The stir increased, doors closed, all the priests fled,
and the Ancients disappeared beneath the columns which formed a deep
vestibule round the temple.
These columns were arranged in such a way that their circular ranks,
which were contained one within another, showed the Saturnian period
with its years, the years with their months, and the months with their
days, and finally reached to the walls of the sanctuary.
Here it was that the Ancients laid aside their sticks of
narwhal's-horn,--for a law which was always observed inflicted the
punishment of death upon any one entering the meeting with any kind
of weapon. Several wore a rent repaired with a strip of purple at the
bottom of their garment, to show that they had not been economical in
their dress when mourning for their relatives, and this testimony to
their affliction prevented the slit from growing larger. Others had
their beards inclosed in little bags of violet skin, and fastened to
their ears by two cords. They all accosted one another by embracing
breast to breast. They surrounded Hamilcar with congratulations; they
might have been taken for brothers meeting their brother again.
These men were generally thick-set, with curved noses like those of the
Assyrian colossi. In a few, however, the more prominent cheek-bone, the
taller figure, and the narrower foot, betrayed an African origin
and nomad ancestors.
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