They accused their chiefs and threatened them. Autaritus was not afraid
of showing himself. With the Barbaric obstinacy which nothing could
discourage, he would advance twenty times a day to the rocks at the
bottom, hoping every time to find them perchance displaced; and swaying
his heavy fur-covered shoulders, he reminded his companions of a bear
coming forth from its cave in springtime to see whether the snows are
melted.
Spendius, surrounded by the Greeks, hid himself in one of the gaps; as
he was afraid, he caused a rumour of his death to be spread.
They were now hideously lean; their skin was overlaid with bluish
marblings. On the evening of the ninth day three Iberians died.
Their frightened companions left the spot. They were stripped, and the
white, naked bodies lay in the sunshine on the sand.
Then the Garamantians began to prowl slowly round about them. They were
men accustomed to existence in solitude, and they reverenced no god. At
last the oldest of the band made a sign, and bending over the corpses
they cut strips from them with their knives, then squatted upon their
heels and ate. The rest looked on from a distance; they uttered cries
of horror;--many, nevertheless, being, at the bottom of their souls,
jealous of such courage.
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