He grasped for his priest's knife. It had fallen from his belt. He beat his breast, and fell in convulsions to the earth. Some of the people fainted with fright. Others covered their heads with their mantles, as if to shut out some stupendous apparition.
At this terrible moment a new portent occurred. The colossal image of Baal shook. Its metal folds creaked one upon another. The ground trembled as if from the convulsion of some subterranean spirit. The idol tottered, and fell half-way to the earth. The priests, wild with terror, ran shrieking into the crowd. Panic seized the multitude, who trod upon one another in their haste to get away from the dread proximity. Many were maimed as they fell among the great stones of the old ruin that covered the ground, and some were crushed beneath the trampling feet, or smothered under the accumulated mass of helpless humanity piled above them. Only when they had reached a distance did the fleeing men pause to look back. Egbalus alone remained near the pavilion. He seemed to have been transformed into a statue. At length he moved, not to follow the awe-stricken fugitives, but to enter the pavilion! Such halting steps did he take that one might have imagined him drawn by some invisible power which he was trying to resist.
"The god has taken the high priest also!" cried Hanno, who had recovered sufficient self-possession to raise his head and look; but, horror-stricken by the sight, he buried his face in the dust.
A venerable priest advanced from the cowering throng midway the open space, and raised his knife with a loud cry:
"I, too, would come to thee, O Baal!"
He plunged the gleaming blade into his own heart. Scores of knives flashed in the hands of the demented priests about him, as if they, also, were waiting the audible summons to follow.
Suddenly Egbalus reappeared. He beckoned those nearest. He called for Hanno, but the new enthusiasm had proved too much for the neophyte, untrained to such deep emotions, and he lay a heaving heap of unconscious devotion. Egbalus selected two attendants, and with them re-entered the Holy Place. Would the god have more? No; Baal was satisfied; for, see! the three priests emerge, not one of them blasted to a walking cinder, nor ascending in a flame of fire. They talked excitedly. Egbalus lifted his hand.
Suddenly the long blare of a trumpet announced the termination of the sacrifice. The crowds were not allowed to re-enter the enclosure, but betook themselves, some to Tyre or to their ships, some over the hills to the inland villages, others along the coast—on foot, in litters, on mules and camels and stately steeds—all scattering, to astound the world with their reports of the miracle.
The setting sun flashed its red rays upon the leaning figure of Baal, that seemed to bow in obeisance to the god of day. Only the priests remained to watch until Astarte, smiling in the crescent moon, wrote her benediction with the silvery beams she threw over the scene.