easing pandemonium told
that the front was not far ahead. The dust filled their eyes, and they
could see nothing beyond; but the signs were for the veteran to read.
Soon there was no more headway to be made through the dense mass; the
corpses of the slain were thick beneath their feet, half-naked Gauls
and Spaniards in white and purple mingled with the dead of the legions,
and still the column pushed forward and still the slain lay closer.

"They give ground. We are driving in their centre," gasped Sergius.

Paullus had been frowning grimly, but now he turned to Marcus Decius
and showed his wolfish teeth in his old-time smile.

"What do you say, decurion?" he asked.

"We drive them, surely; but--"

"Yes, truly, _but_--do you hear those cries on the flank? We drive
their Iberians, their Celts; it is the Africans that let us plunge on
like one of Varro's stupid bulls: then they put the sword in our side.
Could you fight now? I tell you we are already driven within the
rails. If the gods keep Hasdrubal slaying my runaways, there may be
hope; if he be a general, there is none."

And still the column's headway seemed hardly checked, though the cries
and the clashing of arms resounded, now, from both flanks as well as
from the front, while, in the depths of its vitals, men were crushed
together till they could scarce breathe. A rumour, too, like those Pan
sends to dismay soldiers, ran quickly from heart to heart, rather than
from lip to lip. It was that Hasdrubal had circled the rear and,
falling upon the allied cavalry, had scattered the left wing as he had
the right; that the Numidians pursued and slaughtered: but where now
were the cavalry of Gaul and Spain, the winners of two victories? A
sullen roar from the far distant rear seemed to answer; but the
language was one that few could read--few of that host. Oh! for an
hour of the veterans that slumbered on the shores of Trebia and
Trasimenus! Oh! for an hour of Fabius, who lingered at Rome, powerless
and discredited. Who were these that wore the armour, that wielded the
ponderous javelins of Rome's legions? From under the bronze helmets
gorgeously fierce with their great crests peered eyes--stupid,
wondering eyes dazed by the uproar, blinded by the dust; eyes wherein,
while as yet there was little of fear, still less was there of the
knowledge of danger to be met and overcome; eyes that had but lately
watched sheep upon the Alban hills, eyes that were use