erity. She certainly has the best--that is, the best
trained--conscience: it no longer disturbs her. Doubtless she smoothed
down its pricks long ago. But I have repeatedly received the dainty
little papyrus rolls whose seal bears a scorpion surrounded by
flames,--little notes in which she earnestly urged me to the "war
spirit," if I desired to retain her friendship.

CHAPTER VIII

Since I wrote this--a few days ago--new and important tidings have come
from Africa. Great changes have taken place there, which perhaps may
force the vacillating Emperor to go to war. What our statecraft had
striven in the most eager and crafty manner to prevent has already
happened in spite of this effort, perhaps in consequence of it. Gelimer
is King of the Vandals!

The archdeacon Verus--all names can be mentioned now--had really spun
webs against, not for us. He betrayed everything to Gelimer! Pudentius
of Tripolis, who was secretly living in Carthage, was to have been
seized; Verus had betrayed his hiding-place. It is remarkable, by the
way, that Pudentius hastily fled from the city a short time before, on
the priest's swiftest horse.

That same day a mysterious event occurred in the palace, of which
nothing is known definitely except the result--for Gelimer is King of
the Vandals; but the connection, the causes, are very differently told.
Some say that Gelimer wanted to murder the King, others that the King
tried to kill Gelimer. Others again whisper--so Pudentius writes--of a
secret warning which reached the King: a stranger informed him by
letter that Gelimer meant to murder him at their next private
interview. The sovereign, to convince himself, must instantly summon
him to one; the assassin would either refuse to come, from fear
awakened by an evil conscience, or he would appear--contrary to the
strict prohibition of court laws--secretly armed. Hilderic must provide
himself with a coat of mail and a dagger, and have help close at hand.
The King obeyed this counsel.

It is certain that he summoned Gelimer on the evening of that very day
to an interview in his bedroom on the ground-floor of the palace.
Gelimer came. The King embraced him, and in doing so, discovered the
armor under his robe and called for help. The ruler's two nephews,
Hoamer and Euages, rushed with drawn swords from the next room to kill
the assassin. But at the same moment Gelimer's two brothers, whom Verus
had concealed amid