art of their forces lay
concealed in their tents, while the remainder prolonged an irregular
skirmish with the enemy till the sun was high in the heavens. On both
sides they retired with fainting steps: their horses were unbridled,
their armor was laid aside, and the hostile nations prepared, or seemed
to prepare, for the refreshment of the evening, and the encounter of the
ensuing day. On a sudden the charge was sounded; the Arabian camp poured
forth a swarm of fresh and intrepid warriors; and the long line of
the Greeks and Africans was surprised, assaulted, overturned, by new
squadrons of the faithful, who, to the eye of fanaticism, might appear
as a band of angels descending from the sky. The praefect himself was
slain by the hand of Zobeir: his daughter, who sought revenge and death,
was surrounded and made prisoner; and the fugitives involved in their
disaster the town of Sufetula, to which they escaped from the sabres and
lances of the Arabs. Sufetula was built one hundred and fifty miles
to the south of Carthage: a gentle declivity is watered by a running
stream, and shaded by a grove of juniper-trees; and, in the ruins of
a triumpha arch, a portico, and three temples of the Corinthian order,
curiosity may yet admire the magnificence of the Romans. [143] After the
fall of this opulent city, the provincials and Barbarians implored on
all sides the mercy of the conqueror. His vanity or his zeal might be
flattered by offers of tribute or professions of faith: but his losses,
his fatigues, and the progress of an epidemical disease, prevented
a solid establishment; and the Saracens, after a campaign of fifteen
months, retreated to the confines of Egypt, with the captives and the
wealth of their African expedition. The caliph's fifth was granted to
a favorite, on the nominal payment of five hundred thousand pieces
of gold; [144] but the state was doubly injured by this fallacious
transaction, if each foot-soldier had shared one thousand, and each
horseman three thousand, pieces, in the real division of the plunder.
The author of the death of Gregory was expected to have claimed the most
precious reward of the victory: from his silence it might be presumed
that he had fallen in the battle, till the tears and exclamations of
the praefect's daughter at the sight of Zobeir revealed the valor and
modesty of that gallant soldier. The unfortunate virgin was offered,
and almost rejected as a slave, by her father's murderer, who