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CONQUER CARTHAG .

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were they going? That was more than he knew himself. 66 Prince," said the pilot to him, "what nation are you going to attack?"-" That," replied the barbarian, "which God at present be

holds in his wrath."

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Genseric died thirty-nine years after the taking of Carthage. This was the only city of Africa, the walls of which he had not destroyed. He was succeeded in his empire by Honoric, one of his sons. After a reign of eight years, Honoric left left the throne to his cousin Gondamond, who wielded the sceptre thirteen years, when the crown devolved to his brother Transamond. The latter reigned twenty-seven years. Ilderic, the son of Honoric, and grandson of Genseric, then inherited the kingdom of Carthage. Gelimer, a relative of Ilderic, conspired against him, and threw him into a dungeon. The emperor Justinian espoused the cause of the dethroned monarch, and sent Belisarius into Africa. Gelimer made scarcely any resistance. The Roman general entered Carthage victorious. He repaired to the palace, where by a freak of fortune, he sat down to there past prepared for Gelimer, and was attended by the officers of that prince. Nothing had changed at the court but the master; and that is a very trifling matter when fortune has deserted him.

Belisarius, for the rest, was worthy of his success. He was one of those men who appear at distant intervals in a vicious age, to bar the right of prescription against virtue. Unfortunately, those noble minds which shine in the midst of meaness, produce no revolution. They are not connected with the human affairs of their time; strangers, and insulated in the present, they cannot possess any influence over the future. The world rolls

over them without hurrying them away; but on the other hand, they are unable to check the tide of the world. If souls of a superior nature shall be useful to society, they must spring up among a people which retains a love of order, of religion, and of good manners, and whose genius and character are in unison with its moral and political situation. In the age of Belisarius, the events were great, and the actors little. For this reason, the annals of that age, though abounding in tragic catastrophes, tire and disgust us. We look not in history for revolutions which crush and overwhelm men; but for men who control revolutions, and who are more powerful than fortune. The universe convulsed by the barbarians, excites no other feelings than those of horror and contempt; but we never fail to take the strongest interest in a petty quarrel between Sparta and Athens, in a narrow corner of Greece.

Gelimer, carried prisoner to Constantinople, graced the triumph of Belisarius. Soon afterwards this monarch turned husbandman. In such a case, philosphy may afford consolation to an ordinary mind, but it serves only to increase the regret of a truly royal heart.

It is well known that it was not by Justinian's order that Belisarius lost his eyes. Were this even the case, it would form but a very small event in the history of human ingratitude. As to Carthage, she witnessed the departure of a prince from her walls to take possession of the throne of the Cæsars; this was that Heraclius who deposed the tyrant Phocas. In 647 the Arabs made their first incursion into Africa. This was followed by four other expeditions within the space of fifty years. Carthage fell under the Mahometan yoke in 696.

CARTHAGE TAKEN BY SARACENS.

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Most of its inhabitants fled into Spain and Sicily. John, the general of the emperor Leontius, retook the city in 697: but the following year the Saracens recovered the possession of it, which they have retained ever since; and the daughter of Tyre fell a prey to the children of Ishmael. It was taken by Hassan, during the caliphat of Abd-elMalek. It is asserted that the new masters of Carthage razed it to the very foundations: but yet considerable remains of it must have existed at the beginning of the ninth century, if it be true that Charlemagne's ambassadors discovered there the body of St. Cyprian. Towards the conclusion of the same century, the Infidels formed a league against the Christians, and at their head, as we are told in history, were the Saracens of Carthage. We shall likewise see that St. Louis found a rising town upon the ruins of this ancient city. Be this as it may, nothing is at present to be seen there but the relics which I shall presently describe. The only name by which it is known in the country is Bersach, apparently a corruption of Byrsa. In going from Tunis to Carthage, you must enquire for the tower of Almenara, or the roua of Mastinaces: Ventoso gloria curru!

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CHAPTER II.

Plan of Ancient Carthage-New Carthage-State of Carthage under the Roman Emperors-Ruins of Carthage - Ancient Port--Port described by Virgil-Aqueduct-Byrsa-Crusade of Louis IX. - His Attempt on Tunis-Fatal Illness of the King-His last Instructions to his Son-His Death-Departure from Tunis — Arrival at Cadiz Cordova - Grenada -Arrival at Madrid-The Escurial-Bayonne-Conclusion.

It is very difficult to collect, from the accounts of the historians, the plan of ancient Carthage. Polybius and Livy treated doubtless very circumstantially of the siege of that city, but their descriptions have not reached us. On this subject we possess nothing but abridgments, such as those of Florus and Velleius Paterculus, who enter into no local details. The geographers, who lived at a later period, were acquainted only with the Roman Carthage. The most complete authority on this head is that of Appian, a Greek, who flourished near three centuries after the event, and who, in his declamatory style, is deficient in precision and perspicuity. Rollin, who follows him, and perhaps injudiciously blends Strabo's account with his, will spare me the trouble of a translation.

"It was seated at the bottom of a bay, surrounded by the sea in the form of a peninsula, the neck of which, that is, the isthmus connecting it with the continent, was a league and a quarter

ANCIENT CARTHAGE.

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(twenty-five stadia) in breadth. The peninsula was eighteen leagues (three hundred and sixty stadia) in circumference. On the west side there was a long point of land, about twelve fathoms (half a stadium) in breadth, which, running out into the sea, separated it from the morass, and was encompassed on all sides by rocks and a single wall. On the south side, and next to the main land, the city was defended by a triple wall thirty cubits in height, exclusively of the parapets and the towers which flanked it all round at equal distances, being eighty fathoms asunder. Each tower had four stories; the walls had but two; they were roofed; and at the bottom were stables capable of containing three hundred elephants, and four thousand horses, together with every thing necessary for their subsistence. Here was likewise room sufficient to lodge twenty thousand infantry and four thousand horsemen and the whole of this warlike equipage was contained in the walls alone. There was but one place where the walls were weak and low: this was a neglected angle, beginning at the point of land above-mentioned and running to the harbour which was on the west side. There were two ports, which communicated with each other, but had only one entrance, seventy feet wide, and defended by chains. The first was for merchant vessels, and here were many and various habitations for the mariners. The other was the inner port for the ships of war, in the middle of which was an island called Cothon, bordered, as well as the port, with large quays, where there were separate buildings, in which two hundred and twenty ships might be placed under cover, and storehouses above them where every thing necessary for the equipment of

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