TARZAN AND THE LOST EMPIRE
“Why are you here?” cried voices. “What are you going to do?”
“We have come to rescue Dilecta from the arms of Fastus and to drag the tyrant from the throne of Castra Sanguinarius.”
Roars of approval greeted the announcement. “Death to the tyrant!” “Down with the palace guards!” “Kill them!” “Kill them!” rose from a thousand lips.
The crowd pushed forward. The officer of the guard, seeing the reënforcements, among which were many legionaries, ordered his men to fall back within the palace grounds and close and bar the gate, nor did they succeed in accomplishing this an instant too soon, for as the bolts were shot the crowd hurled itself upon the stout barriers of iron and oak.
A pale-faced messenger hastened to the throne-room and to Caesar's side.
“The people have risen,” he whispered, hoarsely, “and many soldiers and gladiators and slaves have joined them. They are throwing themselves against the gates, which cannot hold for long.”
Caesar arose and paced nervously to and fro, and presently he paused and summoned officers.
“Dispatch messengers to every gate and every barracks,” he ordered. “Summon the troops to the last man that may be spared from the gates. Order them to fall upon the rabble and kill. Let them kill until no citizen remains alive in the streets of Castra Sanguinarius. Take no prisoners.”
As word finds its way through a crowd, as though by some strange telepathic means, so the knowledge soon became common that Sublatus had ordered every legionary in the city to the palace with instructions to destroy the revolutionaries to the last man.
The people, encouraged by the presence of the legionaries led by Praeclarus, had renewed their assaults upon the gates, and though many were piked through its bars, their bodies were dragged away by their friends and others took their places, so that the gates sagged and bent beneath their numbers; yet they held and Tarzan saw that they might hold
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