Strangely enough we depend on the enemies of Carthage for accounts of her history, as, with few exceptions, her own records were destroyed. No great poems are left, no annals, nothing remains but a few inscriptions, some fragments, and the three treaties with Rome. The Roman narratives are tinged with envy and hatred, yet even so the fame of Carthage stands out clearly, and the deeds of her sons, both as sailors and soldiers, surpass those of other days and other peoples. What admirals of any time would so gallantly have dared such a voyage in small vessels as did Hanno, who almost reached the equator from the north coast of Africa, or Himilco, who, in a four months’ voyage, “keeping to his left the great shoreless ocean on which no ship had ever ventured, where the breeze blows not, but eternal fogs rest upon its lifeless waters,” discovered the Scilly Isles, Ireland, and the wide isle of Albion? These admirals have left records of their doings which still exist. Generals more famous still, vied with each other in their country’s service, fighting bravely on in face of neglect and want of support, knowing that success met with scant praise, and that failure meant death if they returned to the capital. Such names as Hamilcar Barca and the still greater Hannibal recall to memory the tales of the genius of those who upheld her power.
Yet for all this Carthage was no warlike city, but was given over to the arts of peace, to the pursuit and enjoyment of wealth. It was a city of merchant princes, an oligarchy like that of Venice in later times, and the Romans were astounded at the luxury and beauty of the buildings and the far-spreading suburbs.
Agriculture was apparently a favourite pursuit, as a treatise on the subject, in twenty-eight books, was written by Mago, who was called by the Romans the father of husbandry. This book they saved from the general destruction of Carthaginian literature and translated into their own language. Varro, whose own work on ancient agriculture is the most valuable we possess, quotes Mago as the highest authority.
As the city was looted and the treasures carried to Rome it is idle to expect to find anything very noteworthy to show the Carthaginian skill in art. But the White Fathers have in their museum a large collection of bronzes and pottery, and a few jewels of all periods, some of them of peculiar interest because of the strong resemblance between the Punic designs and those of Egypt. Many of the gods are the same, and sacred eyes and scarabs are plentiful. Curious bulbous vessels, used as feeding-bottles for babies, have faces roughly painted on them, the spout taking the place of a mouth. The bronzes have much in common with those of Pompeii, and some fine tombs with full-sized figures might be Greek. The garden of the Monastery is also full of fine fragments and inscriptions, and stands on the brow of the hill that was once the Byrsa, and is now known as the hill of St. Louis. It faces the Gulf of Tunis, charming in outline, glorious in light, and full of colour.
THE OLD PUNIC CISTERNS, CARTHAGE
The twin peaks of Bou Korneïne, the Gemini Scopuli of Virgil, soft as a dream in the early morning, are the distinctive beauty of the curve of the bay to the right. On the other side rise the heights of Sidi Bou Saïd, or Cap Carthage. The Mediterranean and the lagoon of the Bahira, “the little sea,” or lake of Tunis, are of a wondrous blue, the water shimmers in the sunshine, the town of La Goulette gleams likewise, and so do the houses scattered along the coast. The slopes of the hill and the whole of the plain towards the sea are covered, as it were, with cloth of scarlet and gold and green, poppies and marigolds and waving corn, in masses such as can rarely be found elsewhere. The ancient ports of Carthage, now so reduced in size, still retain something of their original form. The military harbour is circular, with an island in the centre where the admiral once dwelt. These tiny lakes, calm as glass, and almost more definitely blue than the Mediterranean itself, hardly suggest themselves as the busy harbours of the Queen of the Seas, but look rather, as a French author says, like the lakes of an English garden.
Here and there shapeless masses of masonry can be seen scattered over the plain, either hardly visible under the living veil of green, or showing like scars, but there is nothing that is in any way an addition to the picture. The view on all sides is beautiful, which is more than can be said by the most charitable of the buildings which crown the hill. Neither the Cathedral of Cardinal Lavigerie, the Chapel of St. Louis, nor the Monastery are worthy of their position in style or treatment. On a bare hillside it might be possible to conjure up fine temples and stirring scenes, to imagine the terrors of the last days of the siege, and the heroic death of the wife of Hasdrubal. Now even St. Louis is too picturesque a figure for the prevailing commonplace, and it would be almost a relief to think that he died at Sousse, as some people suppose.
One remarkable work, and one only, has survived all the changes and chances in the life of Carthage, and still endures to show that the vast size of the original city was in no wise exaggerated. Not only have the aqueduct and cisterns outlasted all the other buildings, but they have been restored, and once more fulfil their purpose, bringing fresh spring-water to a thirsty city—no longer indeed to Carthage, but to the equally ancient and still flourishing Tunis.
Modern Tunis does not require nearly as much water as the greater Carthage, so that only the smaller group of cisterns, lying near the sea and the ruined baths, is now in use. These cisterns are eighteen in number, and can only be called small by comparison, as they are said to be 135 mètres long, and hold nearly 30,000 cubic mètres of water.