came to our native country to
conquer and rule us, mightier warriors than we, have vanquished us, but
not this land, this sun, these deserts. Sand and sun and luxurious
idleness have lessened the strength of the strangers' arms, the might
of their will. So will also fare these tall, blue-eyed giants. The
vigor will leave their bodies, and the lust for battle their souls. And
then--then we will again wrest from them the heritage of our
ancestors.' So it was predicted, so it has been.

"For tens of years our archers, our spearmen could not withstand the
fierce foes; then their strength decayed, and we often drove them back
when they entered the sacred desert. When, some day, a star like this
returns, my ancestor declared, the reign of the strangers will be over.
Take heed whence a scourge-like star comes again; for from that
direction will come the foe that will hew down the yellow-haired men.
The star to-night came from the east; and from the east will come the
conquerors of Genseric's people!

"We have news that the Emperor has made war upon the Vanda