"What is it that you want?"
"I say that we must be more ingenious or more terrible! If the whole of
Africa rejects your yoke the reason is, my feeble masters, that you do
not know how to fasten it to her shoulders! Agathocles, Regulus, Coepio,
any bold man has only to land and capture her; and when the Libyans in
the east concert with the Numidians in the west, and the Nomads
come from the south, and the Romans from the north"--a cry of horror
rose--"Oh! you will beat your breasts, and roll in the dust, and tear
your cloaks! No matter! you will have to go and turn the mill-stone in
the Suburra, and gather grapes on the hills of Latium."
They smote their right thighs to mark their sense of the scandal, and
the sleeves of their robes rose like large wings of startled birds.
Hamilcar, carried away by a spirit, continued his speech, standing on
the highest step of the altar, quivering and terrible; he raised his
arms, and the rays from the candelabrum which burned behind him passed
between his fingers like javelins of gold.
"You will lose your ships, your country seats, your chariots, your
hanging beds, and the slaves who rub your feet! The jackal will crouch
in your palaces, and the ploughshare will upturn your tombs. Nothing
will be left but the eagles' scream and a heap of ruins.
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