BOW AND SPEAR
It was a goodly sight, could the queen have waited to behold it, that downward march of the Armenian host to meet their enemy in the plain. The flower and pride of all the north, formidable in size, number, and length of weapons, they deployed, squadron by squadron, and company by company, under cover of their archers on the wall, till they found space near the river's empty bed to form that wedge, or solid triangle in which it was their custom to offer battle. This mass consisted of spearmen, who with levelled points and raised bucklers seemed to present but an impervious hedge of steel to the efforts of an adversary. It was designed to penetrate and cleave asunder by sheer weight and pressure the opposing force, while Thorgon and his long swords, mounted on their swift hardy horses, held themselves in readiness to cut up and destroy in detail the fragments of an enemy thus riven the wider the more it gave ground to its assailants.
Such a method of fighting was considered by the mountain men to insure victory; and the queen's eye sparkled, her cheek glowed, when she beheld the hosts of Aryas the Beautiful thus eager to engage her own on a system of which she had mastered all the details, prepared to worst it at every point.
"The lion is astir," she said, "and walking deliberately into the toils without an effort at escape. By the light of Ashtaroth, I will have his claws pared, his fangs drawn, and the beast as tame as a kitten, before close of day!"
Splendidly armed, ablaze with gold and jewels that flashed in the morning sun, she stood in her chariot, looking like the goddess by whom she swore, her beautiful face radiant with pleasure, her heart beating high with courage, triumph, and the wild tumult of unbridled love.
Her shield-bearer's place still remained vacant, and save a youth to drive her horses, she was alone in the chariot; for Assarac, who remained as usual in attendance, occupied another at her side.
The eunuch's face was very grave and sad; its fleshy outlines had fallen, the eyes were sunk and haggard, while about the lips care and sorrow had carved those anxious lines that age itself fails to imprint when the heart remains at ease.
He looked little like a priest of Baal, less like a warrior of Ashur: but never prophet burned with fiercer fire, never were nerves of champion strung to more desperate courage, than glowed in the vexed heart and wounded spirit of Assarac the eunuch, thus waiting on Semiramis the queen.
He had galloped back with her to the camp before sunrise, and at the first trumpet call ascended into his chariot, that he might aid her with his counsel, perhaps shield her with his body in the press of battle.
In the disposal of her power she had shown her accustomed skill. Dark masses of horsemen gathered like clouds on either flank. Her spearmen, in a solid column, occupied the centre, protecting a bristling array of war-chariots, ready to be launched against the enemy so soon as he advanced into the plain; while forming her own guard and a reserve to be hurled, as it were, at the critical moment on any point she should select, rode a picked body of warriors clothed in blue, shining with gilded armour, and chosen from the flower of her men of war by the queen herself.