CHAPTER IX.
THE LAND OF OXEN.

On the third morning after the battle we sighted the mountains of Italy,[32] and having entered the gulf,[33] along the north of which extends the Iapygian Peninsula, we soon came to the mouth of a river that meandered along a fine plain, in which the broad pastures were diversified by groves of pines and oleanders. Inland, about a hundred stadia from the shore, rose a range of grey mountains, partially wooded, and crowned by a ridge of ragged peaks. The anchorage was tolerably good, and as we required fresh water and provender for the cattle, I determined to lay to at once. I had all the animals sent on shore. This was a work of some difficulty; Bichri with a few armed men was put in charge of them, and he was to employ the prisoners to drive them where they could find proper pasturage; my intention in doing this was that the animals should follow the ships along the coast as far as the Sicilian Straits, where, unless I succeeded meanwhile in disposing of them, they should be re-embarked.

"Not much chance of selling them here," said Himilco; "we are in Vitalia, the land of oxen. If we could have brought them some goats now, like those we let the Ionians have, we might have found a market. Of cattle such as these they have more than enough already."

"Probably so," I answered; "but first of all we must find some inhabited spot amidst all this desolation; we must try and meet with some of these Italians or Vitalians, whichever they are called. There must be some Iapygians here too in the south, as well as in the north. Do you know the Iapygian dialect?"

Himilco said that, although he was not acquainted with that dialect, he had some knowledge of the language of the Vitalians, as well as of that which was spoken by the Opsci, the Marsians, the Volscians, the Samnites, the Umbrians, the Sabellians of the eastern coast, and the Latins of the western. He mentioned also that Gisgo was tolerably familiar with the tongue of the Rasennæ, away to the north-west.

The spokesman of my seven Phocian prisoners now approached me somewhat timidly, as if he had something to ask. His name was Aminocles. He began by addressing me:

"King of the Phœnicians!"

I stopped him and told him that my proper appellation was not king but captain.