"Come along! Hamilcar is burning the camp of Autaritus!"
He made a spring. She found herself quite alone.
Then she examined the zaimph; and when she had viewed it well she was
surprised that she had not the happiness which she had once imagined to
herself. She stood with melancholy before her accomplished dream.
But the lower part of the tent was raised, and a monstrous form
appeared. Salammbo could at first distinguish only the two eyes and
a long white beard which hung down to the ground; for the rest of the
body, which was cumbered with the rags of a tawny garment, trailed along
the earth; and with every forward movement the hands passed into the
beard and then fell again. Crawling in this way it reached her feet, and
Salammbo recognised the aged Gisco.
In fact, the Mercenaries had broken the legs of the captive Ancients
with a brass bar to prevent them from taking to flight; and they were
all rotting pell-mell in a pit in the midst of filth. But the sturdiest
of them raised themselves and shouted when they heard the noise of
platters, and it was in this way that Gisco had seen Salammbo. He
had guessed that she was a Carthaginian woman by the little balls of
sandastrum flapping against her cothurni; and having a presentiment
of an important mystery he had succeeded, with the assistance of his
companions, in getting out of the pit; then with elbows and hands he
had dragged himself twenty paces further on as far as Matho's tent.
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