The middle parts of the foundering ship could no longer be occupied, and the ill-fortuned men who were to perish were now crowded densely fore and aft. Even now, however, the legionaries preserved their discipline, and they slew some of the hired rowers who pressed them in too disorderly a manner. These were deaths which were but somewhat hastened, yet military order was restored thereby, for the rowers feared the strokes of the pila and the broadswords.
"They go!" muttered Ben Ezra. "So perish all who afflict the chosen people. Rome will yet fall before the sword of Judah and the spear of Israel. Jehovah standeth for his elect. He will have vengeance upon the heathen. He will smite through kings in the day of his wrath."
"O Ulric the Jarl," said Sigurd, "thou mayest trust the Jew. He hateth Rome as we do."
Then came Ulric nearer, still watching the quinquereme, but he spoke words to Ben Ezra in a tongue that those who stood by understood not.
"Father Abraham!" exclaimed the old man, "where didst thou learn Hebrew? I like thee well for this. After yonder quinquereme goeth down thou hast cause to consult with me. There are matters thou knowest not."
"Odin!" exclaimed Ulric. "Watch! She is pitching forward! They are falling!"
In a mass together, as the decks slanted, plunged the overcrowded Romans. It was of no avail to struggle or to thrust with sharp weapons. Angrily, loudly, in his last desperate valor, blew the trumpeter his final defiance, but as the blast ended the prow of the quinquereme went madly under, lifting the stern out of water for a moment. Then went up a great cry and quickly naught could be seen save a few heads of swimmers dotting the blue water.
The helmets disappeared first because of the weight of armor, but the Saxons cast no spears at any who remained, and some who were bareheaded seemed to be swimming well.
"He hath golden hair," said Sigurd, pointing at one of these. "He is no Roman. I will call to him in Greek--"
"Bid him come," said Ulric, "if so be he is not a Roman. He may live."
Sigurd sent to the swimmer a few words in a smoothly sounding tongue, and the golden-haired youth struck out for the trireme, but he was followed by twain who were dark and who cursed him in Latin. Well for him that he was the better swimmer, for they strove to grapple him that he might die with them. He might not even then have fully escaped but that Ulric knew their meaning and said to Tostig the Red: