The elephants added greatly to the confusion of the scene. One of the largest in the troop fell in the gateway, and lay there for some time on his side, unable to rise, and braying in a terrific manner. Another was excited to a phrensy by the loss of his master, who had fallen off from his head, wounded by a dart or a spear. The faithful animal turned around to save him. With his trunk he threw the men who were in the way off to the right hand and the left, and then, taking up the body of his master with his trunk, he placed it carefully upon his tusks, and then attempted to force a passage through the crowd, trampling down all who came in his way. History has awarded to this elephant a distinction which he well deserved, by recording his name. It was Nicon.
[Illustration: DEATH OF PYRRHUS.]
All this time Pyrrhus was near the rear of his troops, and thus was in some degree removed from the greatest severity of the pressure. He turned and fought, from time to time, with those who were pressing upon his line from behind. As the danger became more imminent, he took out from his helmet the plume by which he was distinguished from the other generals, and gave it to a friend who was near him, in order that he might be a less conspicuous mark for the shafts of his enemies. The combats, however, between his party and those who were harassing them in the rear were still continued; and at length, in one of them, a man of Argos wounded him, by throwing a javelin with so much force that the point of it passed through his breast-plate and entered his side. The wound was not dangerous, but it had the effect of maddening Pyrrhus against the man who had inflicted it, and he turned upon him with great fury, as if he were intending to annihilate him at a blow. He would very probably have killed the Greek, had it not been that just at that moment the mother of the man, by a very singular coincidence, was surveying the scene from a house-top which overlooked the street where these events were occurring. She immediately seized a heavy tile from the roof, and with all her strength hurled it into the street upon Pyrrhus just as he was striking the blow. The tile came down upon his head, and, striking the helmet heavily, it carried both helmet and head down together, and crushed the lower vertebræ of the neck at their junction with the spine.
Pyrrhus dropped the reins from his hands, and fell over from his horse heavily to the ground. It happened that no one knew him who saw him fall, for so great had been the crowd and confusion, that Pyrrhus had got separated from his immediate friends. Those who were near him, therefore, when he fell, pressed on, intent only on their own safety, and left him where he lay. At last a soldier of Antigonus's army, named Zopyrus, coming up to the spot, accompanied by several others of his party, looked upon the wounded man and recognized him as Pyrrhus. They lifted him up, and dragged him out of the street to a portico that was near. Zopyrus drew his sword, and raised it to cut off his prisoner's head. At this instant Pyrrhus opened his eyes, and rolled them up with such a horrid expression as to strike Zopyrus with terror. His arm consequently faltered in dealing the blow, so that he missed his aim, and instead of striking the neck, only wounded and mutilated the mouth and chin. He was obliged to repeat the stroke again and again before the neck was sundered. At length, however, the dreadful deed was done, and the head was severed from the body.
Very soon after this, Halcyoncus, the son of Antigonus, rode up to the spot, and after learning what had occurred, he asked the soldiers to lift up the head to him, that he might look at it a moment. As soon as it was within his reach, he seized it and rode away, in order to carry it to his father. He found his father sitting with his friends, and threw down the head at his feet, as a trophy which he supposed his father would rejoice to see. Antigonus was, however, in fact, extremely shocked at the spectacle. He reproved his son in the severest terms for his brutality, and then, sending for the mutilated trunk, he gave to the whole body an honorable burial.
That Pyrrhus was a man of great native power of mind, and of extraordinary capacity as a military leader, no one can deny. His capacity and genius were in fact so great, as to make him, perhaps, the most conspicuous example that the world has produced of the manner in which the highest power and the noblest opportunities may be wasted and thrown away. He accomplished nothing. He had no plan, no aim, no object, but obeyed every momentary impulse, and entered, without thought and without calculation, into any scheme that chance, or the ambitious designs of others, might lay before him. He succeeded in creating a vast deal of turmoil and war, in killing an immense number of men, and in conquering, though temporarily and to no purpose, a great many kingdoms. It was mischief, and only mischief, that he did; and though the scale on which he perpetrated mischief was great, his fickleness and vacillation deprived it altogether of the dignity of greatness. His crimes against the peace and welfare of mankind did not arise from any peculiar depravity; he was, on the contrary, naturally of a noble and generous spirit, though in process of time, through the reaction of his conduct upon his heart, these good qualities almost entirely disappeared. Still, he seems never really to have wished mankind ill. He perpetrated his crimes against them thoughtlessly, merely for the purpose of showing what great things he could do.