The Last of the Legions and Other Tales of Long Ago

by Arthur Conan Doyle

  II

  THE LAST GALLEY

  "Mutato nomine, de te, Britannia, fabula narratur."

  It was a spring morning, one hundred and forty-six years before thecoming of Christ. The North African coast, with its broad hem of goldensand, its green belt of feathery palm trees, and its background ofbarren, red-scarped hills, shimmered like a dream country in the opallight. Save for a narrow edge of snow-white surf, the Mediterranean layblue and serene as far as the eye could reach. In all its vast expansethere was no break but for a single galley, which was slowly making itsway from the direction of Sicily and heading for the distant harbour ofCarthage.

  Seen from afar it was a stately and beautiful vessel, deep red incolour, double-banked with scarlet oars, its broad, flapping sailstained with Tyrian purple, its bulwarks gleaming with brass work. Abrazen, three-pronged ram projected in front, and a high golden figureof Baal, the God of the Ph[oe]nicians, children of Canaan, shone uponthe after-deck. From the single high mast above the huge sail streamedthe tiger-striped flag of Carthage. So, like some stately scarlet bird,with golden beak and wings of purple, she swam upon the face of thewaters--a thing of might and of beauty as seen from the distant shore.

  But approach and look at her now! What are these dark streaks which foulher white decks and dapple her brazen shields? Why do the long red oarsmove out of time, irregular, convulsive? Why are some missing from thestaring portholes, some snapped with jagged, yellow edges, some trailinginert against the sides? Why are two prongs of the brazen ram twistedand broken? See, even the high image of Baal is battered and disfigured!By every sign this ship has passed through some grievous trial, some dayof terror, which has left its heavy marks upon her.

  And now stand upon the deck itself, and see more closely the men who manher! There are two decks forward and aft, while in the open waist arethe double banks of seats, above and below, where the rowers, two to anoar, tug and bend at their endless task. Down the centre is a narrowplatform, along which pace a line of warders, lash in hand, who cutcruelly at the slave who pauses, be it only for an instant, to sweep thesweat from his dripping brow. But these slaves--look at them! Some arecaptured Romans, some Sicilians, many black Libyans, but all are in thelast exhaustion, their weary eyelids drooped over their eyes, their lipsthick with black crusts, and pink with bloody froth, their arms andbacks moving mechanically to the hoarse chant of the overseer. Theirbodies of all tints from ivory to jet, are stripped to the waist, andevery glistening back shows the angry stripes of the warders. But it isnot from these that the blood comes which reddens the seats and tintsthe salt water washing beneath their manacled feet. Great gaping wounds,the marks of sword slash and spear stab, show crimson upon their nakedchests and shoulders, while many lie huddled and senseless athwart thebenches, careless for ever of the whips which still hiss above them. Nowwe can understand those empty portholes and those trailing oars.

  Nor were the crew in better case than their slaves. The decks werelittered with wounded and dying men. It was but a remnant who stillremained upon their feet. The most lay exhausted upon the fore-deck,while a few of the more zealous were mending their shattered armour,restringing their bows, or cleaning the deck from the marks of combat.Upon a raised platform at the base of the mast stood the sailing-masterwho conned the ship, his eyes fixed upon the distant point of Megarawhich screened the eastern side of the Bay of Carthage. On theafter-deck were gathered a number of officers, silent and brooding,glancing from time to time at two of their own class who stood apartdeep in conversation. The one, tall, dark, and wiry, with pure, Semiticfeatures, and the limbs of a giant, was Magro, the famous Carthaginiancaptain, whose name was still a terror on every shore, from Gaul to theEuxine. The other, a white-bearded, swarthy man, with indomitablecourage and energy stamped upon every eager line of his keen, aquilineface, was Gisco the politician, a man of the highest Punic blood, aSuffete of the purple robe, and the leader of that party in the statewhich had watched and striven amid the selfishness and slothfulness ofhis fellow-countrymen to rouse the public spirit and waken the publicconscience to the ever-increasing danger from Rome. As they talked, thetwo men glanced continually, with earnest anxious faces, towards thenorthern skyline.

  "It is certain," said the older man, with gloom in his voice andbearing, "none have escaped save ourselves."

  "I did not leave the press of the battle whilst I saw one ship which Icould succour," Magro answered. "As it was, we came away, as you saw,like a wolf which has a hound hanging on to either haunch. The Romandogs can show the wolf-bites which prove it. Had any other galley wonclear, they would surely be with us by now, since they have no place ofsafety save Carthage."

  The younger warrior glanced keenly ahead to the distant point whichmarked his native city. Already the low, leafy hill could be seen,dotted with the white villas of the wealthy Ph[oe]nician merchants.Above them, a gleaming dot against the pale blue morning sky, shone thebrazen roof of the citadel of Byrsa, which capped the sloping town.

  "Already they can see us from the watch-towers," he remarked. "Even fromafar they may know the galley of Black Magro. But which of all of themwill guess that we alone remain of all that goodly fleet which sailedout with blare of trumpet and roll of drum but one short month ago?"

  The patrician smiled bitterly. "If it were not for our great ancestorsand for our beloved country, the Queen of the Waters," said he, "I couldfind it in my heart to be glad at this destruction which has come uponthis vain and feeble generation. You have spent your life upon the seas,Magro. You do not know how it has been with us on the land. But I haveseen this canker grow upon us which now leads us to our death. I andothers have gone down into the market-place to plead with the people,and been pelted with mud for our pains. Many a time have I pointed toRome, and said, 'Behold these people, who bear arms themselves, each manfor his own duty and pride. How can you who hide behind mercenaries hopeto stand against them?'--a hundred times I have said it."

  "And had they no answer?" asked the Rover.

  "Rome was far off and they could not see it, so to them it was nothing,"the old man answered. "Some thought of trade, and some of votes, andsome of profits from the State, but none would see that the Stateitself, the mother of all things, was sinking to her end. So might thebees debate who should have wax or honey when the torch was blazingwhich would bring to ashes the hive and all therein. 'Are we not rulersof the sea?' 'Was not Hannibal a great man?' Such were their cries,living ever in the past and blind to the future. Before that sun setsthere will be tearing of hair and rending of garments; but what willthat now avail us?"

  "It is some sad comfort," said Magro, "to know that what Rome holds shecannot keep."

  "Why say you that? When we go down, she is supreme in all the world."

  "For a time, and only for a time," Magro answered gravely. "Yet you willsmile, perchance, when I tell you how it is that I know it. There was awise woman who lived in that part of the Tin Islands which juts forthinto the sea, and from her lips I have heard many things, but not onewhich has not come aright. Of the fall of our own country, and even ofthis battle, from which we now return, she told me clearly. There ismuch strange lore amongst these savage peoples in the west of the landof Tin."

  "What said she of Rome?"

  "That she also would fall, even as we, weakened by her riches and herfactions."

  Gisco rubbed his hands. "That at least makes our own fall less bitter,"said he. "But since we have fallen, and Rome will fall, who in turn mayhope to be Queen of the Waters?"

  "That also I asked her," said Magro, "and gave her my Tyrian belt withthe golden buckle as a guerdon for her answer. But, indeed, it was toohigh payment for the tale she told, which must be false if all else shesaid was true. She would have it that in coming days it was her ownland, this fog-girt isle where painted savages can scarce row a wickercoracle from point to point, which shall at last take the trident whichCarthage and Rome have dropped."

  The smile which flickered upon the old Patrician's
keen features diedaway suddenly, and his fingers closed upon his companion's wrist. Theother had set rigid, his head advanced, his hawk eyes upon the northernskyline. Its straight, blue horizon was broken by two low black dots.

  "Galleys!" whispered Gisco.

  The whole crew had seen them. They clustered along the starboardbulwarks, pointing and chattering. For a moment the gloom of defeat waslifted, and a buzz of joy ran from group to group at the thought thatthey were not alone--that some one had escaped the great carnage as wellas themselves.

  "By the spirit of Baal," said Black Magro, "I could not have believedthat any could have fought clear from such a welter. Could it be youngHamilcar in the _Africa_, or is it Beneva in the Blue Syrian ship? Wethree with others may form a squadron and make head against them yet. Ifwe hold our course, they will join us ere we round the harbour mole."

  Slowly the injured galley toiled on her way, and more swiftly the twonew-comers swept down from the north. Only a few miles off lay the greenpoint and the white houses which flanked the great African city.Already, upon the headland, could be seen a dark group of waitingtownsmen. Gisco and Magro were still watching with puckered gaze theapproaching galleys, when the brown Libyan boatswain, with flashingteeth and gleaming eyes, rushed upon the poop, his long thin armstabbing to the north.

  "Romans!" he cried. "Romans!"

  A hush had fallen over the great vessel. Only the wash of the water andthe measured rattle and beat of the oars broke in upon the silence.

  "By the horns of God's altar, I believe the fellow is right!" cried oldGisco. "See how they swoop upon us like falcons. They are full-mannedand full-oared."

  "Plain wood, unpainted," said Magro. "See how it gleams yellow where thesun strikes it."

  "And yonder thing beneath the mast. Is it not the cursed bridge they usefor boarding?"

  "So they grudge us even one," said Magro with a bitter laugh. "Not evenone galley shall return to the old sea-mother. Well, for my part, Iwould as soon have it so. I am of a mind to stop the oars and awaitthem."

  "It is a man's thought," answered old Gisco; "but the city will need usin the days to come. What shall it profit us to make the Roman victorycomplete? Nay, Magro, let the slaves row as they never rowed before, notfor our own safety, but for the profit of the State."

  So the great red ship laboured and lurched onwards, like a weary pantingstag which seeks shelter from his pursuers, while ever swifter and evernearer sped the two lean fierce galleys from the north. Already themorning sun shone upon the lines of low Roman helmets above thebulwarks, and glistened on the silver wave where each sharp prow shotthrough the still blue water. Every moment the ships drew nearer, andthe long thin scream of the Roman trumpets grew louder upon the ear.

  * * * * *

  Upon the high bluff of Megara there stood a great concourse of thepeople of Carthage who had hurried forth from the city upon the newsthat the galleys were in sight. They stood now, rich and poor, effeteand plebeian, white Ph[oe]nician and dark Kabyle, gazing with breathlessinterest at the spectacle before them. Some hundreds of feet beneaththem the Punic galley had drawn so close that with their naked eyesthey could see those stains of battle which told their dismal tale. TheRomans, too, were heading in such a way that it was before their veryfaces that their ship was about to be cut off; and yet of all thismultitude not one could raise a hand in its defence. Some wept inimpotent grief, some cursed with flashing eyes and knotted fists, someon their knees held up appealing hands to Baal; but neither prayer,tears, nor curses could undo the past nor mend the present. That broken,crawling galley meant that their fleet was gone. Those two fiercedarting ships meant that the hands of Rome were already at their throat.Behind them would come others and others, the innumerable trained hostsof the great Republic, long mistress of the land, now dominant also uponthe waters. In a month, two months, three at the most, their armieswould be there, and what could all the untrained multitudes of Carthagedo to stop them?

  "Nay!" cried one, more hopeful than the rest, "at least we are brave menwith arms in our hands."

  "Fool!" said another, "is it not such talk which has brought us to ourruin? What is the brave man untrained to the brave man trained? Whenyou stand before the sweep and rush of a Roman legion you may learn thedifference."

  "Then let us train!"

  "Too late! A full year is needful to turn a man to a soldier. Where willyou--where will your city be within the year? Nay, there is but onechance for us. If we give up our commerce and our colonies, if we stripourselves of all that made us great, then perchance the Roman conquerormay hold his hand."

  And already the last sea-fight of Carthage was coming swiftly to an endbefore them. Under their very eyes the two Roman galleys had shot in,one on either side of the vessel of Black Magro. They had grappled withhim, and he, desperate in his despair, had cast the crooked flukes ofhis anchors over their gunwales, and bound them to him in an iron grip,whilst with hammer and crowbar he burst great holes in his ownsheathing. The last Punic galley should never be rowed into Ostia, asight for the holiday-makers of Rome. She would lie in her own waters.And the fierce, dark soul of her rover captain glowed as he thoughtthat not alone should she sink into the depths of the mother sea.

  Too late did the Romans understand the man with whom they had to deal.Their boarders who had flooded the Punic decks felt the planking sinkand sway beneath them. They rushed to gain their own vessels; but they,too, were being drawn downwards, held in the dying grip of the great redgalley. Over they went and ever over. Now the deck of Magro's ship isflush with the water, and the Romans', drawn towards it by the ironbonds which hold them, are tilted downwards, one bulwark upon the waves,one reared high in the air. Madly they strain to cast off the death-gripof the galley. She is under the surface now, and ever swifter, with thegreater weight, the Roman ships heel after her. There is a rendingcrash. The wooden side is torn out of one, and mutilated, dismembered,she rights herself, and lies a helpless thing upon the water. But a lastyellow gleam in the blue water shows where her consort has been draggedto her end in the iron death-grapple of her foeman. The tiger-stripedflag of Carthage has sunk beneath the swirling surface, never more tobe seen upon the face of the sea.

  For in that year a great cloud hung for seventeen days over the Africancoast, a deep black cloud which was the dark shroud of the burning city.And when the seventeen days were over, Roman ploughs were driven fromend to end of the charred ashes, and salt was scattered there as a signthat Carthage should be no more. And far off a huddle of naked, starvingfolk stood upon the distant mountains, and looked down upon the desolateplain which had once been the fairest and richest upon earth. And theyunderstood too late that it is the law of heaven that the world is givento the hardy and to the self-denying, whilst he who would escape theduties of manhood will soon be stripped of the pride, the wealth, andthe power, which are the prizes which manhood brings.