it no
longer; but when he recognised the adversary who was advancing, he
thought no more of changing it.

"No shield! My battle-axe! Quick!" he cried.

And Wachis handed to him his favourite weapon.

Then King Teja dropped his shield, and, swinging his axe, rushed out of
the pass at Cethegus.

"Die, Roman!" he cried.

Once again the two great enemies looked each other in the face. Then
spear and axe whizzed through the air. Neither thought of parrying the
stroke, and both fell. Teja's axe had pierced Cethegus's left breast
through shield and armour.

"Roma, Roma eterna!" once more cried Cethegus, and fell back dead.

His spear had struck the King's right breast. Not dead, but mortally
wounded, he was carried into the pass by Hildebrand and Adalgoth. And
they had need to make haste. For when, at last, they saw the King of
the Goths fall--he had fought without a pause for eight hours, and
evening was coming on--all the Italians, Persians, and Thracians, and
fresh columns of attack which had now come up, rushed towards the pass,
which was now again defended by Adalgoth with his shield; Hildebrand
and Wachis supporting him.

Syphax took the body of Cethegus in his arms and carried it to one
side. Weeping aloud he held the noble head of his master upon his
knees, the features of which appeared almost superhuman in the majesty
of death. Before him raged the battle. Just then the Moor remarked that
Anicius, followed by a troop of Byzantines--Scaevola and Albinus among
them--was approaching him, and pointing to the body of Cethegus with an
air of command.

"Halt!" cried Syphax, springing up as they drew near; "what do you
want?"

"The head of the Prefect, to take to the Emperor," answered Anicius;
"obey, slave!"

But Syphax uttered a yell--his spear rushed through the air, and
Anicius fell. And before the others, who at once busied themselves with
the dying man, could come near him, Syphax had taken his beloved burden
upon his back, and began to climb up a steep precipice of lava near the
pass, which Goths and Byzantines had, till then, held to be impassable.
More and more rapidly the slave advanced. His goal was a little column
of smoke which rose just at the other side of the cliff. For there
yawned one of the small crater chasms of Vesuvius. For one moment
Syphax stopped upon the edge of the black rocks; once again he raised
the corpse of Cethegus erect in his strong arms, as if to show the
noble form to the