The sanction of the gods was not wanting; for crows alighted from all
quarters of the sky. They wheeled in the air as they flew with loud
hoarse cries, and formed a huge cloud rolling continually upon itself.
It was seen from Clypea, Rhades, and the promontory of Hermaeum.
Sometimes it would suddenly burst asunder, its black spirals extending
far away, as an eagle clove the centre of it, and then departed again;
here and there on the terraces the domes, the peaks of the obelisks,
and the pediments of the temples there were big birds holding human
fragments in their reddened beaks.
Owing to the smell the Carthaginians resigned themselves to unbind the
corpses. A few of them were burnt; the rest were thrown into the sea,
and the waves, driven by the north wind, deposited them on the shore at
the end of the gulf before the camp of Autaritus.
This punishment had no doubt terrified the Barbarians, for from the top
of Eschmoun they could be seen striking their tents, collecting their
flocks, and hoisting their baggage upon asses, and on the evening of the
same day the entire army withdrew.
It was to march to and fro between the mountain of the Hot Springs
and Hippo-Zarytus, and so debar the Suffet from approaching the Tyrian
towns, and from the possibility of a return to Carthage.
Pages:
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244