ately? I
will accompany you. I am curious to see that land with its strange
customs, and its valiant and sturdy inhabitants, of whose brave deeds
you have so often told me."

They crossed the city. The streets were deserted. The entire population
had gone up to the Acropolis. Actaeon stopped a moment before Sonnica's
warehouses to give the news of his journey to her slaves, and then he
followed his friend, riding forth from the city.

Alorcus lodged in one of the inns in the suburb, an enormous edifice
with extensive stables and broad courtyards, where continuously rang the
diverse tongues of the interior of the Peninsula, hoarsened and made
strident by dickering for merchandise and the bartering of beasts. Five
men of the tribe accompanied the young Celtiberian during his stay in
Saguntum, taking care of his horses and serving him as free domestics.

On learning that they were to depart these sons of the mountains shouted
with joy. They had languished with inactivity in that rich and fruitful
country amid customs which they detested, and they made preparations for
the journey in haste.

The sun was setting when they started. Alorcus and Actaeon rode in
advance, their mantles thrown over their heads, padded linen
breastplates to protect their chests after the Celtiberian fashion, and
short broadswords, and leather shields hanging at their sides. The five
servants and the messenger brought up the rear, armed with long lances,
driving the mules laden with Alorcus' clothing and provisions.

Throughout the afternoon they traveled upon the roads, being still in
the Saguntine domain, and they passed cultivated and fruitful fields,
beautiful villas and compact little towns clinging close around the
tower which served them as defense. When night closed in they camped
close to a miserable village in the mountains. There the territory of
Saguntum ended. Beyond lay the tribes which were almost constantly
warring with the people of the coast.

Next morning the Greek beheld a wholly different landscape. The sea and
the green plains lay behind him, and he saw only mountains and more
mountains, some covered with great pine forests, others red, with bluffs
of bluish stone, overgrown with dense thickets which, brushed by the
passing caravan, sent forth clouds of frightened birds, while terrified
rabbits scampered under the very horses' hoofs.

The trails were not the work of man. The beasts laboriously picked their
way in the tr