to increase in size; and the deep lines forming semicircles
round his nostrils gave him a strange and terrifying appearance, the
look of a wild beast. His unnatural voice was like a roar; he said:

"Perhaps you are right, Demonades. In fact there are many ulcers here
which have closed. I feel robust. Here! look how I am eating!"

And less from greediness than from ostentation, and the desire to prove
to himself that he was in good health, he cut into the forcemeats
of cheese and marjoram, the boned fish, gourds, oysters with eggs,
horse-radishes, truffles, and brochettes of small birds. As he looked
at the prisoners he revelled in the imagination of their tortures.
Nevertheless he remembered Sicca, and the rage caused by all his woes
found vent in the abuse of these three men.

"Ah! traitors! ah! wretches! infamous, accursed creatures! And you
outraged me!--me! the Suffet! Their services, the price of their
blood, say they! Ah! yes! their blood! their blood!" Then speaking to
himself:--"All shall perish! not one shall be sold! It would be better
to bring them to Carthage! I should be seen--but doubtless, I have not
brought chains enough? Write: Send me--How many of them are there? go
and ask Muthumbal! Go! no pity! and let all their hands be cut off and
brought to me in baskets!"

But strange cries at once hoarse and shrill penetrated into the hall
above Hanno's voice and the rattling of the dishes that were being
placed around him. They increased, and suddenly the furious trumpeting
of the elephants burst forth as if the battle were beginning again. A
great tumult was going on around the town.

The Carthaginians had not attempted to pursue the Barbarians. They had
taken up their quarters at the foot of the walls with their baggage,
mules, serving men, and all their train of satraps; and they made
merry in their beautiful pearl-bordered tents, while the camp of the
Mercenaries was now nothing but a heap of ruins in the plain. Spendius
had recovered his courage. He dispatched Zarxas to Matho, scoured the
woods, rallied his men (the losses had been inconsiderable),--and they
were re-forming their lines enraged at having been conquered without a
fight, when they discovered a vat of petroleum which had no doubt been
abandoned by the Carthaginians. Then Spendius had some pigs carried off
from the farms, smeared them with bitumen, set them on fire, and drove
them towards Utica.

The elephants were terrified by the flam