must have been bored by slaves lowered by ropes, head
foremost, it appearing absolutely impossible for a man to stoop to work
if lowered in the ordinary way.

The Carthaginians, altogether unaccustomed to work of this nature,
returned to their huts at night utterly exhausted, cramped, and aching
in every limb. Many had been cruelly beaten for not performing the tasks
assigned to them. All were filled with a dull despairing rage. In the
evening a ration of boiled beans, with a little native wine, was served
out to each, the quantity of the food being ample, it being necessary to
feed the slaves well to enable them to support their fatigues.

After three days of this work five or six of the captives were so
exhausted that they were unable to take their places with the gang when
ordered for work in the morning. They were, however, compelled by blows
to rise and take their places with the rest. Two of them died during the
course of the day in their stifling working places; another succumbed
during the night; several, too, were attacked by the fever of the
country. Malchus and his friends were full of grief and rage at the
sufferings of their men.

"Anything were better than this," Malchus said. "A thousand times better
to fall beneath the swords of the Romans than to die like dogs in the
holes beneath that hill!"

"I quite agree with you, Malchus," Halco, the other officer with the
party, said, "and am ready to join you in any plan of escape, however
desperate."

"The difficulty is about arms," Trebon observed. "We are so closely
watched that it is out of the question to hope that we should succeed in
getting possession of any. The tools are all left in the mines; and as
the men work naked, there is no possibility of their secreting any.
The stores here are always guarded by a sentry; and although we might
overpower him, the guard would arrive long before we could break through
the solid doors. Of course if we could get the other slaves to join us,
we might crush the guard even with stones."

"That is out of the question," Malchus said. "In the first place, they
speak a strange language, quite different to the Italians. Then, were
we seen trying to converse with any of them, suspicions might be roused;
and even could we get the majority to join us, there would be many who
would be only too glad to purchase their own freedom by betraying the
plot to the Romans. No, whatever we do must be done by ourselves alone;
and f