Part 28 (1/2)
CHAPTER III
Many days' march westward from the road which the Byzantines were following toward Carthage, and a considerable distance south of Mount Auras, the extreme limit of the Vandal kingdom in Africa, lay a small oasis. It was within the sandy desert which extended southward into the unknown interior of the hot portion of the globe. A spring of drinkable water, a few date-palms in the circle around it, and, beneath their shade, a patch of turf of salt gra.s.s, affording sufficient fodder for the camels--that was all. The ground in the neighborhood was flat, except that here and there rose waves of the yellow, loose, hot sand swept together by the wind. Nowhere appeared shrub, bush, or hillock; as far as the eye could rove in the brightest light of day, it found no resting-place till, wearied by the quest, it sought some point close at hand.
But it was night now, and wonderfully, indescribably magnificent was the silent solitude. Over the whole expanse of the heavens the stars were glittering in countless mult.i.tudes with a brilliancy which they show only to the sons of the desert. It is easy to understand that deity first appeared to the Moors in the form of the stars. In them they wors.h.i.+pped the radiant, beneficent forces which contrasted benignly with the desert's scorching heat, the desert's storms. From the course, position, and s.h.i.+ning of the stars, they augured the will of the G.o.ds and their own future.
Around the spring were pitched the low goatskin tents of the nomad Moors, only half a dozen of them, for the whole tribe had not gathered.
The faithful camels, carefully tethered by the feet among the tent ropes, and covered with blankets to protect them from the stings of the flies, were lying in the deep sand with their long necks outstretched.
In the centre of the little encampment were the n.o.ble racers, the battle stallions, and the brood mares, confined in a circle made with ropes and lances thrust into the sand. On the round top of one of the tents towered a long spear, from whose point hung a lion's skin; for this was the shelter of the chief.
The night wind, which blew refres.h.i.+ngly from the distant sea in the northeast, played with the mane of the dead king of the wilderness, sometimes tossing the skin of the huge paw, sometimes the tuft of hair at the end of the tail. Fantastic shadows fell on the light sandy soil; for though the moon was not in the sky, the stars shone bright. A deep, solemn stillness reigned. Every living creature seemed buried in sleep.
Four huge fires, one at each of the four points of the compa.s.s, were blazing, a bow-shot from the tents, to frighten the wild beasts from the flocks; from them arose at long intervals the only sound that broke the stillness; namely, the cry of some shepherd who thus kept himself awake and warned his companions to be watchful. This solemn silence continued for a long, long time.
At last a couple of stallions neighed, a weapon clanked outside from the direction of the fires, and directly thereafter a light, almost inaudible footstep came toward the centre of the camp,--toward the ”Lion Tent.” Suddenly it paused; a slender young man stooped to the ground before the entrance.
”What? Are you lying in front of the tent, grandfather?” he asked in astonishment. ”Are you asleep?”
”I was watching,” a low voice answered.
”I should have ventured to rouse you. There is a fateful star in the heavens. I saw it appear when I was keeping the eastern fire-watch. As soon as I was relieved, I hastened to you. The G.o.ds are sending a warning! But youth does not understand their signs; you do, wise ancestor. Look yonder, to the right--the right of the last palm. Don't you see it?”
”I saw it long ago. I have expected the sign for many nights, ay, for years.”
Awe and a slight sense of fear thrilled the youth. ”For years? You knew what would happen in the heavens? You are very wise, O Cabaon.”
”Not I. My grandfather told my father, and he repeated the marvel to me. It was more than a hundred years ago. The fair-faced strangers came from the North across the sea in many s.h.i.+ps, led by that King of terrors with whose name our women still silence unruly children.”
”Genseric!” said the youth, softly; his tone expressed both hate and horror.
”At that time, from the same direction as the s.h.i.+ps, a terrible star mounted into the heavens--blood-red, like a flaming scourge with many hundred thongs; it swung menacingly over our country and people. And my grandfather, after he had seen the terrible war-king in the harbor of Tsocium, said to my father and to our tribe: 'Unfasten the camels!
Bridle the n.o.ble racers, and set forth. Go southward, into the scorching bosom of the protecting Mother! This King of Battles and his war-loving nation are what the terrible star announced. For many, many years, and tens of years, all who oppose them will be lost; the armies of Rome and the galleys of Constantinople will be swept away by these giants from the North, like the clouds which seek to oppose the star.'
And so it came to pa.s.s. The sons of our tribe, though they would far rather have discharged their long arrows at the fair-haired giants, obeyed the old man's counsel, and we escaped into the sheltering desert. Bonifacius, the Roman General, fell. Our ancestor had foretold it in the prophetic saying: 'G will destroy B. But,' he added, 'some day, after more than a hundred years, a star will rise in the east, and then B will overthrow G. Other tribes of our race who, with the imperial troops, tried to resist the invaders, were mowed down like them by Genseric, the son of darkness. And when they came howling to our tents, raising the death-wail, and summoned us to a war of vengeance, my grandfather and afterwards my father refused, saying: 'Not yet! They cannot yet be conquered. More than two or three generations of men will pa.s.s, and no one will be able to stand before the giants from the North, neither the Romans by sea, nor we sons of the desert. But the children of the North cannot remain permanently in the land of the sun! Many of those who came to our native country to conquer and rule us, mightier warriors than we, have vanquished us, but not this land, this sun, these deserts. Sand and sun and luxurious idleness have lessened the strength of the strangers' arms, the might of their will. So will also fare these tall, blue-eyed giants. The vigor will leave their bodies, and the l.u.s.t for battle their souls. And then--then we will again wrest from them the heritage of our ancestors.' So it was predicted, so it has been.
”For tens of years our archers, our spearmen could not withstand the fierce foes; then their strength decayed, and we often drove them back when they entered the sacred desert. When, some day, a star like this returns, my ancestor declared, the reign of the strangers will be over.
Take heed whence a scourge-like star comes again; for from that direction will come the foe that will hew down the yellow-haired men.
The star to-night came from the east; and from the east will come the conquerors of Genseric's people!
”We have news that the Emperor has made war upon the Vandals, that his army has landed in the far East! But it does not agree--the other sign!
G doubtless means Gelimer, the fair-haired King. But the Emperor of the Romans is J, Justinian. Speak, have you chanced to hear the name of the Roman. General?”
”Belisarius.”
The old man started up. ”And B will overthrow G,--Belisarius will vanquish Gelimer! Look, how blood-red the scourge-like star is s.h.i.+ning!
That means b.l.o.o.d.y battles. But we, son of my son, we will not interpose when Roman sword and Vandal spear are clas.h.i.+ng against each other. The conflict may easily extend as far as the Auras Mountain; we will plunge deeper into the wilderness. Let the aliens fight and destroy one another. The Roman eagle, too, will not long have its eyrie here. The star of misfortune will rise for them as well as for these tall sea-kings. The intruders come--and pa.s.s away; we, the sons of the country, will remain. Like the sand of our deserts we wander before the wind, but we shall not pa.s.s away; we always return. The land of the sun belongs to the sons of the sun. And, as the sand of the desert covers and buries the proud stone buildings of the Romans, so shall we, ever returning, bury the alien life which forces itself into our country, where it can never thrive. We retire--but we return.”