The Adventures of Captain Mago

"A fine place for an ambush!" said Hannibal, wiping the perspiration from his forehead, and little dreaming what was in store for us.

Himilco took a draught from the goat-skin that he carried at his side, and heaved a long-drawn sigh:

"Ah!" he said, "it was in just such a plaguy hole as this that I lost my eye ten years ago. I hope the hand that thrust the lance has been rotten long since."

My own experience of the dangers of the land of Tarshish made me very cautious, and with the approval of my two military subordinates, I despatched Hanno and Jonah to the rear to call together the stragglers, and to collect any that might have lost their way in the woods; Bichri and his ten Benjamite archers, and Aminocles with his five companion Phocians, I sent on in front to make their way rapidly across the ravine, and to explore the forest on the opposite side.

Jonah's trumpet was soon heard sounding its call, and very shortly afterwards Bichri and Aminocles were seen entering the wood beyond the hollow. Without suspecting that there was any cause for alarm, I ordered the guide (who was still being watched narrowly by my sailors) to advance, and we began our descent. Some of us had already reached the bottom, and the main body were making their way as best they could down the troublesome incline, when the guide came to a sudden halt. He was about fifty paces ahead, just beginning to re-ascend the hollow. As soon as he stopped, a whistle was distinctly heard from the woods in front, and Himilco called out:

"Look out, captain – look out! there's mischief brewing."

I shouted with all my might to the guide to move on more briskly, and the sailor who had been put in charge of him was in the act of pushing him forward, when the savage made a sudden dive, felled the sailor to the ground, in two or three bounds cleared the intervening space, and disappeared in the adjoining thicket.

"I told you so," said Himilco; "I knew well enough that the Iberian scoundrels would be at their old games again."

While he spoke, Jonah's trumpet sounding an alarm told only too plainly that the column was being attacked in the rear, and in front a frightful chorus of yells and war-cries was followed instantaneously by an avalanche of stones. One of my poor sailors fell at my side with his skull smashed, and all the native bearers who had entered the ravine threw down their loads and fled precipitately.

"Form a line!" shouted Hannibal to his men; and in spite of the storm of stones that was falling around him, the intrepid leader mounted a projecting rock, and brandishing his sword, vigorously rallied his force. A party of sailors made a body-guard about the two women, and Chamai, pale with rage and excitement, rushed with his sword drawn to Hannibal's side.

"What do you think of this?" said Himilco to me, pathetically, as he picked up a great stone that had fallen within a hand's breadth of his side; "these Tarshish almonds seem to be falling pretty thick."

And as if in answer to his words, a second storm yet heavier than the first came pelting down amongst us, and knocked over several of our men; but this time it came from behind, from the quarter of the ravine that we had just quitted, and showed us that we were assailed as much in our rear as in front.

"O, if only we had some cavalry and some chariots," began Hannibal; "how easy to turn both flanks like the Khetas[40 - The Hittites of the Bible. Kheta was the general name given by the Egyptians to the Semitic tribes.] did with the Assyrians.[41 - B.C. 1070.] We would send our cavalry to the right, and our chariots to the left, and a free passage for our own centre should soon be forced."

"But considering we have no cavalry and no chariots," I said, interrupting him, "we must defend ourselves how we can."

Without taking any notice of what I had said, he was proceeding to expatiate upon the advantages and disadvantages of our position, when a huge stone struck his helmet, knocking off the crest and battering in the headpiece, and enforced upon him more effectually than I had done the necessity of abandoning theory for practice. For an instant he staggered with the shock, but quickly recovering himself, he roared out:

"By Nergal! this won't do. Holy El-Adonai! this is too much. They must pay the penalty for this. Archers! quick! up the slopes! shoot every one who attempts to enter the ravine!"

And turning to me, he cried:

"Captain, will you take your sailors back again up the very path by which you came down, and sweep round to those vagabonds who are harassing our rear?"

"Men of Judah," he continued, "follow Chamai. Chamai, lead them yonder to the left. And now, my men, to the right with me. Forward!"

"Forward to the left! long live the King!" shouted Chamai at the full pitch of his lungs, as he obeyed orders, and led off his company in the direction contrary to Hannibal.

The archers under Hamilcar formed a circle round the women and the baggage, and were a guard for the bottom of the ravine; Himilco and Gisgo, with my party, regained the ridge we had so recently quitted; and thus on every side we presented a front to the enemy.

No sooner had we scaled the side of the ridge, than my men, cutlass in hand, began to lay about them vigorously. The half-naked men of Tarshish, armed only with clumsy bludgeons or wooden-pointed lances, could make no stand against our sharp weapons, and fell in numbers beneath our blows; and although crowds of them disappeared behind the thickets, we did not break our compact mass to go in pursuit, but pushed on straight ahead. Concealed and protected by the underwood, many of the foe continued to follow us, and to hurl javelins at us from piles that had been secreted ready for the purpose. When, however, we came to any open patch, clear of trees, a detachment of our men would make a dash into the brushwood in the hope of capturing some of the stragglers; but the savages were generally much too fleet of foot to allow themselves to be caught, and only about fifteen altogether were secured in this way. To these no quarter was given.

Although we had advanced two stadia, we found no traces of Hanno and Jonah. I did not consider it advisable to go further, and made my men halt and form a circle round a large oak that stood alone in a little glade; but Himilco, whose vengeance seemed insatiable, ventured on for about another stadium, with Gisgo and fifteen sailors. It was somewhat more than an hour before they returned. They had caught and killed two of the Iberians, but what created a far greater interest for us, they had found Hanno's writing-case all covered with blood, lying in a copse with the dead bodies of nine or ten of our adversaries, and the mutilated corpse of one of our own sailors. The trampled soil, the pools of blood, and the carcases of the savages strewn all about rendered it only too probable that after a desperate struggle the scribe and poor Jonah had succumbed to numbers, and that they had not only been massacred, but their bodies had been carried away.

It was with saddened hearts that we made our way back to the spot where we had been first surprised, repelling our enemies all along as they persisted in harassing us. As soon as I reached the ridge, and had satisfied myself that the women and the troop around them were all safe, I closed in my ranks and told up my losses. Six of my men had fallen. Meanwhile I was beginning to feel very uneasy about both Hannibal and Chamai, but my anxiety was of no long duration; they soon appeared together on the opposite height of the chasm: Bichri, too, was with them, and the troops were in good order. They had nearly forty prisoners; and in the midst of the ranks I could see Aminocles marching along with a child in his arms, whilst amongst the captives I could distinguish a woman, two men wearing kitonets, and another dressed in a long Syrian robe. Hannibal was in front, and no sooner did he catch sight of me than he waved his sword over his head with a triumphant gesture, while Chamai, still more excited, with his head bare and his forehead covered with blood, began running rapidly towards me. I made pretence of looking another way as he stopped to kiss Abigail in passing, but in a minute or two he was at my side, his countenance beaming with joy. All out of breath, he exclaimed:

"Close quarters! but we have pretty well done for them now!"

Seeing the deep gash in his forehead and his blood-stained sword, I observed that he bore evident traces of a smartish tussle with the Iberians.

"Iberians!" he said, contemptuously; "who cares for Iberians? No; it is our Tyrians that have done the mischief. However, we have nabbed the scoundrel Hazael; and Aminocles has recovered his boy; he was only just in time to save the child's life."

"And Bodmilcar? what of him?" I asked, all excitement at the information.

"Ah! we have just missed him," he said; "Hannibal got near enough to slice him pretty sharply in the ribs, and if it had not been for this unlucky wound of mine, we should have had him here now; but his people contrived to rescue him, and to carry him off to the wood."

Half-frantic with agitation, and impatient to exact vengeance on my hated adversary, I forgot all about our perilous position, my scattered ingots, and the fate of my unfortunate scribe, and declared to Chamai that without the loss of an hour we must go in pursuit, and get Bodmilcar dead or alive. Across the ravine, off I started, bidding who would to follow.

Himilco had shown Chryseis the writing-case, stained as it was with blood, and a very few words had sufficed to make her realise what were the fears we entertained upon the scribe's behalf. She said nothing, but while Abigail grasped her waist and wept tears of sympathy, she walked steadily along, her hands tightly clenched, and giving no other outward sign of emotion than a slight convulsive movement of the shoulders. Chamai, whom I had omitted to inform of the too likely fate of Hanno and Jonah, hurriedly asked Himilco what had become of them, but the pilot only answered by a significant shake of the head, and by pointing to the woods behind.

As I drew near to Hannibal, he advanced rapidly to greet me. He seemed in high spirits, and although he was evidently affected by the intelligence we gave him about Hanno, he endeavoured to disguise his feelings by saying that we must all submit to the chances of war.

"But what's to be done next?" he added, quickly.

I told him that I was determined at all hazards to go in pursuit of Bodmilcar, who must not be suffered to escape.

"Easier said than done," replied Hannibal. "Bodmilcar not only had a large force of Phœnician criminals and deserters, but when he attacked us he had a regular swarm of savages, all armed either with clubs or javelins. At any rate, he can keep his distance. I know not whether he is alive or dead; but I know this, that the fellows have found out that it is not to their advantage to tackle us in close quarters. However, we are too few to surround them, and to pursue them is only to expose ourselves to another ambush."

"What is to be done, then?" I asked, gnashing my teeth with vexation.

"You must get to the top of the hill before night," he answered, decidedly; "you must reach the open plain; you must not run the risk of another surprise. Once on the plateau you are secure; you can rest your men and give them food; they are knocked up. And you will have time to interrogate your prisoners."

Chagrined as I was, I could not resist the conviction that Hannibal's advice was judicious, and, however reluctantly, gave up all thought of immediate pursuit. I directed that the prisoners should be fastened together by a rope passed round their necks, and that forty men should be told off under Himilco for a guard, with orders to kill the first man that showed the least sign of resistance.

"You may trust me for that," said the pilot, with a vindictive grin; "they have only left me one eye, but that is a sharp one."

When the captives had been securely bound, I had all the packages and silver collected that had been left strewn about by the runaway porters.

"There will be a double load for each of these scoundrels to carry," I remarked; "I shall take good care not to trust Iberians with my property again till I have seen them well fettered."

The baggage was gathered without the occurrence of any renewed attack, and Gisgo returned from the wood brandishing a stout cudgel that he had cut from the bough of an oak.

"Here's something to make them stir their legs a bit!" he said, as he saw the men loaded with their burdens.

"Now then, get on, you brutes!" Himilco screamed in Iberian; "and the first rogue that shirks his work is a dead man!"

Placing the prisoners in the middle, we proceeded cautiously to continue our ascent; and while we were prosecuting our toilsome march, I asked Bichri to give me full particulars about the encounter with Bodmilcar.

"As accurately as I can," he said, "I will. On leaving you we advanced without obstruction some hundred paces into the wood, when in a moment we found ourselves with a host of Iberians in our front, and as many in our rear, pelting us with stones and darts. We ran full speed to a spot where the trees were not so thick, and planting our backs against a projecting rock, we stood on our defence; but almost directly afterwards we espied a troop of soldiers dashing down towards us. They were Bodmilcar and his miscreants. There seemed no hope for us: in a few minutes we must have been overpowered; but, happily, Hannibal and Chamai made their appearance, and a desperate fray ensued. I saw Bodmilcar fall to the ground; Chamai had all but secured him, when he was cut down by a cutlass, and the Tyrians seized their opportunity to carry off their chief, the barbarians covering their retreat, and hurling an incessant shower of missiles. But we were rescued."

I had listened with eager attention to Bichri's story, and as he came to a pause, I asked:

"But how about Hazael, and the woman and the child?"

"Patience, and you shall hear," he said. "We resolved to go in pursuit of our foe, who, we had no doubt, was seriously wounded, and we had got into the thick of the forest, when we came upon a pile of wood with a child lying bound on the top of it. Fourteen or fifteen soldiers were standing round, and Hazael, with a long knife in his hand was on the very point of slaying the child, while two men were forcibly dragging off a woman, who had evidently thrown herself across its body. The very instant that Aminocles caught sight of the victim, he shrieked aloud 'My son, my son!' and dashed like a madman into the group; we all rushed after him, and Hazael, seeing that he was in danger, made a lunge at the child with his knife and took to his heels. However, I was too quick for him, and soon had him back again. Meanwhile Aminocles and my archers had made short work with the other men, and the boy, who had fainted, was set free by cutting the cords that fastened him, and was found to have sustained no very serious injury. The woman, too, who had been endeavouring to ward off the blow of the knife, was recognised by one of the Phocians as the wife whom he had lost. Altogether, considering we have captured the eunuch, saved the child, and restored a man his wife, I do not know that we have done a bad day's work."

But changing his tone, Bichri added, mournfully: