It was the last night of the old year, according to Nephite reckoning. The great heat and the terrible efforts of the day had overcome both officers and men. The murmur of the Atlantic's waves sounded a soft lullaby in the ears of Amalickiah and his hosts, who, for the first time during the campaign, had suffered a check in their triumphal march. Even Amalickiah slept; but not so with Teancum. He was brooding over the wrongs and perils of his beloved country, as well as his own sufferings, both the deadly fruit of one man's unholy ambition. As he pondered he grew more angry, and at last he determined by one desperate stroke to put an end to the war; or, if not that, at least to slay the cause of it. Taking one servant with him, he secretly stole out of his own camp into that of the enemy. A death-like silence reigned in both. Cautiously and unobserved he searched out the royal tent. There lay the foe, there lay his guards, all overcome with resistless fatigue. To draw his javelin, thrust it into the king's heart and then flee, was but the work of a moment, and so adroitly did he fulfill his purpose that Amalickiah died without a struggle or a cry, and it was not until the morning that his guards discovered that the hosts of Laman were without a head. When Teancum returned to his own warriors he awoke them from their slumbers and rehearsed to them all that he had done. It is not difficult to imagine their enthusiasm, which, for fear they should arouse the enemy, they were compelled to restrain. They, however, kept a strong guard on the alert, lest when the Lamanites awoke and discovered that their king was dead, they should, in their anger make a sudden onslaught on the Nephite lines. This thought, however, was not realized. When the Lamanites found that Amalickiah was slain, they hastily retreated to the fortified city of Mulek. Amalickiah was succeeded on the Lamanitish throne by his brother Ammoron, who continued the war with unrelenting vindictiveness. FOOTNOTE: [6] During this year Nephihah the second Chief Judge died, and his son Pahoran, succeeded him on the judgment seat. CHAPTER XXXII. JACOB THE ZORAMITE--HIS CHARACTERISTICS--THE STRATEGY BY WHICH MULEK WAS TAKEN--THE FIERCE BATTLE BETWEEN JACOB AND THE NEPHITE FORCES--JACOB'S DEATH. (ALMA CHAP. 52.) The general who commanded the Lamanite forces at Mulek was named Jacob. He was a Nephite apostate, who had accepted the errors of the Zoramites. His appointment was one characteristic of the prevailing policy of Amalickiah and of his successor, Ammoron. It was to give the command of the Lamanite armies to men who, like themselves, were traitors to their own government; for, in such cases, to military knowledge was almost invariably added intense religious hate, which neither asked nor gave quarter on the battlefield, but fought to the last extremity with unconquerable fury.