Some took ropes' ends and lighted them to use as torches. Others held
crossed pikes. The corpses were placed upon these and were conveyed
apart.
They were found lying stretched in long lines, on their backs, with
their mouths open, and their lances beside them; or else they were piled
up pell-mell so that it was often necessary to dig out a whole heap
in order to discover those they were wanting. Then the torch would be
passed slowly over their faces. They had received complicated wounds
from hideous weapons. Greenish strips hung from their foreheads; they
were cut in pieces, crushed to the marrow, blue from strangulation, or
broadly cleft by the elephants' ivory. Although they had died at almost
the same time there existed differences between their various states of
corruption. The men of the North were puffed up with livid swellings,
while the more nervous Africans looked as though they had been smoked,
and were already drying up. The Mercenaries might be recognised by the
tattooing on their hands: the old soldiers of Antiochus displayed
a sparrow-hawk; those who had served in Egypt, the head of the
cynosephalus; those who had served with the princes of Asia, a hatchet,
a pomegranate, or a hammer; those who had served in the Greek republics,
the side-view of a citadel or the name of an archon; and some were to
be seen whose arms were entirely covered with these multiplied symbols,
which mingled with their scars and their recent wounds.
Pages:
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310