Ladders were held out for their assistance; all rushed upon them.

The discharge of a catapult drove the crowd back; only the Ten were taken away.
They walked amid the Clinabarians, leaning their hands on the horses' croups for support.
Now that their first joy was over they began to harbour anxieties.
Hamilcar's demands would be cruel.

But Spendius reassured them.
"I will speak!" And he boasted that he knew excellent things to say for the safety of the army.
Behind all the bushes they met with ambushed sentries, who prostrated themselves before the sword-belt which Spendius had placed over his shoulder.
When they reached the Punic camp the crowd flocked around them, and they thought that they could hear whisperings and laughter.

The door of a tent opened.
Hamilcar was at the very back of it seated on a stool beside a table on which there shone a naked sword.

He was surrounded by captains, who were standing.
He started back on perceiving these men, and then bent over to examine them.
Their pupils were strangely dilated, and there was a great black circle round their eyes, which extended to the lower parts of their ears; their bluish noses stood out between their hollow cheeks, which were chinked with deep wrinkles; the skin of their bodies was too large for their muscles, and was hidden beneath a slate-coloured dust; their lips were glued to their yellow teeth; they exhaled an infectious odour; they might have been taken for half-opened tombs, for living sepulchres.
In the centre of the tent, on a mat on which the captains were about to sit down, there was a dish of smoking gourds.