To avoid infection, the corpses of the velites had been speedily buried;
and the position of the graves was no longer visible.

All the Barbarians lay drooping on the ground. A veteran would pass
between their lines here and there; and they would howl curses against
the Carthaginians, against Hamilcar, and against Matho, although he was
innocent of their disaster; but it seemed to them that their pains would
have been less if he had shared them. Then they groaned, and some wept
softly like little children.

They came to the captains and besought them to grant them something that
would alleviate their sufferings. The others made no reply; or, seized
with fury, would pick up a stone and fling it in their faces.

Several, in fact, carefully kept a reserve of food in a hole in the
ground--a few handfuls of dates, or a little meal; and they ate this
during the night, with their heads bent beneath their cloaks. Those
who had swords kept them naked in their hands, and the most suspicious
remained standing with their backs against the mountain.

They accused their chiefs and threatened them. Autaritus was not afraid
of showing himself. With the Barbaric obstinacy which nothing could
discourage, he would advance twenty times a day to the rocks at the
bottom, hoping every time to find them perchance displaced; and swaying
his heavy fur-covered shoulders, he reminded his companions of a bear
coming forth from its cave in springtime to see whether the snows are
melted.

Spendius, surrounded by the Greeks, hid himself in one of the gaps; as
he was afraid, he caused a rumour of his death to be spread.

They were now hideously lean; their skin was overlaid with bluish
marblings. On the evening of the ninth day three Iberians died.

Their frightened companions left the spot. They were stripped, and the
white, naked bodies lay in the sunshine on the sand.

Then the Garamantians began to prowl slowly round about them. They were
men accustomed to existence in solitude, and they reverenced no god. At
last the oldest of the band made a sign, and bending over the corpses
they cut strips from them with their knives, then squatted upon their
heels and ate. The rest looked on from a distance; they uttered cries
of horror;--many, nevertheless, being, at the bottom of their souls,
jealous of such courage.

In the middle of the night some of these approached, and, dissembling
their eagerness, asked for a small mouthful, merely to try, t