Lords of the World: A story of the fall of Carthage and Corinth

"Before I turned?" interrupted the sick man, who had been listening with rapt attention to the narrative. "Before I turned, you say; you are sure that I was struck by my friends behind me?"

"As sure," replied Scipio, "as that I am sitting here and speaking to you at this moment."

"Go on, then."

"Before you turned you were struck from behind. The first blow was on the back of your leg. I saw you put your hand to the place. And you had hardly done that when you were felled to the ground by a second blow. That was on your head. We guessed as much from the way you fell; and when we came to examine you afterwards, we found it to be as I have said. Your good physician here will tell you the particulars."

"Yes," said the leech, "I will at the proper time. But for the present my patient has heard enough. Indeed, unless I am very much mistaken, he has heard too much."

"Whether it is enough or too much," said Cleanor, "I must hear it all. It would be ten times worse to be left in this suspense. I can only judge from what you say that I must have been struck from behind, that is by my own friends. But that treachery I can't believe. What do you say, sir," he went on, looking to the physician; "can you throw any light on the matter?"

"Be calm, be calm, my friend," said the physician. "You will undo all the good that we have been doing you for the last ten days. Here, let me feel your pulse.... It is just as I thought," he went on, "a regular bounding pulse. I would have given anything for you to have had such a pulse when I first took you in hand. But now it means fever, and fever means I don't know what."

"Still, I must have the whole story now," persisted Cleanor. "Do you think I can sleep with this doubt regarding my friends hanging over me?"

"Well, a wilful man will have his way, but, mind, I wash my hands of the whole business. I am not responsible for what may happen. And it promised to be such a beautiful cure, too!"

"For heaven's sake go on! Tell me how I came to be wounded?" cried the patient, with an emphasis of which no one would have thought him capable half an hour before.

"Well," replied the physician, "I will tell you what I know, but it is under protest. You see this"—he produced from his pocket a leaden bullet of the kind commonly used in slings—"I extracted this from the wound on your hip. A nasty wound it was, and had caused a terrible loss of blood. You see that mark? It is not a Roman mark, certainly. Do you recognize it? Unless I am very much mistaken, it is the Carthaginian letter that answers to what we Greeks call alpha. What do you say?"

"You are right," said Cleanor. "I have myself given them out to the slingers from the stores. Yes, it is a Carthaginian bullet."

"Then there is another thing," the physician went on. "When they were stripping you to put you into bed, this stone that I hold in my hand fell out of a fold in your clothes. There were some fragments of hair upon it, and I recognized the hair as yours. See, they are here still;" and he produced a small piece of papyrus in which they were wrapped. "Now, where did that bit of stone come from? It has got, if you look closely at it, a little mortar on one side. At some time it has been built into a wall. You don't find such things lying about on the open plain. No; that bit of stone came from somewhere inside Nepheris. I have got some ten or twelve other pieces of stone very like it, that were picked up near the place by a boy whom I sent to search the next day. They are much of a size, and, I should say, though I don't profess to know much about such things, that they came from a catapult. Nothing else could have sent them so far. Now I have told you all I know."

"Many thanks, sir!" said the Greek in a low voice. "I am convinced that there has been treachery; indeed you leave no room for doubt. But I could almost wish," he added with a melancholy smile, "I could almost wish that you had been less skilful, and my friends here less affectionate. I hardly feel as grateful to you as I ought to be. It is a grievous thing for a man to feel that he has been wounded in the house of his friends."

"Come, come," said the kindly physician, "it may have been only an accident or a mistake after all! However, you have had excitement enough, and more than enough, for the day. Take this, and it will send you to sleep;" and producing a small phial of poppy-juice from his wallet he poured a potent dose into a cup of wine, and gave it to his patient.

"Thanks, doctor!" murmured Cleanor, but added in a whisper, "Yes, sleep, but if only there could be no waking!"

CHAPTER XXI.
POLYBIUS.

CLEANOR'S wish for the sleep from which there is no waking was only too genuine. He felt almost heart-broken at the treatment which he had received. He had thrown himself into the cause of Carthage with a single-minded energy which had never been permitted to flag, and these wounds were his reward!

True, he had a pretty clear notion of the quarter from which this treacherous enmity had proceeded. He felt sure that Hasdrubal had never forgiven him. That his vanity had been humbled and his cruelty baffled were offences that would be sure to rankle in the mind of such a man. But what could be said for a people which was content to be ruled by a Hasdrubal? The young Greek felt that he had lost his country, so to speak, a second time. His native town had perished, and now the city of his adoption, Carthage, which he had been eager to serve with life and death, had cruelly repudiated him.

The first result of these thoughts was an absolute loss of all interest in life. He did not wish to recover, and for a time it seemed most likely that what he did not wish would not be. The physician found that all the ground which had been gained was lost, and for some days he despaired of his patient's life. There was no active disease; that would have given his art something definite to combat. But there was a total indifference to everything, which offered an inert, and, as it seemed, unconquerable resistance to all his efforts.

Still, at twenty there is an almost physical desire for life which triumphs over the deepest sorrows and the most acute disappointments. Had Cleanor been master of his own actions he might have committed suicide. As it was, lying helpless in the hands of his physician and his friends, he had to submit to being kept alive. His appetite returned by degrees, though he was almost ashamed of being hungry. As his strength grew, and the blood began to course more briskly through his veins, he found interests revive which he had thought to be extinguished, interests to which he seemed to have bidden farewell. And so the process of recovery went on.

The young Scipio did his best to help it forward. He had often reproached himself with haste and want of discretion in prematurely revealing to his friend and preserver the revolting truth of the treachery of which he had been the object. He now exerted himself to repair the mischief. His attendance by the sick-bed was unceasing. He was always ready to talk, to read aloud, or to play a game of draughts or soldiers, as the strength of the patient permitted.

And all was done with so genuine an affection that it could not fail to win its way to the heart of the patient. More than once the young man's great kinsman, the Commander himself, spared an hour from his innumerable occupations to pay a visit to the sick man's tent. Cleanor felt again, in even increased force, what had impressed him at his first meeting, the inexplicable charm of Scipio's personality.

Under these circumstances Cleanor's health improved, at first almost in spite of himself, for he could hardly be said to have had any wish for life, and then with greater rapidity, as time weakened the painful impressions of the past and strengthened new interests and hopes. In the early days of his illness his host, for he occupied the private tent of the younger Scipio, had been granted a furlough from his military duties, for the express purpose of attending on his guest. Though renewed more than once, this had to come to an end.

But Cleanor never lacked company, and that of the most interesting kind. It will be remembered that on the occasion of his visiting the Roman camp in the capacity of interpreter to the officer negotiating an exchange of prisoners, he had made the acquaintance of the historian Polybius. This acquaintance he was now able to improve. Polybius, as a non-combatant, had plenty of time to bestow on the invalid, in whom he found an intelligent listener and even critic. It became his constant custom to bring what he had written on the previous day, read it aloud to the invalid, and invite his criticism on it.

"I want above all things," Polybius said, "to be both candid and clear. Tell me if I seem to write like a partisan, or if I am obscure. What you do not readily understand will certainly be unintelligible to nine readers out of ten."

The reading was commonly followed by a conversation, in which a great variety of subjects were touched upon, and in which Cleanor found a quite inexhaustible interest. Polybius, who was now past middle age,41 had seen about as much of men and manners as any man of his time. He had held high military office in his native country, commanding the cavalry of the Achæan League, the last effort of Greece to hold her place in the world of politics. He had never seen, it so happened, any active service of importance, but in the knowledge of the theory of war he was unsurpassed by any man of his time. He had indeed made a very important contribution to the military art by greatly improving the practice of signalling. If there was anything that raised the old soldier's vanity it was this. He could not boast of any victories, and he belonged to a nation which had ceased to be a factor of importance in the politics of the world, but the credit of this invention gave him, he believed, a rank among the great soldiers of history. It was, he told Cleanor, the proudest moment of his life when he saw his system used, and used with success, by the great Scipio himself.42

But nothing in Polybius' conversation was more interesting than what he had to say about his experiences during his seventeen years of exile in Italy. Along with many hundreds of his countrymen—with all, it might almost be said, who were in any way distinguished or able—he had been deported to Italy. But he had been more fortunate than most of his companions. While they were distributed among the towns of Northern Italy, where they dragged out a miserable existence, without books or society, and often with but the scantiest means, he had been permitted to live in Rome. He had won the friendship of Æmilius Paullus, the great conqueror of Macedonia, and he and his two sons interested themselves in him. The society into which he was thus introduced was the most brilliant which Rome possessed, and Polybius was never weary of talking about it. Cleanor, who, like his countrymen in general, had been accustomed to regard the Romans as little better than barbarians, was astonished at his enthusiasm.

"We haven't any society in Greece," Polybius would say, "that can be fairly matched with them. They are on a larger scale, more strongly built, so to speak. They are not so acute, perhaps, as some of our people, but far more solid and strong."

"But they have no literature, I am told," interrupted Cleanor.

"That is hardly so," replied Polybius, "they have the beginnings of what will be, I am sure, a great literature. At present they do little more than translate from us. But their translations are better than any originals we can now produce. I used to be present at the first readings of the comedies of their great writer, Terence. They were taken, it is true, from Menander and Diphilus and other Greeks, but the taking was done with the greatest art, and the language was admirable. You may take it for granted that with a language so finished as Latin now is, a real literature is sure to come before long. And it was curious, too, to see what admirable judges of style these young nobles were. It wasn't true, though it was commonly reported, that Scipio and his friend Lælius wrote Terence's plays for him, but I can bear witness of my own knowledge that they helped him greatly with them. You see, he was not a Roman born, and it is not everyone that can write Roman Latin, any more than everyone can write Attic Greek. And there is another thing which we cannot match: the culture of the women in the best families. Among us it is very seldom that a respectable woman can do more than read and write; very often she cannot do as much as that. It is very different in Rome—not, of course, everywhere, for there are some who stick obstinately to the old ways, but in the circle of which I am talking. Lælius—he, you know, is Scipio's great friend—whose acquaintance you will soon make, has a daughter whose learning would put many of our students to shame. She was a girl not far into her teens when I used to see her—they do not shut up their women in our fashion—and she could speak Greek with the very finest accent, and they said just the same of her Latin; of that, of course, I could hardly judge so well."

"Did you ever see the old man Cato?" asked Cleanor. "I have often heard talk of him. He must have been a worthy of a very different stamp."

"Yes, yes, I knew him well," replied Polybius, "and have excellent reasons for remembering him. As you say, he was of a very different stamp, and belonged to quite another age. He was of a time when scarcely a Roman had ever set his foot outside Italy, or even imagined that anything good could come from beyond the seas. Yet it was strange how the new spirit had succeeded in touching even him in his old age. Do you know that I had the honour of having him for a pupil? He must have been close upon eighty years of age when he found that it put him at a disadvantage not to know what other men knew, and he actually took to learning Greek. He had long been able to speak it in a way, but he took to reading it, and I had the pleasure of being his teacher. I used to stay at his country house, for it was only there that he had leisure for his lessons. It was a curious experience. He used to entertain his neighbours, the country-side folk, farmers and the like, in the friendliest fashion. They were fine, sturdy folk, and I soon understood, when I saw them, how Rome seems likely to conquer the world. And what heads they had! The wine-cup didn't halt in its rounds, I can tell you, and if I hadn't missed my turn as often as I could, the end would have been disaster. As for the old man, he never shirked.43 But there was a very harsh side to his character. Nothing could be harder than his dealings with his slaves. They were mere beasts of burden to him, not one whit of more account than his horses and oxen,—not indeed of so much, seeing that they gave more trouble. He gave them just as much food as would keep them alive, not a morsel more. When they grew too old for work, he turned them out of doors to starve. However, he behaved very well to me, and if I gave him any help, he repaid me many fold. He was won over somehow to take the part of the exiles. Of course Scipio and his friends had a great deal to do with it, but I always thought that he had also a kindness for me. I was in the senate-house when the question came on—should the Greek exiles be allowed to go home? There was a hot debate, and a close division was expected. The old man rose to speak quite at the end of the sitting. I must say that what he said was not flattering, but it was certainly effective. 'Are we going to waste any more time about these trumpery Greeks? If we don't settle the matter to-day we shall have the whole discussion over again.' Then he sat down. The senators laughed; and the motion was carried easily. I went to thank him the next day. He was very friendly, and I took courage to say that if we were allowed to go back, we might also be restored to our rank and honours. He smiled very grimly. 'Friend,' he said, 'when a man is lucky enough to get out of the Cyclops' cave, I take it that he would be a fool to go back after his hat or his cloak.' I took the hint, and was off before two days had passed. But before I went, he sent a message that he wanted to see me. He was then at his country house, and he was busy making some alterations in a book that he had written about agriculture. He was dictating, and a slave, a wretched Greek, who looked, as he probably was, half-starved, was writing down. 'I bought him at Magnesia44,' he said, 'for £20, and an excellent bargain it was, but he is getting past his work now.' I saw the poor fellow flush up, but Cato cared no more for his feelings than if he had been a dog. 'But now for what I wanted to say to you. I don't suppose that I shall see the end of Carthage, though it will not be for want of urging my countrymen to bring it about.45 But you probably will, for it can hardly be postponed for another ten years. Well, there is one thing in Carthage that I have always wished to see, and that is, Mago's work on agriculture. I have never been able to get anything like a complete copy of it. Only two or three of the books—there are twenty-eight in all—have come into my hands, and I have found them quite admirable, and have made all the use of them that I could for my own treatise. What I wanted to say to you was to bear this matter in mind if you should chance to be at hand when the end comes. Books often fare very badly at such times. What, indeed, does the common soldier know about their value? But, depend upon it, this one will be worth a whole ship-load of gold and silver. Keep your eyes open, then, and warn all whom you know to be on the look-out for Mago's book.' That was the last time I saw him. He lived two years longer, and died happy, I suppose, because war had been declared against Carthage."

CHAPTER XXII.
A PLEASURE TRIP.

THE year drew to its close with a period of inaction on both sides. The Carthaginians, greatly disheartened by the defeat of the native tribes, made no further attempt to assume the offensive. They still held Fort Nepheris, the Romans not being able to spare enough men to invest it. The besiegers, on the other hand, were content to let things alone for the present. Time was on their side. They added daily to the strength of their siege-works, and their troops, most of them at their first landing raw recruits, were now becoming well-seasoned soldiers. A few days before the end of the year Scipio left for Rome in order to be present at the elections. Nothing was done during his absence, but it was understood that on his return active operations would be commenced without delay.

On the day after the departure of the commander-in-chief, Cleanor received a visit from his physician. Latterly these visits had been rare and brief, not going beyond a few questions and a short gossip on the news of the camp. Now, however, the patient was subjected to a close examination. When this was completed, the physician shook his head.

"My young friend," he said, "you are not making quite the progress I had hoped and expected to see. The pulse is weak, I find. You have headaches, you tell me, now and then, and little appetite. This last is not a good sign. A young man like you, when he is really getting well, ought to be as hungry as a wolf. On the whole, I think you would be the better for a change, and we must consider how it can be managed."

At this point of the conversation Polybius entered the tent. "I am not satisfied," said the physician, addressing the new-comer. "I don't find my young patient making as good a recovery as I had hoped, and I have been suggesting a change. These are excellent quarters, and every care is taken, I know, of our friend, but a camp is not a good place for a complete recovery. Somehow the presence of a number of men seems to make the air somewhat stale."

"I am particularly glad to see you," said Polybius, "for this is exactly the business about which I have come. Scipio, who thinks of everybody, and forgets nothing, was talking to me about Cleanor here the day before yesterday, and the very last thing he said to me yesterday when I bade him good-bye on board his galley was, 'Don't forget the invalid.' He left the matter, as a whole, to my discretion, but his idea was a short trip to Egypt. I was to ask your opinion, and if that was favourable, I was to arrange the details. Scipio will be away for nearly or quite a month, for there are many things to settle in Rome, and of course nothing of importance will be done during his absence. That gives us plenty of time. What do you say, doctor?"

"Nothing could be better," replied the physician. "We will say a month. That won't give you much time on shore. But I don't care about that. In fact it is the sea voyage that I count upon for putting our young friend right. Still, there is plenty to see in Alexandria, even if you can't get any further."46

"That is exactly what I expected to hear," said Polybius. "In fact, I so much took it for granted that I have given orders for a galley to be ready this evening. So if you don't object, Cleanor, we will start at once. There is a nice westerly breeze blowing, which we ought not to lose."

Cleanor had no objection to make. He was, on the contrary, much pleased with the idea. He had certainly been feeling somewhat languid, and the time was beginning to hang heavy on his hands. Besides, what could be more delightful than to see Alexandria?

A start accordingly was made at sunset. Everything favoured the voyagers. The wind never veered from the west, and though towards evening it commonly lulled, it never ceased; during the day it always blew briskly, but never was so strong as to cause inconvenience. In consequence the galley's voyage was almost a record, for she reached the quay in what was called the Eunostos or Haven of Happy Return in nine days. The travellers paid the customary visit of thanksgiving for a safe voyage to the Temple of Poseidon, and dropped a half-stater47 apiece into the chest for offerings. This done, they presented a letter of introduction, with which Scipio had furnished them, to the official who represented Rome in Alexandria, were received by him with effusion, and pressed to accept his hospitality, but preferred the independence of lodgings of their own.

Their first visit was, of course, to the great Library. This had not at that time reached the enormous proportions which it attained about a century later, when it received, in addition to its own wealth, the vast collections of Pergamum,48 but the volumes on its shelves already numbered more than a quarter of a million. The two friends could have spent months, had months been at their disposal, in this wilderness of learning. It was not only the multitude of its treasures that astonished them, it was the extraordinary value of many of the particular volumes. Here the student was permitted to inspect, under due safeguards, of course, the actual autographs of some of the most famous authors of the world. One of the Ptolemies, ironically called the Well-doer, had fraudulently possessed himself of the originals of Æschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, presenting the Athenian people which owned them with copies and a money compensation. His successors had followed the same unscrupulous policy. Indeed, no valuable manuscript that once found its way into Alexandria was ever permitted to leave it.

Adjoining the Library was the Museum, with its theatre or great lecture-hall, its smaller lecture-rooms, its dining-hall, and collegiate buildings, cloisters, gardens, and park. The two friends wandered from room to room, where all comers were welcome—the munificent endowments of learning rendered all fees unnecessary—and listened to discourses on all the subjects of knowledge under the sun.

There did not happen to be any commanding or famous personality among the professors of the time, but there was plenty of learning and abundance of rhetoric if not of eloquence. A successor of Aristarchus discoursed on the criticism of Homer, denouncing, for such happened to be the subject of the day, the pernicious heresy of the Chorizontes, the critics who maintained a diverse authorship of the Iliad and the Odyssey. The chair of Euclid was occupied by a geometrician who had made some additions to the science of trigonometry. In the lecture-room devoted to astronomy they had the good fortune to hear a really distinguished man of science, Hipparchus of Bithynia, who had been invited by the authorities of the Museum to give a course of lectures. He had chosen for his subject his own great discovery of the precession of the equinoxes, made, as he explained, by a comparison of his own observations with those of earlier astronomers.49

As they left the room they were invited by an attendant, who observed that they were strangers, to read an inscription written in letters of gold over the principal door. It was the epigram of Apollonius of Rhodes on the reception of the Hair of Berenice among the Constellations. Polybius was recognized by one of the professors, who had been glad to leave the thankless politics of Greece for a quiet competence in this abode of learning, and was invited by the professor to take dinner in the great banqueting-hall. Cleanor was, of course, included in the invitation. The intervening time was spent pleasantly enough in inspecting the garden, in which the collection of tropical plants, afterwards so famous, had been already begun, and in examining, what was then a sight peculiar to Alexandria, a menagerie.

Both Polybius and his friend were inclined to think that all time not spent in the Library or the lecture-room was more or less wasted. Still, there were sights which it was impossible for a visitor to Alexandria to neglect. Such was the mausoleum of the Ptolemies, with the coffin of gold in which reposed the remains of the great Alexander; the observatory; the palace of justice; and the market, thronged with the commerce of the whole of the civilized world. There were hours, too, when the Library was shut, and these were spent in a way both amusing and instructive. The two wandered through the different regions of the great city, the streets inhabited by the Jews, with squalid exteriors, often concealing palaces fit for kings, and the native quarter, crowded with figures and faces that might have belonged to long-dead subjects of the Pharaohs. Not less interesting than the city were the docks and quays. Egypt was already one of the great granaries of the world. Loading the wheat ships was an employment that provided thousands of labourers with sustenance, and at this time, thanks to the war, which had thrown out of cultivation the fertile territory of Carthage, the trade was particularly brisk.

Anyhow, the time did not hang heavily on the visitors' hands, and Cleanor could hardly believe that ten days had passed when Polybius introduced the subject of departure. There was a certain hesitation in the old man's manner, and Cleanor, who had all the quick observation and alert intelligence of his race, did not fail to perceive it.

"This is a delightful place, Cleanor," he said, "and I hope to see it again. Indeed, there are books in the Library which I must go through carefully before I give my magnum opus to the world. But that must be for the future. Now I have no choice but to go. We must not allow less than twelve days for the return voyage, though, if this wind holds, we shall not take so long."

"Yes," replied Cleanor, "I am ready to start at any time."

Polybius hesitated a second before he spoke. "Well," he said, "I don't think that there is any necessity for your coming with me. It is a pity that you should not see something more of Egypt now you are here. And then there is the question of health. It would be a thousand pities that you should have anything like a relapse. As for me, I must go. Next month, or, at furthest, the month after, is likely to see one of the greatest events in the history of the West, and it would be folly in me, who pretend to be an historian, if, having the chance of seeing it with my own eyes, I should fail to be present."

Cleanor saw in a moment that the whole thing had been planned, and that his companion was speaking by instruction. But he thought it prudent to conceal his knowledge.

"Yes," he said, "I understand; but I think that I would sooner go back with you."

This was put out as a feeler, and it did not fail in its object.

"I think it must be as I said," replied Polybius with some hesitation. "To tell you the truth, it was Scipio's wish that you should remain here, and I should not like to go against his wish. The master of legions," he added with a smile, "must have his own way."

"Exactly so," said the young man, "and I have no wish to oppose him."

"Good!" replied Polybius with evident relief; "I was sure that you would be reasonable, so sure, in fact, that I have made arrangements for you to start to-morrow on a journey up the Nile. All expenses have been paid, and you will have nothing to do but enjoy the most wonderful sight in the world. There need be no hurry. Take your time and see everything at your leisure. The chance may never come again. The boat and its crew have been hired for three months. When you return you shall find, all being well, a letter with instructions awaiting you here."

"Well," said Cleanor, "I can't help being sorry that you are not coming with me, but the plan is a most delightful one. You could not have devised anything better."

The young man's real thoughts were quite of another kind, though he concealed them with an adroitness which would have done credit to a veteran diplomatist. The fact was that he had been haunted for some time past by anxieties with which was mingled a certain feeling of self-reproach. They had scarcely presented themselves, or had been readily banished, during the period of his weakness and forced inaction. But when health was fully restored, and he again felt himself capable of action, he could no longer ignore them.

What had happened, what was likely to happen, to his foster-mother and her daughter? To Theoxena he was bound by one of the most natural and tender of ties. To let her perish, or suffer a fate worse than death, would be a shameful failure of duty, only less disgraceful than if she had been his mother indeed. And her daughter—? He had scarcely thought of the girl at the time, so engrossing had been the anxieties of the moment. But her image had been impressed deeply on his memory, and even on his heart. He seemed to see her still, as she told, with all the simplicity of a child, the pitiful story of her kidnapped brother. The large pathetic eyes, brimmed with tears, haunted him night and day.

And there came with the thought the memory of another face, his sister in blood, lost to him for ever. Was Fate about to deal him another blow even worse than the first? Cleoné was dead. Was the time coming when the best thing that he could wish for Daphne would be that she should be dead also? And was he to be sight-seeing on the Nile, curiously speculating on the history of long-past generations, while this awful tragedy of the present was working itself out at Carthage? The thought was maddening. "No!" he said to himself; "I may not be able to do anything to help, but at least I will not be taking my pleasure while they are suffering torture or death!"

It was, however, necessary to dissimulate. It was plain that Scipio was determined to have him out of the way when Carthage fell. Nor could anything, he acknowledged to himself, be more reasonable or more kind. Though he could not be supposed to feel any sense of duty to a state from which he had received such treatment, still he might well wish not to witness its final catastrophe. Of his private feelings the Roman general could have no knowledge.

His only course was to appear to acquiesce in the plan. Scipio must undoubtedly have provided for the contingency of his resistance. Polybius, he remembered, had introduced the subject with a certain hesitation, as if an objection was not impossible. He was now, Cleanor trusted, off his guard. A too prompt consent might have seemed suspicious. As it was, he reflected with satisfaction, he had shown exactly the right kind of reluctance. He had expressed regret at losing his friend's company, without giving a hint of any personal unwillingness to accept the plan.

That evening Polybius started on his return voyage. Cleanor was with him to the last moment, talking with an admirably simulated gaiety and interest of the pleasure which lay before him in exploring the Egypt of the Pharaohs.

CHAPTER XXIII.
DIPLOMACY.

THE Nile boat which had been engaged for Cleanor was lying at one of the quays which bordered a considerable part of the eastern or city shore of Lake Mareotis. The arrangement had been that it should start early in the morning of the day following the departure of Polybius. But the young man purposely delayed his appearance till late in the day, and the captain and crew, who had plenty of private affairs to occupy them for as long as their employers chose to stay, made no complaint.

It wanted but two or three hours to sunset when Cleanor at last presented himself. The captain explained that they would not have time that day to go further than the mouth of the canal which connected the lake with the river Nile. This was false. They had plenty of light to make the passage of the canal itself. But the passenger assented with an unquestioning alacrity which inspired the old rogue who owned the boat with the liveliest expectations of a lazy and prosperous voyage. Both were, in fact, equally satisfied. The captain wanted to do as little as possible, and also contemplated a final carouse at the Canal Tavern, a house famous for its wines. The passenger, who had made up his mind to leave the boat at the earliest opportunity, was glad not to be taken any further distance from the city than could be helped.

As soon as they halted for the night he summoned the old captain and had an explanation with him. He began by asking in an indifferent tone the names of the chief cities which they were to pass. The captain of course had his lesson by heart, and answered with a long list of places, adding, as he mentioned each name, the chief sights for which it was famous.

"And do you particularly wish to see all these places again?" asked the Greek with a smile.

The old man stared at him. "It is my business, my lord," he answered; "a poor trade, it is true, but it was my father's before me, and his father's too, and so on for I don't know how many generations. I don't know why I have stuck to it, for the pay is poor, but so I have. It is our way, I suppose, in Egypt."

"The pay is poor, you say," said the Greek; "but it would be better if you didn't go this voyage, and had the pay all the same."

"My lord is laughing at his servant," said the captain, staring again with eyes more wide open than ever.

"Not at all; the fact is that I have no more wish to see these places than you have."

The captain went on staring. "Then why—?" he began.

"My friends settled the matter for me; but I would sooner stay where I am."

"I understand," said the captain, closing one eye entirely, and diminishing the other to its natural size. "I understand. You have a friend, a young friend, I daresay, and you don't think that this is a good time for a long voyage."

Cleanor saw that the captain had his own ideas of what was keeping him in Alexandria, and did not care to disabuse him. After all, he reflected, he was not quite wrong. He nodded.

"You are right, my lord. These cities and temples and tombs up the river are very fine, but they will be just as fine ten, twenty, thirty years hence. You can't say that of youth. It passes, my lord, it passes, and you must enjoy it while you can. But what am I to say? I have been paid to take you up to Philæ, and, if you wish it, as far as the Second Cataract. I signed the agreement before a notary. He knows all about it; other people know it. What am I to say when they find me loitering about here and your lordship not to be seen? You will hardly believe it, but there are positively people so wicked that they will say I murdered you to get the money without making the journey."

Cleanor did believe that there were such people, and thought to himself that the captain did not look altogether like a man to whom such things were impossible.

"Oh!" said he, "I will set that all right. I will sign a paper before the chief of the village, or anyone else that will serve, to say that I was compelled by urgent private business, which kept me in Alexandria, to give up my proposed voyage. You will be able to show that to any one who may be curious enough to inquire."

And this was actually done. The village headman was called on for his services, and witnessed a declaration on the part of Cleanor that he released the captain of the Sphinx from his contract to carry him to Philæ and the Second Cataract, and that he claimed no compensation or return of the money or of any part of it for the non-fulfilment of the conditions. This done, he made the captain and crew a present of a gold piece, and saw with satisfaction that they departed to expend it at the Canal Tavern. Shortly afterwards Cleanor hired a small rowing-boat, and before long found himself again in Alexandria.

As to his general plan of operations he was quite clear. There was only one plan of getting into Carthage. It was full of risk, but still it was practicable. A brisk trade was being carried on from Alexandria in blockade-running. Corn had long been at famine prices in the besieged city. What was worth an ounce of silver on an Alexandrian quay could be sold for at least half an ounce of gold in the markets of Carthage. If only one ship-load out of three succeeded in escaping the Roman galleys a magnificent profit was realized. The average of those ships that ran the blockade was not smaller; it was probably higher. The new harbour-mouth gave, as has been explained, a better chance.

Cleanor, then, was resolved to make his venture in a blockade-running corn-ship. The question was, what disguise should he use? Fortune had done something for him. The wound in his thigh had given him a limp. During his illness a slight beard and a fairly thick moustache had grown. These things meant a considerable change. More was effected by a brown dye which gave him the complexion of an Arab. The character that he thought it best to assume was that of pedlar. He provided himself with suitable clothing and a pack, which last, however, he left for the present unfilled.

As Egypt was in alliance with Rome the traders that followed the business of blockade-running had to affect a certain disguise. The cargoes were consigned to dealers in Italian ports, and the ships themselves actually shaped their course for Italy, and kept on it as long as possible, so as to minimize to the utmost the chances of capture. The event of a passenger offering himself was rare, for the destination of this class of corn-ships was an open secret. If, however, one chanced to come, the captain could hardly refuse a passage. If he was exceptionally honest he might put difficulties in the way; commonly he left the stranger to find out his mistake, taking the precaution of having the passage-money paid in advance.

Cleanor, who had put up for the night at a little tavern close to the water-side, picked up a little information from the talk which was going on round him. Improving his acquaintance with a sailor, who seemed the most respectable of the somewhat miscellaneous company at the tavern, he learnt a good deal more. Finally his new friend offered to introduce him to the captain of the Sea-mew, a blockade-runner which was intending to sail the following day.

"Dioscorides," said the sailor, "is an honest man in his way. He would have taken your passage-money for Rhegium, it is true, and made no scruple about carrying you to Carthage. That, you might say, is scarcely fair. But then you are quite safe with him. He won't cut your throat and throw you overboard for the sake of your pack. That's what I call honesty in a sea-captain. If you want to find a finer article, you will hardly get it on this side of the Pillars of Hercules. We will go on board at the last moment, and I will give him a hint that it is all straight."

The object of going on board so late was to show that the person proposing himself as a passenger had no idea of lodging an information against the ship with the agent of the Roman Republic.

On the following day, accordingly, this programme was carried out. The Sea-mew was taking on board the water wanted for the voyage, a part of the preparations naturally left to the last, when Cleanor and his friend reached the quay. A grizzled veteran, whose face was tanned by the suns and winds of some fifty years of voyaging, was receiving his last instructions from a keen-looking man, whose pale and unhealthy-looking skin spoke of long confinement to the desk and the counting-house. The conference over, Cleanor was introduced.

"My young friend here," said the sailor, "is going the same way as you are. Cleanor, this is Dioscorides, the captain of the Sea-mew. You could not sail with a better man; and you," he went on, turning to the captain, "will find him an agreeable and accommodating passenger." The word "accommodating" was emphasized by a wink.

"Good!" said the captain; "come and see your quarters. That is the last water-cask, and now we are off."

He led the way as he spoke to the gangway that connected the quay-side with the deck. In five minutes more the Sea-mew was on her way westward.

A little after noon, the Sea-mew being now fairly started and making good way with a strong breeze that was almost dead aft, the captain invited his passenger to come below. The cabin was not spacious,—for the vessel, though carrying cargo, was built for speed, her owners having had in view the more risky kinds of trade,—but it was well furnished, and the meal that was spread on the table was almost sumptuous. The captain did not fail to observe his passenger's look of surprise.

"In this business," he said, "a mina or two this way or that does not make much odds. It is no use to save when you are going either to make your fortune or be drowned, or, it may be, hanged."

"Possibly," replied Cleanor; "but a passenger is not in the same case. I am afraid that such fare will not suit my modest means."

"Don't trouble yourself on that score," returned the captain. "Suppose we say fifty drachmas for your passage-money, and ten more as a present to the crew, if the voyage turns out to your liking."

"I am afraid that you will not gain much by me on these terms," said Cleanor as he produced the money, which he had carefully made up out of a variety of coins. He thought it safer to avoid any appearance of wealth.

The voyage which followed was prosperous in the extreme. A west wind, with just a touch of south in it, carried the Sea-mew towards Italy, which, as has been said, was nominally her destination, with a quite surprising regularity of speed. She seldom made more than six miles in the hour, but she did this day and night with little variation, and without a single drawback. Her course lay just within view of the African shore till Cyrene was sighted. Then the captain struck a bolder course, nor did they come again within sight of land till a little object showed itself in the northern horizon which was speedily identified as Malta. Not long after they spoke a coral-fisher's boat, from which they learnt that a Roman squadron, with the commander-in-chief on board, had passed a couple of days before.

"If that is so," said the captain, "I shall steer straight for Carthage. We are likely to have a clear course. It is scarcely likely that the Roman cruisers will be prowling about for prizes in the wake of their own squadron."

As they sat together at their supper, the only officer who messed with them having gone on deck to superintend the setting of another sail, the captain said to Cleanor:

"Don't suppose that I want to intrude on your private affairs, and if my questions are inconvenient, or you have any reason whatever for declining to say anything more about yourself, don't hesitate to tell me. I sha'n't be offended or think the worse of you for it. On the other hand, I may be able to help you or give you a hint. Now, to be quite frank, I can't make you out. You wish to pass as a pedlar—excuse my plainness of speech. Now, you are no more a pedlar than I am; not so much, indeed, for you have never, I should say, either bought or sold anything in your life. You talk like a gentleman. I could not do it myself, but I know the real thing when I hear it. Now, what does it mean?"

Cleanor had been long prepared for some such question as this. When he adopted his disguise he had vaguely counted on being one among a crowd of passengers, and able to keep himself as much in the background as he pleased. In such a situation he might have sustained his character with fair success. But it was a very different thing to sit tête-à-tête for a fortnight together with a shrewd man of business, who had been accustomed to mix with all sorts and conditions of passengers. Cleanor had felt from the first that it would be useless to maintain the pretence, and he was prepared to abandon it if he should be challenged. But he was not prepared to tell his true story. He had devised what he could not help thinking a very plausible substitute for it.

"You are quite right, my good friend," he said, "I am not a pedlar. Still, I hope to do a good stroke of business in Carthage."

"Business!" said the captain, opening his eyes wide. "I fancy this is a poor time for business there."

"For buying, doubtless—I suppose they have to keep all their money for food—but not for selling. That is what I am after. I have had a commission from someone whose name I must not mention to buy books."

"Books!" repeated the old sailor in unfeigned astonishment; "who in the world wants to buy books?"

"Well," said Cleanor, "there are people who have the taste. There are some very valuable things of the kind in Carthage, taken, most of them, from Greek cities in Sicily. My employer thought it a good opportunity for picking up some bargains, and he has made it worth my while to go. You see, books are not like gold and jewels. Most people don't see anything in them. You yourself, though you have seen a good deal of the world, could not understand anyone buying them. I am not likely, you see, to be interfered with."

The sailor shrugged his shoulders.

"Well," he said, "everyone to his taste. However, now I understand how it is that you don't talk like other pedlars. Good luck go with you!"

The captain was right in supposing that the sea would be clear in the wake of the Roman squadron. He now matured a very bold design, which wanted for its successful accomplishment only one element of good fortune, an absolutely favourable wind. The Sea-mew was one of the fastest sailers in the Mediterranean, and with her own wind, which was a point or so off aft, could do what she liked even with a well-manned ship of war. The captain's plan was to hang closely, but just out of range, on the skirts of the Roman squadron as they neared their destination. This he could do without difficulty. Twenty galleys presented a larger object to him than he to them, and he reckoned, with a confidence that was not misplaced, that they would not keep a very careful look-out aft. If a solitary sail was to heave in sight for a moment it would probably attract no attention.

What was wanted was the right wind, and this, to his great joy, he got just when it was wanted. The breeze, which for some hours had been due north, shifted to W.N.W. The weather thickened a little, and to make the lucky combination complete, the voyage came to an end a little after nightfall. The Sea-mew, which for some hours had been keeping, under shelter of the failing light, within two miles of the Roman squadron, now came up close to the rearward galley. In the preoccupation of the time she was practically unobserved. The Sea-mew was built almost on war-ship lines, and was flying Roman colours. No one certainly supposed for a moment that she was an Alexandrian blockade-runner.

Two hours afterwards she was safe in the harbour of Carthage, and the captain—he was owner as well as master—had realized a handsome fortune. He had shipped one hundred and fifty tons of wheat and as much barley at Alexandria, the wheat at one mina and a half50 per ton, and the barley for half as much, and he now sold the wheat for eight and the barley for five minas per ton. The crew had a fourth of the gross profits divided between them, but enough was left to enable the captain to give up this very perilous kind of business for good and all.

"If I tempt the gods again after this I deserve to be crucified," he said to his chief officer; and he kept his word.

CHAPTER XXIV.
IN SORE NEED.

CLEANOR succeeded in landing without attracting, as far as he knew, any observation. He lent a hand to the disembarking of the cargo of the Sea-mew, and after going to and fro between the ship and the warehouse some half-dozen times, quietly slipped away. It was now far on towards midnight. The rest of the night he spent in a shed. This gave him shelter; of food he had been careful to provide as large a supply as he could conveniently carry. He foresaw an immediate use for it.

Rising—it cannot be said waking, as he scarcely slept during the whole night—as soon as the earliest light of dawn made its way into his resting-place, he made his way out of the inclosure which surrounded the docks by an exit which he had observed during his sojourn in the city, and had noted for possible use in the future. He was still fortunate enough not to be seen.

This done, he soon made his way to the street where he remembered the house of his foster-mother, Theoxena, to be situated. It was still early morning, and but very few persons were about, these being almost entirely women, who were fetching water from the public fountain at the end of the street. He was not long in recognizing among these his foster-mother, and it went to his heart to see how pale and wasted she looked, and how slowly and painfully she moved under the slight burden of the pitcher which she carried upon her shoulder.

He was careful not to betray himself by look or movement, for he was anxious to know whether his disguise was successful. If her eyes, sharpened by a love that was almost as strong as a mother's, did not discover him, he felt that he was safe, and on this not only his own life but the power to help others depended. He passed her slowly, exaggerating a little the limp caused by his lameness. She looked at him twice, the second time, he thought, with a momentary awakening of interest, which, however, died away almost as soon as it appeared.

And now chance gave him a fully convincing proof of how completely she had failed to recognize him. At the very moment of his passing she made a slight stumble, her feebleness probably causing her to drag her feet. The pitcher shook upon her shoulder, and was in imminent danger of falling. Cleanor caught it with his hand, and steadied it till she had recovered herself. She looked at him with a little smile of thanks, murmured a few words of acknowledgment of his help, and passed on, in what was evidently complete ignorance of his identity.

This was proof enough for Cleanor. Looking round and hastily satisfying himself that there was no one near, he murmured "Theoxena". She started and looked at him, but still without recognition, for his voice was disguised. The art of doing this was an accomplishment in which he was almost perfect; and indeed, the most elaborate dressing up of features and figure is of but little avail without the disguised voice.

"What, mother Theoxena," he added in his natural tones, "don't you know your son?"

In a moment her face beamed with delighted recognition. Pressing his finger on his lips to enjoin silence, he stepped up to her door, which, happily, was close at hand. Had it taken her more than two or three steps to reach it she must have fallen in the street. As it was, he had almost to lift her across the threshold, and to put her in one of the two chairs which formed part of the very scanty furniture of the room. Seeing that she wanted help, he ventured to call out the name of Daphne.

In a few seconds the girl appeared. She was dressing, and had been about to bind up her hair when she was startled by the sudden call. Her locks—cut short, the reader will remember, to furnish the string of a bow—had grown enough to fall over her shoulders, and were even more luxuriant and brilliant than ever. But her face was a piteous contrast to their splendour—so pale, so wasted, so worn with suffering was it. The eyes, which had haunted the young man's memory, looked larger than before, so shrunk were her cheeks, and their look was pathetic beyond expression. She seemed scarcely to observe the presence of a stranger, but flew to her mother's side and busied herself with the task of restoring her to consciousness.

When Theoxena began to revive, Cleanor put a few drops of a strong cordial wine which he carried in a flask between her lips, and had the pleasure of seeing a faint tinge of colour show itself in her cheeks. In a few minutes more she was sufficiently recovered to sit up. Cleanor would not permit her to talk.

"Not a word," he said; "you are not strong enough yet. You must be satisfied for the present with seeing me alive and well. The rest we can postpone. Do you think she could eat something?" he went on, turning to the girl.

Poor Daphne's eyes filled with tears. "We have nothing in the house, sir," she said. "We had a little crust of rye-bread at noon yesterday, but she said that she was not hungry, and made me eat nearly all of it."

Cleanor was horrified. He had expected to find them in great want, but this actual starvation was worse than he had looked for. He glanced hastily round the room. He had already noticed that it was very bare. He now saw that it had been stripped of almost everything. Daphne observed his look, and explained.

"We have had to sell nearly all the furniture for food, and oh, sir, they give so little for the things! I know that money is very scarce, and the dealers are quite besieged with people who want to sell their furniture and clothes, but I can't help thinking that they cheat me because I am a girl and cannot help myself. Six days ago I sold mother's bed for eight drachmas—I remember her telling me that it cost thirty—and the eight were only enough to buy two rye-loaves and two anchovies. Poor mother does find it so hard to eat the bread alone. These lasted us till yesterday. We should have had nothing but for the old man who lives next door. He had a grandson who used to play with our little Cephalus. The dear little boy died about a month ago, and the old man always will make us have what he calls the child's portion. It has been getting to be very small lately, for the old man's pension is not large, and money buys less and less every day. But I don't know what we should have done without it."

"Well," said Cleanor, "you will have me to help you now. I suppose, by the way, you remember who I am?"

"Yes, sir," replied the girl; "it was you that were so kind to us about Cephalus."

"You ought to have remembered, then, to call me not 'sir' but brother; or, better still, Cleanor. But now about food. This will be better than nothing for the present."

He produced from the pack which he carried some twice-baked bread, something like what we call biscuit, and some strips of dried goat's flesh. It was pitiful to see how the girl tried to hide the eager look which would come into her eyes at the sight of the food. The elder woman had almost ceased to care for life, but youth protests against suffering and will make its voice heard.