The Scarlet Banner Part 39

And since this singular King, who sometimes seems to be soft wax, sometimes the hardest granite, is not to be influenced by fair words, we will address him to-morrow with spears.

Fara hopes that hunger has so enfeebled the Vandals and Moors that they cannot withstand a violent a.s.sault. The truth is: Fara, a German,--and a thoroughly admirable one,--can endure everything except long-continued thirst and inactivity. And we have very little wine left. Poor wine too! There is nothing to do except by turns to sleep and mount guard before the mouse-hole called Pappua. He is tired of it.

He wants to take it by force. The Herulians will fight like madmen; that is their way. But I look at the narrow ascent in those yellow cliffs, and have my doubts of success. I think, unless Saint Cyprian and Tyche work in our behalf to-morrow, we shall get, not Gelimer and the Vandals, but plenty of hard knocks.

We have had them,--the hard knocks! And they were our just due. The Vandals and Moors up yonder vied with each other in trying which could serve us worst, and we paid the penalty. Fara, as leader and warrior, managed matters as well as it is possible to do in dealing with the impossible. He divided us into three bodies: first, the Armenians, then the Thracians, lastly, the Herulians. The Huns--whose horses can do much, but cannot climb like goats--remained below before our camp. In bands of two hundred strong we rushed in a long line of two men abreast up the only accessible path. I will make the story short. The Moors rolled rocks, the Vandals hurled spears, at us. Twenty Armenians fell without having even seen the crest of a foeman's helmet; the others drew back. The Thracians, despising death, took their places. They advanced probably a hundred feet higher; by that time they had lost thirty-five of their number, had not seen an enemy, and also turned back. "Cowardice," cried Fara. "It is impossible," replied Arzen, the severely wounded leader of the Armenians,--a Vandal spear with the house-mark of the Asdings, a flying arrow, had pierced his thigh.

"I don't believe it," shouted Fara, "follow me, my Herulians."

They followed him. So did I; but very near the last of the line. For, as the legal councillor of Belisarius, I do not consider myself under obligation to perform any deeds of special heroism. Only when he himself fights do I often foolishly imagine that my place is by his side.

I have never seen such a storm. Fragments of boulders and lances hurled by invisible hands crushed and spitted the men. But those who were left climbed, leaped, crept higher and higher. The top of the mountain--which neither of the two former scaling parties had approached--was gained. The hiding-places of many of the Moors concealed under the cliffs of the central portion were discovered, and numbers of these lean brown fellows paid for their loyal hospitality to the fugitives with their lives; I saw Fara himself kill three of them.

He was just ranging his breathless band, and on the point of giving the order to rush up to the narrow gateway in the rocks that yawns in the mountain summit, when from this gateway burst the Vandals, the King in advance; the crown on his helmet betrayed him. I saw him very close at hand, and never shall I forget that face. He looked like a rapturous monk, and yet also like the hero Zazo, whom I saw fall before Belisarius. Behind him was a youth who strongly resembled him. The scarlet banner, I believe, was borne by a woman. Yet I am probably mistaken; for the whole charge fell upon us with the speed and might of a thunderbolt. The first rank of the Herulians was scattered as completely as if it had never stood there.

"Where is the King?" cried Fara, springing forward.

"Here," rang the answer.

The next instant five of his Herulians were supporting their sorely wounded leader. This I saw, then I fell backward. The young Vandal behind the King had sent his spear whizzing against my firm coat of mail; I staggered, fell, and slid like an arrow down the smooth sandy incline, much faster and more easily than I had climbed it. When I came to myself and rose again, Fara's faithful followers were bearing him past me on two shields. The leader of the Armenians was leaning on his spear.

"Do you believe it now, Fara?" he asked. "Yes," replied the German, pressing his bleeding head. "I believe it now. My beautiful helmet," he went on, laughing. "But better to have the helmet cleft than the skull under it, too." When he reached the bottom of the mountain he laughed no longer; one hundred and twenty of his two hundred Herulians lay dead among the rocks. I think this will be the only storming of Mount Pappua.

Fara's wound is healing. But he complains a great deal of headache.

They must be miserably starving to death on that accursed mountain.

Deserters often come down now, but only Moors. Not a single Vandal during the whole campaign has voluntarily joined us, in spite of my fine invitation to treason and revolt! Of the much-lauded German virtues fidelity seems to be almost the only one which has remained to these degenerates.

Fara gave orders that no more should be received.

"The more mouths and stomachs Gelimer has, the smaller his stock of food will be," he said.

But now, as they will no longer be accepted as comrades in arms, the Moors sell themselves for slaves for a bit of bread. Fara also prohibited this sorrowful trading. He said to his men:

"Let them starve up there; you will get them all as captives of war so much the sooner."

Yet it does the Vandals (it is said that there are not more than forty of them) all honor that they still hold out while the Moors succ.u.mb. It is the strongest contrast conceivable; for everything we heard in Constantinople concerning the luxury and effeminacy of the Vandals was surpa.s.sed by what we saw in their palaces, villas, and houses, and by what the Carthaginians have told us. Two or three baths daily, their tables supplied with the dainties of all lands and seas, all their dishes of gold, nothing but Median garments, spectacles, games in the Circus, the chase,--but with the least possible exertion,--dancers, mimes, musicians, outdoor pleasures in beautifully kept groves of the finest fruit-trees, daily revels, daily drinking bouts, and the most unbridled enjoyment of every description. As the Vandals led the most luxurious, the Moors led the most simple lives of all peoples. Winter and summer, they are half clad in a short gray garment, and live in the same low felt hut or leather tents, where one can scarcely breathe; neither the snow of the high mountains nor the scorching heat of the desert affects them; they sleep on the bare ground, only the richest spread a camel-skin under them; they have neither bread, wine, nor any of the better foods. Like the animals, they chew unground, even unroasted barley, spelt, and corn.

Yet now the Vandals endure starvation without yielding, while the Moors succ.u.mb.

It is incomprehensible! Sons of the same nation from whom, in two short battles, we wrested Africa. To our wondering question how this can be, all the deserters make one reply: "The holy King." He constrains them by his eyes, his voice, by magic. But Fara says his magic cannot hold out long against hunger and thirst. And since, as these strong Moors, emaciated to skeletons, say that the King and his followers do not utter a word of complaint while enduring these sufferings, Fara thought, from genuine kindness of heart, that he would try to end this misery. He dictated to me the following epistle: "Forgive me, O King of the Vandals, if this letter seems to you somewhat foolish. My head was always more fit to bear sword-strokes than to compose sentences. And since you and my head met a short time ago, thinking has been still more difficult than usual. I write, or rather I have these words written, plainly, according to the Barbarian fashion. Dear Gelimer, why do you plunge yourself and all your followers into the deepest abyss of misery? Merely to avoid serving the Emperor? For this word, 'liberty,'

is probably your delusion. Do you not see that, for the sake of this liberty, you are becoming under obligations of grat.i.tude and service to miserable Moors, that you are dependent upon these savages? Is it not better to serve the great Emperor at Constantinople, than to rule over a little band of starving people on Pappua? Is it disgraceful to serve the same lord as Belisarius? Cast aside this folly, admirable Gelimer!

Think, I myself am a German, a member of a n.o.ble Herulian family. My ancestors wore the badge of royalty of our people in the old home on the sh.o.r.e of the dashing sea, near the islands of the Danes--and yet I serve the Emperor, and am proud of it. My sword and the swift daring of my Herulians decided the victory on the day of Belisarius's greatest battle. I am a general, and have remained a hero, even in the Emperor's service. The same fate will await you. Belisarius will secure you on his word of honor life, liberty, estates in Asia Minor, the rank of a patrician, and a leadership in the army directly under him. Dear Gelimer, n.o.ble King, I mean kindly by you. Defiance is beautiful, but folly is--foolish. Make an end of it!"

The messenger has returned. He saw the King himself. He says the sight of him was almost enough to startle one to death. He looks like a ghost or the King of Shades; gloomy eyes burn from a spectral face. Yet when the unyielding hero read the well-meant consolation of his kind-hearted fellow-countryman, he wept. The very man who struck down the unconquerable Fara and endures superhuman privations wept like a boy or a woman. Here is the Vandal's answer:--

"I thank you for your counsel. I cannot follow it. You have given up your people; therefore you are drifting on the sea of the world like a blade of straw. I was, I am King of the Vandals. I will not serve the unjust foe of my people. G.o.d, so I believe, commands me and the remnant of the Vandals to hold out even now. He can save me if He so wills. I can write no more. The misery surrounding me benumbs my thoughts. Good Fara, send me a loaf of bread; a delicate boy, the son of a dead n.o.ble, is lying very ill, in the fever caused by starvation. He begs, he pleads, he shrieks for bread--it tears one's heart-strings! For a long time not one of us has tasted bread.

"And a sponge dipped in water; my eyes, inflamed by watching and weeping, burn painfully.

"And a harp. I have composed a dirge upon our fate, which I would fain sing to the accompaniment of the harp."

Fara granted the three requests,--the harp could be obtained only by sending to the nearest city,--but he guards even more closely than before the "Mountain of Misery," as our people call it.

CHAPTER XIX

Dull, misty, and gray, a cold damp morning in early March dawned upon the mountain. The sun could not penetrate the dense clouds.

The ancient city of Medenus had long since been abandoned by its Carthaginian and Roman founders and builders. Most of the houses, constructed of stone from the mountain, stood deserted and ruinous.

Nomad Moors used the few which still had roofs as places of refuge in winter. The largest structure was the former basilica. Here the King and his household had found shelter. A scanty fire of straw and f.a.gots was burning in the centre on the stone floor. But it sent forth more smoke than heat, for the wood was wet, and the damp fog penetrated everywhere through the cracks in the walls, through the holes in the roof, pressing down the slowly rising yellowish-gray smoke till, trailing and gliding along the cold wall, it sought other means of escape through the entrance, whose folding-doors were missing. In the semicircular s.p.a.ce back of the apses coverlets and skins had been spread upon the marble floor. Here sat Gibamund, hammering upon his much-dented shield, while Hilda had laid the scarlet standard across her lap, and was mending it.

"Many, many arrows have pierced thee, ancient, storm-tried banner. And this gaping rent here,--it was probably a sword-stroke. But thou must still hold together to the end."

"The end," said Gibamund, impatiently completing the nailing of the edge of the shield with one last blow of the hammer. "I wish it would come. I can bear to witness the suffering--_your_ suffering--no longer.

I have constantly urged the King to put an end to it. Let us, let all the Vandals,--the Moors can surrender as prisoners,--charge upon the foe together, and--He would never let me finish. 'That would be suicide,' he answered, 'and sin. We must bear patiently what G.o.d has imposed upon us as a punishment. If it is His will. He can yet save us, bear us away from here on the wings of His angels. But the end is approaching--of itself. The number of graves on the slope of the mountain is daily increasing.'"

"Yes, the row constantly lengthens; sometimes the high mounds of our Vandals surmounted by the cross!"

"Sometimes the faithful Moors' heap of stones with the circle of black pebbles. Yesterday evening we buried the delicate Gundoric; the last scion of the proud Gundings, the darling of his brave father Gundobad."

"So the poor boy's sufferings are over? In Carthage the child was always clad in purple silk as he rode through the streets in a sh.e.l.l carriage drawn by ostriches."

"Day before yesterday the King brought to the miserable heap of straw where he was lying the fragrant bread he had begged from the enemy. The child devoured it so eagerly that we were obliged to check him. We turned our backs a moment,--I was getting some water with the King for the sick boy,--when a cry of mingled rage and grief summoned us. A Moorish lad, probably attracted by the smell of the bread, had sprung in through the open window and torn it from between the child's teeth.

It made a very deep impression on the King. 'This child, too, the guiltless one? O terrible G.o.d!' he cried again and again. I closed the boy's dying eyes to-day."

"It cannot last much longer. The people have killed the last horse except Styx."

"Styx shall not be slaughtered," cried Hilda. "He bore you from certain death; he saved you."

"_You_ saved me, with your Valkyria ride," exclaimed Gibamund; and, happy in the midst of all the wretchedness, he pressed his beautiful wife to his heart, kissing her golden hair, her eyes, her n.o.ble brow.

"Hark! what is that?"

"It is the song which he has composed and is singing to the harp Fara sent him. Well for thee, Teja's stringed instrument, that thou art not compelled to accompany such a dirge," she cried wrathfully, springing up and tossing back her waving locks. "I would rather have shattered my harp on the nearest rocks than lent it for such a song."

"But it works like a spell upon the Moors and Vandals."

"They do not understand it at all; the words are Latin. He has rejected alliteration as pagan, as the magic of runes! He allows no one to mention his last battle-song."

"Of course they scarcely understand it. But when they see the King as, almost in an ecstasy, like a man walking in his sleep, with his burning eyes half closed, his wan, sorrowful face surrounded by tangled locks, his ragged royal mantle thrown around his shoulders, his harp on his arm, he wanders alone over the rocks and snows of this mountain; when they hear the deep, wailing voice, the mournful melody of the dirge, it affects them like a spell, though they understand little of the meaning. Hark! there it rises again."

Nearer and nearer, partly borne away by the wind, came in broken words, sometimes accompanied by the strings, the chant: