The foot trod on slimy things, and
there were swamps of mud although no rain had fallen.
This confusion of dead bodies covered the whole mountain from top to
bottom.
Those who survived stirred as little as the dead. Squatting in unequal
groups they looked at one another scared and without speaking.
The lake of Hippo-Zarytus shone at the end of a long meadow beneath
the setting sun. To the right an agglomeration of white houses extended
beyond a girdle of walls; then the sea spread out indefinitely; and the
Barbarians, with their chins in their hands, sighed as they thought of
their native lands. A cloud of grey dust was falling.
The evening wind blew; then every breast dilated, and as the freshness
increased, the vermin might be seen to forsake the dead, who were colder
now, and to run over the hot sand. Crows, looking towards the dying,
rested motionless on the tops of the big stones.
When night had fallen yellow-haired dogs, those unclean beasts which
followed the armies, came quite softly into the midst of the Barbarians.
At first they licked the clots of blood on the still tepid stumps; and
soon they began to devour the corpses, biting into the stomachs first of
all.
The fugitives reappeared one by one like shadows; the women also
ventured to return, for there were still some of them left, especially
among the Libyans, in spite of the dreadful massacre of them by the
Numidians.
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