The Adventures of Captain Mago. Cahun David-Léon
cubits by six; there must be six benches of sandal-wood and ivory; the bedsteads must be inlaid; the windows must be framed and fitted perfectly."
"Fitted!" I rejoined: "have I not told you already that you may furnish and adorn the cabins as you will: their size, their position must rest with me: in such matters my authority is supreme. You may tell your royal master from me that adequate accommodation shall be provided, but that with my arrangements no one is at liberty to interfere."
The eunuch looked aghast at my temerity; but he seemed somehow to comprehend that I was not to be trifled with. He muttered a few words to the effect that I had better see that everything was duly done, and without a word or gesture of leave-taking, turned on his heel and sauntered leisurely away. I watched him for a moment, and turning to Himilco, who had been near enough to overhear the conversation, I said:
"Unless I reckon badly, that fellow will give us some trouble before we have done with him."
"Ah, no; I'll take care of that," said Himilco. "Sooner than the painted hound should interfere with us too much, I'd have a rope to his heels, and he should dangle, head in the water, all the way from Joppa to Tarshish. 'Tis not for us to permit ourselves to be treated like dogs."
"No," said I; "but maybe, all will go well; Moloch will be our guardian; and once at sea we shall not fail to secure the protection of our Ashtoreth. To tell you the truth, I am really far more apprehensive about Hanno's pranks with Bodmilcar."
"We must hope for the best," replied Himilco. "Bodmilcar will be on board the gaoul, and we will contrive for Hanno to come with us in one of the galleys."
"True," I assented; "it is indispensable that they should be separated. But with regard to this eunuch's requirements; I hardly see whether it will be better to provide the cabins in the gaoul, as being the more roomy, or to have them under my own supervision. Plague upon the slave and eunuch both!"
At that moment Hanno come up, with his roll of papyrus in his hand, and caught the tenor of our conversation.
"A slave and an eunuch to go!" he exclaimed. "Surely the charge of them ought to fall to my lot. Such duties ever belong to a scribe. Besides, I have made some progress in the studies of a magician; and better even than a magician I could humour their fancies, and understand their likes and dislikes."
I expressed my opinion that they would have enough of magicians in Egypt whither they were going, and resolved that I would keep them under my own eye.
"There's an end then to all my pretty scheme of teaching them calligraphy, rhetoric, and what not," said Hanno, smiling. "I must fall back, I see, upon my own accounts."
He unfolded his roll, and submitted to me his reckoning of the amount that would be requisite to pay our sailors and our oarsmen, at the same time handing me his statement of the sums that had already been expended in the purchase of the goods for barter.
The outlay far exceeded the golden talent, the thousand shekels, which the King had advanced. He had, however, commissioned me to spare no expense, and had promised to meet all reasonable demands, so that I felt no uneasiness, but sent Hanno straight to the palace to exhibit the accounts and to ask for a further grant. The request was most generously met.
Meanwhile, Himilco and I continued to employ ourselves in having planks of fir from Senir20 fitted to the flanks of our vessels, and in rigging our heavy masts of oak with yard-arms of cedar.
Our work progressed to our entire satisfaction. The Gadita was repaired and entirely refitted; the figure-head, an immense horse, was illuminated with dazzling enamel eyes; the sides of the vessel were painted red upon a black ground; and twelve shields of bronze, each glowing in the centre with a polished copper boss, were hung outside.
After everything had been completed, I obtained permission for the Gadita to be conducted with great ceremony, to the music of trumpets and cymbals, into the basin of the harbour. For the occasion the naval suffect lent me a large purple sail, reserved expressly for state festivities; twelve armed sailors, lance in hand, stood behind the shields of bronze; and twenty-two oarsmen, plying their oars in regular cadence, made the ship glide swiftly through the water. Gisgo, the helmsman, from his station in the stern, deftly wielded the tiller, according to the directions of Himilco, whose place was at the prow. Bodmilcar, Hanno, and myself were upon the poop. We were all of us in state attire, and were conscious of a keen enjoyment of the admiring gaze of the crowds of sailors who thronged, not only the adjacent quays, but the terraces of the arsenal and of the admiralty palace, and watched our manœuvres. The naval suffect was himself one of the spectators; he was seated at the grand entrance of the palace, just above the flight of steps that led down to his official wharf. So pleased he was with the appearance of the Gadita, that he invited all the officers to sup with him in the evening, and sent a sheep, a large jar of wine, two baskets of bread, a supply of figs and raisins, and twelve cheeses, for the entertainment of our sailors.
Arrived at the palace, we passed up the narrow staircases and dim corridors of the eastern tower, and found ourselves in a large round room with a lofty dome, from the centre of which there hung a polished copper lamp. The suffect paid us many compliments; and, on learning that we should be ready for our outfit within ten days, he gave me permission to go next morning and to choose whatever arms would be requisite for the expedition.
After our entertainment we embarked from the suffect's private wharf, intending to return, all of us, to our own quarters on shore; but all at once Bodmilcar declared himself so enamoured of the Gadita, that he resolved to sleep alone on board. As our boat was silently threading its way along the canal that intersected the mainland, cutting off an island by its course, Hanno commenced singing in a foreign language. My attention was arrested, and I asked him what language it was. He replied that it was Ionian, and expressed his surprise that I did not understand it.
"No," I answered; "it is strange to me. I have sailed but rarely along those coasts. But haven't you done with the Ionians yet?"
"Oh, Bodmilcar is not here to get in a rage, and we have not got the slave amongst us to be affected by any songs of mine."
"The slave!" I exclaimed with wonder. "I did not imagine that the slave would care for your songs. Is she an Ionian?"
Hanno laughed, and made me no answer; but after a while he yielded to my persuasion, and made me acquainted with all he knew.
"Hazael the eunuch," he said, "is a chattering fool. When I went to the palace I saw him, and wormed out of him that the slave in question had been brought from some Chaldean merchants, and that she had been originally carried away from her own country by a Tyrian pirate, so that the whole truth was not hard to guess."
"Not a word of this," I said; "not a word to Bodmilcar. More than ever it makes me resolve to have both eunuch and slave on board my own galley; otherwise I foresee there will be no end of mischief. Neither you nor Himilco must breathe a syllable until we have seen our unwelcome passengers securely landed at their destination."
Each promised faithfully to preserve the strictest reticence: Hanno, for his part, vehemently asseverating that if a word upon the matter should escape him, he would forthwith cut off his tongue, and devote himself to Horus, the Egyptian god of silence.
As we now reached our lodging, the conversation dropped, and for the next few days we were far too much engaged in active duties to think any further of what had transpired.
I gave my own personal superintendence to the weaving of all the sails, which were made strictly after the directions prescribed by the goddess Tannat.21 I saw that my ropes were well twisted and thoroughly tarred; and I arranged the benches for my oarsmen with such compactness that there was only an interval of a hand's breadth between the seat of the rower on the upper tier and the head of the man in the tier below.
To give extra strength to the masts and yards, I had them bound at regular distances with bands of ox-hide, and finally I had the entire hulls plated with sheets of copper, fastened together with bolts of bronze.
Never had prouder ships been launched upon the Great Sea.22
CHAPTER
Senir, in Libanus, now Djebel Sannin.
The Grecian
The Mediterranean.