第 17 页

"Now, Malchus, tell us your story," Hannibal said. "It seems strange to

me that you should have said nought to your father or me of what you

had learned, and left us to take such measures as might seem fit to us,

instead of taking the matter into your own hands."

"Had I had certainties to go upon I should assuredly have done so, but,

as you will see when I tell you all I had learned, I had nothing but

suspicions, and those of the vaguest, and for aught I knew I might be

altogether in the wrong."

Malchus then gave the full details of the manner in which his suspicions

had been first excited, and in which on the previous night he had taken

steps to ascertain whether there were any foundation for them.

"You see," he concluded, "there was no sort of certainty, nothing to

prove that the money was not paid for the purchase of a horse or slave.

It was only the one fact that one of the party was a servant here that

rendered what I discovered serious. Had it not been for the fate of

Hasdrubal I should never have given the matter a second thought; but,

knowing that he was assassinated by a trusted servant, and seeing two

men whose families I knew belonged to Hanno's faction engaged in secret

talk with one of your attendants, the suspicion struck me that a similar

deed might again be attempted. The only words I had to go upon were,

`Tomorrow night, then, without fail.' This was not enough for me to

bring an accusation against two men of noble family; and, had I told

you the tale without the confirmation it has now received, you would

probably have treated it but lightly. I resolved, therefore, to wait

and see, taking such precaution that no harm could come of my secrecy. I

concealed in my room ten of my Numidians, with my lieutenant Trebon--an

ample force whatever might betide.

"If, as I suspected, this man intended, with two or three others, to

steal into your chamber and slay you while you slept, we could at once

have stopped the attempt; should he come with a larger force, we could,

as is proved, resist them until the guard arrived on the spot. If, on

the other hand, night passed off quietly and my suspicions proved to be

altogether erroneous, I should escape the ridicule which would certainly

have been forthcoming had I alarmed you without cause."

"You have acted very wisely and well, my son," Hamilcar said, "and

Carthage owes you the life of our beloved Hannibal. You indeed reasoned

with great wisdom and forethought. Had you informed us of what you had

discovered we should have taken precautions which would doubtless have

effected the object; but they would probably have become known to the

plotters, and the attempt would have been postponed and attempted some

other time, and perhaps with success. What say you, Hannibal, have I not

reason to be proud of this young son of mine?"

"You have indeed, Hamilcar, and deeply am I indebted to him. It is not

my life I care for, although that now is precious to me for the sake

of my beloved Imilce, but had I fallen now all the plans which we have

thought of together would have been frustrated, and the fairest chance

which Carthage ever had of fighting out the quarrel with her rival would

have been destroyed. Truly it has been a marvellous escape, and it seems

to me that the gods themselves must have inspired Malchus to act as he

did on such slight grounds as seeing two Carthaginians of the guard in

company with three or four natives at a late hour of the evening."

"What do you think will be best to do with the traitors who have plotted

against your life, Hannibal? Shall we try and execute them here, or send

them to Carthage to be dealt with?"

Hannibal did not answer for a minute.

"I think, Hamilcar, the best plan will be to keep silent altogether as

to the danger I have run. The army would be furious but would at the

same time be dispirited were it known in Carthage that two of her nobles

had been executed for an attempt on my life. It would only cause a fresh

outbreak of animosity and an even deadlier feud than before between

Hanno's friends and ours. Therefore, I say, let the men taken tonight be

executed in the morning without question asked, and let no word be said

by them or by us that they were bribed by Carthaginians. All in the

palace now know that a party of natives have broken in, and will guess

that my life was their object; there is no need that they should know

more. As to the two men, I will call them before me tomorrow, with none

but you present, and will let them know that I am aware that they are

the authors of this attempt, and will bid them resign their places in

the guard and return at once to Carthage."

"It grieves me that they should go unpunished," Hamilcar said; "but

doubtless your plan is the wisest."

"Then," Hannibal said, rising, "we will to bed again. Malchus, acquaint

Trebon of our determination that silence is to be kept; tell him that I

shall bear him in mind, and not forget his share in this night's work.

As for you, Malchus, henceforth you are more than my cousin; you have

saved my life, and I shall never forget it. I shall tell Imilce in the

morning of the danger which has passed, for it is sure to come to her

ears, and she will know better than I do how to thank you."

Accordingly in the morning Hannibal's orders were carried out; the

twelve natives taken prisoners were beheaded without any of the usual

tortures which would have been inflicted upon a similar occasion.

No less than fourteen others had been killed in the fight. The two

Carthaginian nobles were sent for by Hannibal. They came prepared to

die, for they knew already by rumour that the attempt had failed, and

doubted not when the summons reached them that Carpadon had denounced

them as his accomplices. But they went to their certain doom with the

courage of their class--pale, perhaps, but otherwise unmoved. Hannibal

was alone with Hamilcar when they entered.

"That assassination is not an altogether unknown crime in Carthage," he

said quietly, "I was well aware, but I did not before think that nobles

in the Carthaginian horse would stoop to it. I know that it was you who

provided the gold for the payment of the men who made an attempt upon my

life, that you personally paid my attendant Carpadon to hire assassins,

and to lead them to my chamber. Were I to denounce you, my soldiers

would tear you in pieces. The very name of your families would be held

accursed by all honest men in Carthage for all time. I do not ask you

whether I have given you cause for offence, for I know that I have not

done so; you acted simply for the benefit of Hanno. Whether you were

instructed by him I do not deign to ask. I shall not harm you. The tale

of your infamy is known to but four persons, and none others will ever

know it. I am proud of the honour of the nobles of Carthage, and would

not that the scum of the people should bandy the name of your families

on their lips as guilty of so foul an act of treason. You will, of

course, at once resign your positions in the Carthaginian horse. Make

what pretext you will--illness or private affairs. Tomorrow sail for

Carthage, and there strive by efforts for the good of your country to

efface the remembrance of this blow which you would have struck her."

So saying, with a wave of the hand he dismissed them.

They went without a word, too astonished at his clemency, too humiliated

by their own disgrace even to utter a word of thanks. When they were

fairly beyond the palace they looked at each other as men awakened from

a dream.

"What a man!" one of them exclaimed. "No wonder the soldiers adore him!

He has given us our lives--more, he has saved our names from disgrace.

Henceforth, Pontus, we, at least, can never again take part against

him."

"It is almost too much to bear," the other said; "I feel that I would

rather that he had ordered us to instant execution."

"Ay, for our own sakes, Pontus, but not for those of others. For myself

I shall retire to the country; it seems to me that never again shall I

be able to mix with others; they may know nothing of it, but it will be

ever on my mind. How they would shrink back in horror were what we have

done whispered to them! Truly, were it not for my family, I would prefer

death with the worst torture to life as it will be now."

The excitement in the army was intense when it became known that a

body of Iberians had attempted to break into Hannibal's palace with the

design of murdering him, and many of the soldiers, seizing their arms,

hurried towards the city, and had not an officer ridden with the news to

Hannibal, they would assuredly have fallen upon the native inhabitants,

and a general massacre would have taken place.

Hannibal at once mounted and rode out to meet the soldiers. He was

received with enthusiastic acclamations; at length he raised his arm to

restore silence, and then addressed the troops, telling them how deeply

he valued the evidence of their affection, but that he prayed them to

return to their camps and lay by their arms.

"We must not," he said, "confound the innocent with the guilty. Those

who were concerned in the attempt have paid the penalty with their

lives; it is not because a handful of Spaniards have plotted against me

that you are to swear hatred against the whole race; were you to punish

the innocent for the guilty you would arouse the fury of the Iberians

throughout the whole peninsula, and all our work would have to be done

over again. You know that above all things I desire the friendship and

goodwill of the natives. Nothing would grieve me more than that, just as

we are attaining this, our efforts should be marred by a quarrel between

yourselves and the people here. I pray you, therefore, as a personal

favour to me, to abstain from all tumult, and go quietly back to your

camp. The attack upon my palace was made only by some thirty or forty of

the scum of the inhabitants, and the attempt was defeated by the wisdom

and courage of my young cousin Malchus, whom you must henceforth regard

as the saviour of my life."

The soldiers at once acceded to the request of their general, and after

another outburst of cheering they returned quietly to their camp.

The result of this affair was to render Malchus one of the most

popular personages in the army, and the lad was quite abashed by the

enthusiastic reception which the soldiers gave him when he passed among

them. It removed, too, any feeling of jealousy which might have existed

among his former comrades of the Carthaginian horse, for although it

was considered as a matter of course in Carthage that generals should

appoint their near relatives to posts of high command, human nature was

then the same as now, and men not possessed of high patronage could not

help grumbling a little at the promotion of those more fortunate than

themselves. Henceforth, however, no voice was ever raised against the

promotion of Malchus, and had he at once been appointed to a command of

importance none would have deemed such a favour undeserved by the youth

who had saved the life of Hannibal.

CHAPTER IX: THE SIEGE OF SAGUNTUM

A few days later the Carthaginian army were astonished by the issue

of an order that the whole were to be in readiness to march upon the

following day. The greatest excitement arose when the news got abroad.

None knew against whom hostilities were to be directed. No one had heard

aught of the arrival of messengers announcing fresh insurrection among

the recently conquered tribes, and all sorts of surmises were indulged

in as to the foe against whom this great force, the largest which had

ever been collected by Carthage, were about to get in motion.

The army now gathered around Carthagena amounted, indeed, to a hundred

and fifty thousand men, and much surprise had for some time existed

at the continual arrival of reinforcements from home, and at the large

number of troops which had during the winter been raised and disciplined

from among the friendly tribes.

Simultaneously with the issue of the order long lines of wagons, laden

with military stores, began to pour out from the arsenals, and all day

long a procession of carts moved across the bridge over the canal in the

isthmus to the mainland. The tents were struck at daylight, the baggage

loaded up into the wagons told off to accompany the various bodies of

soldiers, and the troops formed up in military order.

When Hannibal rode on to the ground, surrounded by his principal

officers, a shout of welcome rose from the army; and he proceeded to

make a close inspection of the whole force. The officers then placed

themselves at the head of their respective commands, the trumpets gave

the signal, and the army set out on a march, as to whose direction and

distance few present had any idea, and from which few, indeed, were ever

destined to return.

There was no longer any occasion for secrecy as to the object of the

expedition. The generals repeated it to their immediate staffs, these

informed the other officers, and the news speedily spread through the

army that they were marching against Saguntum. The importance of the

news was felt by all. Saguntum was the near ally of Rome, and an attack

upon that city could but mean that Carthage was entering upon another

struggle with her great rival.

Saguntum lay about 140 miles north of Carthagena, and the army had to

cross the range of mountains now known as the Sierra Morena, which

run across the peninsula from Cape St. Vincent on the west to Cape St.

Martin on the east. The march of so large an army, impeded as it was

by a huge train of wagons with stores and the machines necessary for a

siege, was toilsome and arduous in the extreme. But all worked with the

greatest enthusiasm and diligence; roads were made with immense labour

through forests, across ravines, and over mountain streams.

Hannibal himself was always present, encouraging the men by his praises,