TARZAN AND THE LOST EMPIRE
“No,” replied Lukedi. “Most of them are from the villages outside the walls of Castra Sanguinarius.”
“Yesterday they called us their own people,” spoke up a black; who understood the language of the Bagego, “and tomorrow they make us kill one another to entertain Caesar.”
“You must be very few in numbers or very poor in spirit,” said Tarzan, “that you submit to such treatment.”
“We number nearly twice as many as the people in the city,” said the black, “and we are brave warriors.”
“Then you are fools,” said Tarzan.
“We shall not be fools forever. Already there are many who would rise against Sublatus and the whites of Castra Sanguinarius.”
“The blacks of the city as well as the blacks of the outer villages hate Caesar,” said Mpingu, who had been brought to the dungeon with Tarzan.
The statements of the blacks furnished food for thought to Tarzan. He knew that in the city there must be hundreds and perhaps thousands of black slaves and many thousands of blacks in the outer villages. If a leader should arise among them, the tyranny of Caesar might be brought to an abrupt end. He spoke of the matter to Cassius Hasta, but the patrician assured him that no such leader would ever arise.
“We have dominated them for so many centuries,” he explained, “that fear of us is an inherited instinct. Our blacks will never rise against their masters.”
“But if they did?” asked Tarzan.
“Unless they had a white leader they could not succeed,” replied Hasta.
“And why not a white leader then?” asked Tarzan.
“That is unthinkable,” replied Hasta.
Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a detachment of soldiers, and as they halted before the entrance to the dungeon and threw open the gate Tarzan saw, in the light of their torches, that they were bringing another prisoner. As they dragged the man in, he recognized Maximus Praeclarus. He saw that Praeclarus recognized him, but as the Roman did not address him, Tarzan kept silent, too. The soldiers chained Praeclarus to the wall, and after they
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