So far as the chief events of Tyrus, or of founding Ancient America, may be concerned, the future fate of the Queen of Carthage has no connexion: but, it may be permitted for the pleasure of the writer (and he dare hope the reader also) to follow this devoted woman to her death.
It can readily be imagined that the Queen of Carthage, in her present position, both as regards her regality and widowhood would not be without suitors for her hand in a second marriage. Many surrounding Princes approached her court to obtain that honour, but all were respectfully rejected, not only in fulfilment of her oath, but from her idolatrous devotion to the memory of her murdered bridegroom. These Royal suitors received the refusal with the respect due to her station, and without any desire to inquire into the cause, or motive of her negative. There was one, however, who would not be satisfied with the simple denial,—but resolved that if she could not be won by the terms of peace, she should be conquered by the deeds of war;—even if, as at a later period, that war should be carried into Africa,—though the Catonian sentence "Delenda est Carthago" should be the motto of his advancing banners.
This bold suitor was Jarbas, the powerful King of Getulia, who threatened to declare war against her new nation, if she persisted in refusing his solicitation of her widowed hand in marriage.
To violate her oath was impossible,—it would have been a double perjury,—to the Gods and to the Dead: to have married in disregard of her oath, would have merged her own kingdom into that of her proposed husband's: if she suffered war to be made upon Carthage, her capital might be entirely destroyed,—her people enslaved,—and herself the violated victim of the Conqueror. In this dire extremity, she desired time from Jarbas for full consideration of the alternative; and, also, that the manes of her departed husband might be appeased by a necessary sacrifice! The King of Getulia at once was softened, and instantly yielded to her reasonable request. The Queen, however, before she made the proposal, had formed her resolution. There was but one way to save her name and people,—to keep her oath inviolate,—and to prove the heroism of Woman's devotion:—it was indeed by a Sacrifice to her Husband's departed Spirit,—but Death was to be the Priest,—her Country the Altar,—and her own Life the Offering!
With this resolution she commanded a funeral pyre to be erected as for a sacrifice: she then gathered the Ministers of State and her People around her; and attired in her robes of Royalty, she ascended the newly-erected Altar of her Nation's freedom! The surrounding multitude, unconscious of her motives, listened with breathless attention to her fervent and patriotic eloquence: she urged them to perpetuate her laws,—to renew their energies for peace or war;—upon her death to place the reins of government in the firm grasp of wise men only, whether they now wielded a priestly sceptre or a peasant's distaff;—as she had no child,—the offspring of her brain they must receive as her successor! To these points of National glory she demanded their oath. The vast assembly, gazing from their elevated Queen to the azure Dome,—and, with one voice, called Apollo, and all his host, to bear witness, and accept their united and sacred Oath;—while Echo caught the sound, and bore it even to the surrounding shores and walls of Carthage, and the People's eyes were raised to Heaven,—the Queen,—sudden as the flash,—stabbed herself to the heart! The high-reared Altar became the funeral pyre of surrounding danger and desolation, for her heroic sacrifice appeased the claims of the warlike king.
This act of the Queen of Carthage would be viewed in modern days as madness; but to estimate it correctly, the mind must retire into the Temples of antiquity, when self-immolation was regarded as the highest test of pure and disinterested virtue! As without a similitude, there can be no comparison, either of Institutions or Nations,—therefore we can only contrast our own with ancient days. This difference in language—the mere instrument of truth properly applied—has been the cause of great injustice to events and personages of antiquity. We have no just right to compare ourselves with the ancients, or to measure their morals or virtues by the standard of our own supposed perfections; and our posterity would be equally as unjust to themselves as to us, were they, twenty centuries hence, to record our actions and institutions by their then received ideas of increased and (truly so) advanced civilization. To be just, they will in mercy to the faults and sins of their ancestors (i. e. ourselves) contrast, not compare us.
The suicide—or rather in ancient phrase—self-immolation of the Queen, was then regarded as the highest virtue; and Cato, the Man of Rome, in after ages (and at the same Utica where the Princess first landed), but imitated the act of Woman at Carthage. A comparison between these two acts can be instituted, because, at the time of their being committed, the ancient world regarded them both in similitude of virtue. The same as the suicidal deaths of the Patriots—Brutus and Cassius,—after the fall of Freedom at Philippi.
The Queen of Carthage, and Cato of Utica, both died by their own hands, in full possession of their minds and faculties,—both sacrifices to the highest principles of national virtue; but how much nobler was the Queen's than the Senator's! The former, by her death, saved her People—the latter died uselessly, and his sword pierced other bosoms than his own. Cato ceased to live, because he would not survive the downfall of his country; but by his death did he save his native land, or even wrench a link asunder from the enslaving chain of Tyranny? No! but had he lived and returned to Rome upon Cæsar's invitation, he might—he must—have rendered service to his groaning country, and by his high character and talents have saved her from suffering,—but by his falsely conceived destruction, they were both lost to Rome and to posterity! The Queen, on the contrary, by her death, rescued her young nation from a war of slavery—gave it additional power by her farewell wisdom, pronounced from the Altar destined to receive her ashes,—bound her tried and faithful Tyrians to elect their Rulers from the scrolls of Intellect only,—the fulness of patriotism was accomplished,—and as the steel pierced her heart, Nature never received a last sigh from a nobler victim! Honoured in life, she was idolized in death,—her last words were as from her tomb, and consequently upon the fall of the Queen, ceased the Kingdom of Carthage; but from those Royal ashes arose, with Phœnix power, the Tyrian and giant Republic, which, in after ages, sent its victorious army across the Seas and snow-crowned Alps, even to the Gates of Rome!
The Queen of Carthage died for her People—the over-applauded Cato for himself alone; the former cast her far-reaching gaze along the deep vista of posterity; the latter only looked within the narrow circle of his own death-chamber. The former died to embrace the Public good—the latter to avoid a selfish evil! Mankind have applauded man, because, in so doing, they praise themselves. Thence Cato's immolation has received undying praise from the pens of Poets and Historians; and even the Tragic Toga has moved in mimic life to infold his death amid Man's applause; but Woman, when she is heroic as the Queen of Carthage, she falls from man's envy, upon her own Altar, never to rise again; or, if she does, it is only to falsely move through the brain of a sycophantic Virgil; or, for her true death to be given to adorn the final fate of the Foundling youth of Argos, who, as Ion, is to be shrouded in a Grecian mantle, and for that people, and not the Tyrian, received the wild applause of an enraptured audience!