chap, xli] OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 311 accessible mountain of Papua, 36 in the inland country of Numidia. He was immediately besieged by Pharas, an officer whose truth and sobriety were the more applauded, as such qualities could seldom be found among the Heruli, the most corrupt of the Barbarian tribes. To his vigilance Belisarius had entrusted this important charge ; and, after a bold attempt to scale the mountain, in which he lost an hundred and ten soldiers, Pharas expected, during a winter siege, the operation of distress and famine on the mind of the Vandal king. From the softest habits of pleasure, from the unbounded command of industry and wealth, he was reduced to share the poverty of the Moors, 37 supportable only to themselves by their ignorance of a happier condition. In their rude hovels of mud and hurdles, which confined the smoke and excluded the light, they pro- miscuously slept on the ground, perhaps on a sheep-skin, with their wives, their children, and their cattle. Sordid and scanty were their garments ; the use of bread and wine was unknown ; and their oaten or barley cakes, imperfectly baked in the ashes, were devoured almost in a crude state by the hungry savages. The health of Gelimer must have sunk under these strange and unwonted hardships, from whatsoever cause they had been endured ; but his actual misery was embittered by the recollec- tion of past greatness, the daily insolence of his protectors, and the just apprehension that the light and venal Moors might be tempted to betray the rights of hospitality. The knowledge of his situation dictated the humane and friendly epistle of Pharas. " Like yourself," said the chief of the Heruli, '< I am an illiterate Barbarian, but I speak the language of plain sense and an honest heart. Why will you persist in hopeless obstinacy ? Why will you ruin yourself, your family, and nation ? The love of freedom and abhorrence of slavery ? Alas ! my dearest Gelimer, are you not already the worst of slaves, the slave of the vile nation of the Moors'? Would it not be preferable to sustain at Con- stantinople a life of poverty and servitude, rather than to reign 36 Mount Papua is placed by d'Anville (torn. iii. p. 92, and Tabul. Imp. Eom. Occident.) near Hippo Regius and the sea ; yet this situation ill agrees with the long pursuit beyond Hippo and the words of Procopius (1. ii. c. 4), eV roh NovfiiSias 37 Shaw (Travels, p. 220) most accurately represents the manners of the Bedo- weens and Kabyles, the last of whom, by their language, are the remnant of the Moors ; yet how changed — how civilized are these modern savages ! — provisions are plenty among them, and bread is common.
