Taanach lighted in the corners of the room four tripods full of strobus and cardamom, then she spread out great Babylonian tapestries, and hung them on cords all round the room,-for Salammbô did not wish to be seen even by the walls. The player of the kinnor waited crouching behind the door, and the young boy, standing up, applied his lips to a reed flute. In the distance the street clamor faded, the violet shadows lengthened before the peristyles of the temples, and on the other side of the gulf the base of the mountain, the olive fields and the waste yellow ground indefinitely undulated till finally lost in a bluish vapor; not a single sound could be heard, and indescribable oppression pervaded the air.

Salammbô crouched on the onyx step on the edge of the porphyry basin; she lifted her wide sleeves and fastened them behind her shoulders, and began her ablutions in a methodical manner, according to the sacred rites.

Next Taanach brought to her an alabaster phial, containing something liquid, yet coagulated; it was the blood of a black dog, strangled by barren women on a winter's night in the ruins of a sepulchre. She rubbed it on her ears, her heels, and the thumb of her right hand, and even the nail remained tinged a trifle red, as if she had crushed a berry. The moon rose, then both at once the cithara and the flute commenced to play. Salammbô took off her ear-rings, laid aside her necklace, bracelets, and her long white simarra; unknotted the fillet from her hair, and for some minutes shook her tresses gently over her shoulders to refresh and disentangle them. The music outside continued; there were always the same three notes, precipitous and furious; the strings grated, the flute was high-sounding and sonorous. Taanach marked the cadence by striking her hands; Salammbô, swaying her entire body, chanted her prayers, and one by oue her garments fell around her on the floor.

The heavy tapestry trembled, and above the cord that sustained it the head of the Python appeared. He descended slowly, like a drop of water trickling along a wall, and glided between the stuffs spread out, then poised himself on his tail; he lifted himself perfectly straight up, and darted his eyes, more brillant than carbuncles, upon Salammbô.