The gladiators were pausing from their toil. Brawny chests heaved and panted, deep voices laughed and swore with returning breath; strong arms looked heavier and stronger as the athlete rested his wide hands upon his hips, and not unconsciously brought his huge muscles into full relief in the attitude. Esca and his late antagonist were wiping the sweat from their brows, and looking at one another with wistful eyes, as if by no means loth to renew the contest, so equally had the last bout been waged. Hirpinus laid down the weighty clubs he had been wielding, with a grunt of relief. No unpractised arm could have lifted those cumbrous instruments from the ground, yet they were but as reeds in the hands of the gladiator; nevertheless, he lamented piteously the tendency of his mighty frame to increasing bulk, which rendered such heavy and uninteresting work necessary to fit him for the arena.
“By the body of Hercules!” complained the giant, “I would I were but such a half-starved ape as thou, my Lutorius! See what the master calls training for a man of some solidity, and thank the gods that an hour’s girls’-play with sword and buckler is enough to keep that slender waist of thine within the compass of a knight’s finger-ring.”
“Girls’-play, call you it?” answered Lutorius. “In faith ’tis a game that would put thy fat carcass on the sand, from sheer want of breath, in a quarter of the time. No more girls’-play for us, my lads, till after the feast of Ceres. The school will be thinner then, or I am mistaken. How many pairs are promised by the Consul for this coming bout? I heard the crier tell us in the street, but I have forgotten.”
“One hundred at least, for sword and buckler alone. And twenty of them out of the Family!” answered Euchenor readily, and with a malicious smile. His profession as a boxer freed him from any fatal apprehensions; but he took none the less pleasure in recalling to his comrades the more [pg 136]deadly nature of their encounters. Rufus alone looked grave; perhaps he was thinking of his wife and children while he listened; perhaps that humble cottage in the Apennines seemed farther off than ever, and the more desirable on that account. The others smiled grimly, and a wolfish expression gleamed for an instant from their eyes—all but Esca, whose glowing young face displayed only courage, excitement, and hope.
“Bird of ill-omen!” said Hippias sternly. “What do you know of the clash of steel? Keep to your own boys’-play, and do not meddle with the game that draws blood at every stroke. I think I am master here!”
Euchenor would have answered sullenly, but a knock at the door arrested his attention. As it swung open, to the surprise of all, and of none more than Esca, Calchas stood before them.
“Salve!” said the old man kindly, as he looked around, his venerable head and calm dignified bearing contrasting nobly with the brute strength and coarser faces of the gladiators. “Salve!” he repeated, smiling at the astonishment his appearance seemed to call forth.
Hippias was not lacking in a certain rough courtesy of the camp. He advanced to the new-comer, bade him welcome as a stranger, and inquired the cause of his visit; “for,” said he, “judging by your looks, O my father! it can scarcely be a mission connected either with me or my disciples here, whose trade, you may observe, is war.”
“I too am a soldier,” answered Calchas quietly, looking the astonished fencing-master full in the face. The gladiators had by this time gathered round; like schoolboys at play they were ripe for mischief, and, like schoolboys, it needed but the merest trifle to urge them into any extreme, either of good or evil.
“A soldier!” exclaimed Euchenor, “then you fear not steel!”—at the same moment he snatched a short two-edged sword from the wall, and delivered a thrust with it full at the old man’s breast. Calchas moved not a muscle; his colour neither rose nor fell; his eyelash never quivered as he looked steadily at the Greek, who probably only intended a brutal jest, and cared but little how dangerous might be its result. The point had reached the folds of the visitor’s gown, when Rufus dashed it aside with his hand, while Hippias dealt the offender a buffet, which sent him reeling to the opposite wall.
“What now?” exclaimed the professor, in a tone with [pg 137]which a man rates a disobedient hound. “What now? Am I not master here?”
The others looked on approvingly. The jest was well suited to their habits. They were amused at the discomfiture of the Greek, and pleased with the coolness shown by an old man of such unwarlike exterior. Esca, however, strode up to his friend’s side, and glared about him in a manner that boded no good to the originator of any more such aggressions, either in sport or earnest.
“Thou hast hurt the youth,” remarked Calchas, in as unmoved a tone as would have become the fiercest gladiator of the school. “Thou hast hurt him, and he was but in jest after all. In truth, Hippias, I have not seen so goodly a buffet dealt since I came to Rome. That arm of thine can strike to some purpose, and thy pupils are, like their master, brave, and strong, and skilful. I have heard of the legion called Invincible, surely I have found it here. My sons, are you not the Invincibles?”
He spoke so quietly they knew not whether he was jesting with them; but the flattering title tickled their ears pleasantly enough, and the gladiators crowded round him, with shouts of encouragement and mirth.
“Invincibles!” they laughed. “Invincibles! Well said, old man! yes, we are the Invincibles. Who can stand against the Family? Hast come to join us? We shall have plenty of space in the ranks ere another moon be old.”
“Give him a sword, one of you!” exclaimed Rufus; “let us see what he can do with Lutorius. The Gaul has had a bellyful already; press him, old man, and he must go down!”
“Nay, let him have a bout with the wooden foils,” laughed Hirpinus. “He is but young and tender. He would sicken at the sight of blood.”
“Or a cast with the net and trident,” continued Manlius.
“Or a round with the cestus,” observed Euchenor; adding with a sneer, “I myself am ready to exchange a buffet or two with him, for sheer goodwill.”
“Hold! my new comrades,” interposed Esca, with rising colour. “In my country we are taught to venerate grey hairs. If ye are so keen for cestus, lance, and sword-play, here am I, untried and inexperienced, willing to stand against the best of you, from now till sundown.”
The gladiators gathered round the last speaker somewhat angrily; the challenge was indeed a bold one in such company, and a contest begun in play amongst those [pg 138]turbulent spirits, might end, not improbably, in too fatal earnest; but Hippias cut the matter short by commanding silence, in loud imperious tones, and, turning to the new-comer, bade him state at once the business that had brought him there and have done with it.
“I came here,” said the old man, looking round with a glance of mingled pity and admiration; “I came here to see, with my own eyes, the band of Invincibles. I have already told you that I too am a soldier, whose duty it is to go down, if need be, daily unto death.”
There was something so quiet and earnest in the speaker’s manner, such an absence of self-consciousness or apprehension, a sincerity and goodwill so frank and evident, that the rude fierce men whom he addressed could not but give him their attention. There was all the interest of novelty in beholding one whose appearance and habits were so at variance with their own, thus throwing himself fearlessly on their forbearance, and trusting, as it were, to that higher nature, which, dormant though it might be, each man felt to exist within himself. Even Hippias acknowledged the influence of his visitor’s confidence, and answered graciously enough—
“If you are a soldier, I need not tell you that we are but on the drill-ground here. You will see my band to better advantage when they defile by Cæsar at the games of Ceres.”
Calchas looked inquiringly round.
“And the chorus,” said he, “that I have heard ring out in such a warlike tone, as your ranks marched past the imperial chair; are you perfect in it, my friends? Do you practise the chant as you do your sword-play and your wrestling?”
He had fixed their attention now. Half-interested, half-amused at his strange persistency, they looked laughingly at each other, and their deep voices burst out into the wild and thrilling cadence of their fatal dirge—
Ave, Cæsar! Morituri te salutant!
As the last notes died away, silence pervaded the school; to the rudest and most reckless, there was something suggestive in the sounds they knew too well would be the last music they should hear on earth. Calchas turned suddenly upon Hippias.
“And the wages Cæsar gives your men?” said he; “since he buys them body and bones, they must be very costly. How many thousand sesterces doth he pay for each?”
A brutal laugh echoed round him at the question.
[pg 139]“Sesterces!” answered Hippias. “Nay; Cæsar’s generosity provides handsomely for the training and nourishment of his swordsmen.”
“True enough!” added Rufus, at which there was another laugh. “He finds us in meat, and drink, and burial!”
“No more?” said Calchas. “Yet I have been told that in Rome everything fetches its price; but little did I think such men as these could be bought for less money than a Syrian dancing-girl, or a senator’s white horses. So you are willing to toil day after day, harder than the peasant on the hillside, or the oarsman in the galley, to live simply, temperately, ay, virtuously, for months together, and then to face certain death, often in its ghastliest form, for the wages a Roman citizen gives his meanest slave—a morsel of meat and a draught of wine! If you conquer in the struggle, a branch of palm may be added to a handful of silver, and you deem your reward is more than enough. Truly, I am old and feeble, these hands are little worth to strike or parry, yet would I grudge to sell this worn-out body of mine at so mean a price.”
“You told us you were a soldier,” observed Rufus, on whom the argument of relative value seemed to make no slight impression.
“So I am,” replied Calchas; “but not at such a low rate of pay as yours. My duties are not heavy. I am not forced to toil all day, nor to watch all night. My head aches with no weighty helmet; breastplate and greaves of steel do not gall my body nor cumber my limbs. I have neither trench to dig, nor mound to raise, nor eagles to guard. I need not stand, like you, against my comrade and my friend, with my point at his throat, and slay the man who has been to me even as a brother, lest he slay me. Yet, though my labours be so easy, and my service be so deficient and inadequate, all the gold and jewels you have seen glistening in a triumph, all the treasures of Cæsar and of Rome, would not equal the reward I hope to earn.”
The gladiators looked from one to the other with glances of astonishment and curiosity. This was a subject that spoke to their personal interest, and roused their feelings accordingly.
“Are there vacancies in your ranks, comrade?” asked Hirpinus, using the military form of speech habitually affected by his profession. “Will you enrol a man of muscle like myself, who has been looking all his life for a [pg 140]service in which there is little to do and plenty to get? Take my word for it, you will not long want for recruits.”
“There is room for all, and to spare,” answered Calchas, raising his voice till it rung through every corner of the building. “My Captain will enlist you freely, and without reserve. Only you come to Him and range yourselves under His banner, and stand by Him for a few short watches, a week, a month, a decade or two of years at the most, and He will stand by you when Cæsar and his legions are scattered to the four winds of heaven; ay, and long after that, for ages and ages rolling on in a circle that has no end! Will you come, brave hearts? I have authority to receive you, man by man.”
“Where is your Captain?” asked Hirpinus. “He must needs have a large following. Is he here in Rome? Can we see him ere we take the oaths and raise the standard? Comrades!” he added, looking round, “this old man speaks as though he were in earnest. Nay, he would scarcely dare to laugh in our very beards!”
“You might have seen Him,” answered Calchas, “not forty years ago, as I myself did, on the sunny plains of Syria. You will not see Him now, till a pinch of dust has been sprinkled on your brow, and the death-penny put into your mouth. Then, when you have crossed the dark river, He will be waiting for you on the other side.”
The gladiators looked at one another. “What means he?” said they. “Is he mad?” “Is he an augur?” “Doth he deal in magic?” Rufus reared his tall head above the throng. “Would you have us believe in what we cannot see?” was the apposite question of that practical swordsman. The old man drew his mantle round his shoulders with the air of one who prepares for argument. All he wanted was a fair hearing.
“Which is the nobler gift,” he asked, “a strong body, or a gallant heart? Ye have fought many times, most of you, in the arena. Answer me truly—which is the conqueror, courage or strength?”
“Courage,” they exclaimed, with one voice; all except Euchenor, who muttered something about skill and good fortune being preferable to either.
“And yet you cannot see it,” resumed Calchas. “Will you therefore argue that it cannot exist? Is there one of you here that doth not feel a something wanting to complete his daily existence? Why do you long for the smiles of women, and the bubble of the winecup? Why can you [pg 141]not rest when the training of to-day is over, for thinking of the labours of to-morrow? Why are you always anxious, always anticipating, always dissatisfied? Because a man consists of two parts, the body and the spirit; because his life is made up of two phases, the present and the future. Your bodies belong to Cæsar, let him have them to do with them what he likes, to-day, to-morrow, at the games of Ceres, at the feast of Neptune, what matter? But the spirit, the man within you, is your own. He it is who doth not wince when the javelin pierces to the quick, or the wild beast rends to the marrow. He it is who quails not when the level sweep of sand seems to rock beneath him, and heave up against his face; when the white garments and eager faces of the crowd spin round him faster and faster as they fade upon his darkening eye. He is the better man of the two, and he will live for ever. Shall you not provide for him? What is your present? Much trouble, many hours of toil. A foot or two of steel in the hand, and a dash at a comrade’s throat, then a back-fall below the equestrian benches, and so the future begins. Do you think there is nothing better there than old Charon’s ferry-boat, and the pale misty banks of the uncertain river? I know the way to a golden land far brighter and fairer than the fabled islands of the West. There is a high wall round it, and the gate is low and narrow; but the key stands in the lock, and you need no death-penny to purchase entrance for the poorest of you. Go to the door in rags, with no other possession but the hope and trust that you may crawl in upon your knees, and it opens ere you have knocked.”
Something in each man’s heart told him, as he listened, that if he could but believe this, the conviction was worth more than all the treasures of the empire put together. Liable as were these gladiators to stand in the jaws of death at a day’s notice, there was something inexpressibly elevating in the idea that the supreme moment which the most careless of them could not but sometimes picture to himself, was the mere passage to a nobler state of existence. The words of a man who is telling what he himself implicitly believes to be the truth, carry with them no small amount of persuasion; and when Calchas paused, the swordsmen looked doubtingly at him with eyes in which incredulity and admiration were strangely mingled; not without a certain wistful gleam of hope. Hippias, indeed, whose tastes inclined him to materialism, and his reflections to utter disbelief in every[pg 142]thing save the temper of a blade, seemed disposed to cut the matter short, as being a waste of valuable time; but the anxiety of his pupils, and especially of Esca, to hear more of the glowing promises held out, induced him to fold his arms and listen, with a smile of conscious superiority, not devoid of contempt.
“And the Captain who leads us?” asked the Gaul, after a whisper and a push from Hirpinus. “What of him? Your promises are fair enough, I grant you, but I would fain know with whom I serve.”
Not one of them but noted the gleam on the old man’s face, as he replied—
“The Captain went up to death with a patient, calm, and kindly face, for you, and you, and you, and me—for those who had never seen Him; for those who mistrusted Him; for those who failed Him, and turned back from Him at His need. Nay, for those who tortured and slew Him, and whom He forgave with the free full forgiveness of a God!—ay, of a God! Which of your gods has done as much for you? When did one of them leave their Mount Olympus, save for some human need, or some human mission of bloodshed and crime? Where is the king who would give up an earthly throne, and go voluntarily to a shameful death for the sake of his people? You are men, my friends—brave, resolute, hearty men; what would you have in him whom you serve? courage, patience, mercy, goodwill to all? What think ye of Him who left the rulership of the whole universe, and went so willingly to die, that He might buy you to be His own here and hereafter? Come and range yourselves under His standard. I will tell you of Him day by day. There is no jealousy amongst His soldiers. The service is easy; He has told us so Himself; and neither mine nor any mortal tongue can calculate the reward.”
“Enough of this!” interrupted Hippias, noting the eager looks and excited gestures of the swordsmen; interpreting, as he did, the words of Calchas in their literal sense, and fearing lest he might, indeed, lose the services of the daring band, on whose blood it was his trade to live. “Enough of this, old man! We have heard you patiently, and now begone! My gladiators have enlisted under Cæsar, and they will not desert their standard for any inducement you can offer. I know not why I have listened to you so long; but trespass not further on my forbearance. This building is no Athenian school of rhetoric; and the only arguments acknowledged by Hippias, are those which may be parried [pg 143]with two foot of steel. Nevertheless, go in peace, old man, and fare you well.”
So Calchas went out from amongst these fierce and turbulent spirits, unharmed and well satisfied. He had sown a handful of the good seed, and knew that somewhere it would take root. More than one of the gladiators was already pondering on his words; and the young Briton, with his ardent nature, his kind heart, and his predisposition in favour of Mariamne’s kinsman, had resolved that he would hear more of these new doctrines, which seemed to dawn upon him like light from another world.
A hundred thousand tongues, whispering and murmuring with Italian volubility, send up a busy hum like that of an enormous beehive into the sunny air. The Flavian amphitheatre, Vespasian’s gigantic concession to the odious tastes of his people, has not yet been constructed; and Rome must crowd and jostle in the great circus, if she would behold that slaughter of beasts, and those mortal combats of men, in which she now takes far more delight than in the innocent trials of speed and skill for which the enclosure was originally designed. That her luxurious citizens are dissatisfied even with this roomy edifice, is sufficiently obvious from the many complaints that accompany the struggling and pushing of those who are anxious to obtain a good place. To-day’s bill-of-fare is indeed tempting to the morbid appetites of high and low. A rhinoceros and tiger are to be pitted against each other; and it is hoped that, notwithstanding many recent failures in such combats, these two beasts may be savage enough to afford the desired sport. Several pairs of gladiators, at least, are to fight to the death, besides those on whom the populace may show mercy, or from whom they may withhold it at will. In addition to all this, it has been whispered that one well-known patrician intends to exhibit his prowess on the deadly stage. Much curiosity is expressed, and many a wager has been already laid, on his name, his skill, the nature of his conflict, and the chances of his success. Though the circus be large enough to contain the population of a thriving city, no wonder that it is to-day full to the very brim. As usual in such assemblages, the hours of waiting are lightened by eating and drinking, by jests, practical and otherwise, by remarks, complimentary, sarcastic, or derisive, on the several notabilities who enter at short intervals, and take their places with no small stir and assumption of importance. The nobility and distinguished [pg 145]characters of this dissolute age are better known than respected by their plebeian fellow-citizens.
There is, however, one exception. Though Valeria’s Liburnians lay themselves open to no small amount of insolence, by the emphatic manner in which they make way for their mistress, as she proceeds with her usual haughty bearing to her place near the patrician benches—an insolence of which some of the more pointed missiles do not spare the scornful beauty herself—it is no sooner observed that she is accompanied by her kinsman, Licinius, than a change comes over the demeanour even of those who feel themselves most aggrieved, by being elbowed out of their places, and pushed violently against their neighbours, while admiring glances and a respectful silence denote the esteem in which the Roman general is held by high and low.
It wants a few minutes yet of noon. The southern sun, though his intensity is modified by canvas awnings stretched over the spectators wherever it is possible to afford them shade, lights and warms up every nook and cranny of the amphitheatre; gleams in the raven hair of the Campanian matron, and the black eyes of the astonished urchin in her arms; flashes off the golden bosses that stud the white garments on the equestrian benches; bleaches the level sweep of sand so soon to bear the prints of mortal struggle, and flooding the lofty throne where Cæsar sits in state, deepens the broad crimson hem that skirts his imperial garment, and sheds a deathlike hue over the pale bloated face, which betrays even now no sign of interest, or animation, or delight. Vitellius attends these brutal exhibitions with the same immobility that characterises his demeanour in almost all the avocations of life. The same listlessness, the same weary vacancy of expression, pervades his countenance here, as in the senate or the council. His eye never glistens but at the appearance of a favourite dish; and the emperor of the world can only be said to live once in the twenty-four hours, when seated at the banquet.
Insensibility seems, however, in all ages to be an affectation of the higher classes; and here, while the plebeians wrangle, and laugh, and chatter, and gesticulate, the patricians are apparently bent on proving that amusement is for them a simple impossibility, and suffering or slaughter matters of the most profound indifference. And on common occasions who so impassible, so cold, so unmoved by all that takes place around her, as the haughty Valeria? but to-day there [pg 146]is an unusual gleam in the grey eyes, a quiver of the lip, a fixed red spot on either cheek; adding new charms to her beauty, not lost upon the observers who surround her.
Quoth Damasippus to Oarses (for the congenial rogues stand, as usual, shoulder to shoulder)—
“I would not that the patron saw her now. I never knew her look so fair as this. Locusta must have left her the secret of her love philtres.”
“Oh, innocent!” replies the other. “Knowest thou not that the patron fights to-day? Seest thou her restless hands, and that fixed smile, like the mask of an old Greek player? She loves him; trust me, therefore, she has lost her power, were she subtle as Arachne. Dost not know the patron? To do him justice, he never prizes the stakes when he has won the game.”
And the two fall to discussing the dinner they have brought with them, and think they are perfectly familiar with the intricacies of a woman’s feelings. Meantime Valeria seems to cling to Licinius as though there were some spell in her kinsman’s presence to calm that beating heart of which she is but now beginning to learn the wayward and indomitable nature. For the twentieth time she asks: “Is he prepared at all points? Does he know every feint of the deadly game? Are his health and strength as perfect as training can make them? And oh, my kinsman! is he confident in himself? Does he feel sure that he will win?”
To which questions, Licinius, though wondering at the interest she betrays in such a matter, answers as before—
“All that skill, and science, and Hippias can do, has been done. He has the advantage in strength, speed, and height. Above all, he has the courage of his nation. As they get fiercer they get cooler, and they are never so formidable as when you deem them vanquished. I could not sit here if I thought he would be worsted.”
Then Valeria took comfort for a while, but soon she moved restlessly on her cushions.
“How I wish they would begin!” said she; yet every moment of delay seemed at the same time to be a respite of priceless value, even while it added to the torture of suspense.
Many hearts were beating in that crowd with love, hope, fear, and anxiety; but perhaps none so wildly as those of two women, separated but by a few paces, and whose eyes some indefinable attraction seemed to draw irresistibly towards each other. While Valeria, in common with many ladies of distinction, had encroached upon the space originally [pg 147]allotted to the vestal virgins, and established, by constant attendance in the amphitheatre, a prescriptive right to a cushioned seat for herself and her friends, women of lower rank were compelled to station themselves in an upper gallery allotted to them, or to mingle on sufferance with the crowd in the lower tier of places, where the presence of a male companion was indispensable for protection from annoyance, and even insult. Nevertheless, within speaking distance of the haughty Roman lady stood Mariamne, accompanied by Calchas, trembling with fear and excitement in every limb, yet turning her large dark eyes upon Valeria, with an expression of curiosity and interest that could only have been aroused by an instinctive consciousness of feelings common to both. The latter, too, seemed fascinated by the gaze of the Jewish maiden, now bending on her a haughty and inquiring glance, anon turning away with a gesture of affected disdain; but never unobservant, for many seconds together, of the dark pale beauty and her venerable companion.
When she was at last fairly wedged in amongst the crowd, Mariamne could hardly explain to herself how she came there. It had been with great difficulty that she persuaded Calchas to accompany her; and, indeed, nothing but his interest in Esca, and the hope that he might, even here, find some means of doing good, would have tempted the old man into such a scene. It was with many a burning blush and painful thrill that she confessed to herself, she must go mad with anxiety were she absent from the death-struggle to be waged by the man whom she now knew she loved so dearly; and it was with a wild defiant recklessness that she resolved if aught of evil should befall him to give herself up thenceforth to despair. She felt as if she was in a dream; the sea of faces, the jabber of tongues, the strange novelty of the spectacle, confused and wearied her; yet through it all Valeria’s eye seemed to look down on her with an ominous boding of ill; and when, with an effort, she forced her senses back into self-consciousness, she felt so lonely, so frightened, and so unhappy, that she wished she had never come.
And now, with peal of trumpets and clash of cymbals, a burst of wild martial music rises above the hum and murmur of the seething crowd. Under a spacious archway, supported by marble pillars, wide folding-doors are flung open, and two by two, with stately step and slow, march in the gladiators, armed with the different weapons of their deadly trade. Four hundred men are they, in all the pride of perfect strength and symmetry, and high training, and practised skill. With [pg 148]head erect and haughty bearing, they defile once round the arena, as though to give the spectators an opportunity of closely scanning their appearance, and halt with military precision to range themselves in line under Cæsar’s throne. For a moment there is a pause and hush of expectation over the multitude, while the devoted champions stand motionless as statues in the full glow of noon; then bursting suddenly into action, they brandish their gleaming weapons over their heads, and higher, fuller, fiercer, rises the terrible chant that seems to combine the shout of triumph with the wail of suffering, and to bid a long and hopeless farewell to upper earth, even in the very recklessness and defiance of its despair—
“Ave, Cæsar! Morituri te salutant!”
Then they wheel out once more, and range themselves on either side of the arena; all but a chosen band who occupy the central place of honour, and of whom every second man at least is doomed to die. These are the picked pupils of Hippias; the quickest eyes and the readiest hands in the Family; therefore it is that they have been selected to fight by pairs to the death, and that it is understood no clemency will be extended to them from the populace.
With quickened breath and eager looks, Valeria and Mariamne scan their ranks in search of a well-known figure: both feel it to be a questionable relief that he is not there; but the Roman lady tears the edge of her mantle to the seam, and the Jewish girl offers an incoherent prayer in her heart, for she knows not what.
Esca’s part is not yet to be performed, and he is still in the background, preparing himself carefully for the struggle. The rest of the Family, however, muster in force. Tall Rufus stalks to his appointed station with a calm business-like air that bodes no good to his adversary, whoever he may be. He has fought too often not to feel confident in, his own invincible prowess; and when compelled to despatch a fallen foe, he will do it with sincere regret, but none the less dexterously and effectually for that. Hirpinus, too, assumes his usual air of jovial hilarity. There is a smile on his broad good-humoured face; and though, notwithstanding the severity of his preparation, his huge muscles are still a trifle too full and lusty, he will be a formidable antagonist for any fighter whose proportions are less than those of a Hercules. As the crowd pass the different combatants in review, none, with the exception perhaps of Rufus, have more backers than their old favourite. Lutorius, too, notwithstanding his Gallic origin, [pg 149]which places him but one remove, as it were, from a barbarian, finds no slight favour with those who pride themselves on their experience in such matters. His great activity and endurance, combined with thorough knowledge of his weapon, have made him the victor in many a public contest. As Damasippus observes to his friend, “Lutorius can always tire out an adversary and despatch him at leisure;” to which Oarses replies, “If he be pitted to-day against Manlius, I will wager thee a thousand sesterces blood is not drawn in the first three assaults.”
The pairs had already been decided by lot; but amongst the score of combatants who were to fight to the death, these formidable champions were the most celebrated, and as such the especial favourites of the populace. Certain individuals in the crowd, who were sufficiently familiar with the gladiators to exchange a word of greeting, and to call them by their names, derived, in consequence, no small increase of importance amongst the bystanders. The swordsmen, although now ranged in order round the arena, are destined, for a time at least, to remain inactive. The sports are to commence with a combat between a lately imported rhinoceros, and a Libyan tiger, already familiarly known to the public, as having destroyed two or three Christian victims and a negro slave. It is only in the event of these animals being unwilling to fight, or becoming dangerous to the spectators, that Hippias will call in the assistance of his pupils for their destruction. In the meantime, they have an excellent view of the conflict, though perhaps it might be seen in greater comfort from the farther and safer side of the barrier.
Vitellius, with a feeble inclination of his head, signs to begin, and a portable wooden building which has been wheeled into the lists, creating no little curiosity, is now taken to pieces by a few strokes of the hammer. As the slaves carry away the dismembered boards, with the rapidity of men in terror of their lives, a huge, unwieldy beast stands disclosed, and the rhinoceros of which they have been talking for the last week bursts on the delighted eyes of the Roman public. These are perhaps a little disappointed at first, for the animal seems peaceably, not to say indolently, disposed. Taking no notice of the shouts which greet his appearance, he digs his horned muzzle into the sand in search of food, as though secure in the overlapping plates of armour that sway loosely on his enormous body, with every movement of his huge ungainly limbs. So intent are the spectators on this rare monster, that their attention is only directed to the [pg 150]farther end of the arena by the restlessness which the rhinoceros at length exhibits. He stamps angrily with his broad flat feet, his short pointed tail is furiously agitated, and the gladiators who are near him observe that his little eye is glowing like a coal. A long, low, dark object lies coiled up under the barrier as though seeking shelter, nor is it till the second glance that Valeria, whose interest, in common with that of the multitude, is fearfully excited, can make out the fawning, cruel head, the glaring eyes, and the striped sinewy form of the Libyan tiger.
In vain the people wait for him to commence the attack. Although he is sufficiently hungry, having been kept for more than a day without food, it is not his nature to carry on an open warfare. Damasippus and Oarses jeer him loudly as he skulks under the barrier; and Calchas cannot forbear whispering to Mariamne, that “a curse has been on the monster since he tore the brethren limb from limb, in that very place, for the glory of the true faith.” The rhinoceros, however, seems disposed to take the initiative; with a short labouring trot he moves across the arena, leaving such deep footprints behind him, as sufficiently attest his enormous bulk and weight. There is a flash like real fire from the tiger’s eyes, hitherto only sullen and watchful—his waving tail describes a semicircle in the sand—and he coils himself more closely together, with a deep low growl; even now he is not disposed to fight save at an advantage.
A hundred thousand pairs of eyes, straining eagerly on the combatants, could scarce detect the exact moment at which that spring was made. All they can now discern is the broad mailed back of the rhinoceros swaying to and fro, as he kneels upon his enemy, and the grating of the tiger’s claws against the huge beast’s impenetrable armour can be heard in the farthest corner of the gallery that surrounds the amphitheatre. The leap was made as the rhinoceros turned his side for an instant towards his adversary; but with a quickness marvellous in a beast of such prodigious size, he moved his head round in time to receive it on the massive horn that armed his nose, driving the blunt instrument, from sheer muscular strength, right through the body of the tiger, and finishing his work by falling on him with his knees, and pressing his life out under that enormous weight. Then he rose unhurt, and blew the sand out of his nostrils, and left, as it seemed, unwillingly, the flattened, crushed, and mangled carcass, turning back to it once and again, with a horrible, yet ludicrous, pertinacity, ere he suffered the Ethiopians who [pg 151]attended him to lure him out of the amphitheatre with a bundle or two of green vegetable food.
The people shouted and applauded loudly. Blood had been drawn, and their appetite was sharpened for slaughter. It was with open undisguised satisfaction that they counted the pairs of gladiators, and looked forward to the next act of the entertainment.
Again the trumpets sound, and the swordsmen range themselves in opposite bodies, all armed alike with a deep concave buckler, and a short, stabbing, two-edged blade; but distinguished by the colour of their scarves. Wagers are rapidly made on the green and the red; so skilfully has the experienced Hippias selected and matched the combatants, that the oldest patrons of the sport confess themselves at a loss which to choose.
The bands advance against each other, three deep, in imitation of the real soldiers of the empire. At the first crash of collision, when steel begins to clink, as thrust and blow and parry are exchanged by these practised warriors, the approbation of the spectators rises to enthusiasm; but men’s voices are hushed, and they hold their breath when the strife begins to waver to and fro, and the ranks open out and disengage themselves, and blood is to be seen in patches on those athletic frames, and a few are already down, lying motionless where they fell. The green is giving way, but their third rank has been economised, and its combatants are as yet fresh and untouched; these now advance to fill the gaps made among their comrades, and the fortunes of the day seem equalised once more.
And now the arena becomes a ghastly and forbidding sight; they die hard, these men, whose very trade is slaughter; but mortal agony cannot always suppress a groan, and it is pitiful to see some prostrate giant, supporting himself painfully on his hands, with drooping head and fast-closing eye fixed on the ground, while the life-stream is pouring from his chest into the thirsty sand. It is real sad earnest, this representation of war, and resembles the battle-field in all save that no prisoners are taken and quarter is but rarely given. Occasionally, indeed, some vanquished champion, of more than common beauty, or who has displayed more than common address and courage, so wins on the favour of the spectators, that they sign for his life to be spared. Hands are turned outwards, with the thumb pointing to the earth, and the victor sheathes his sword, and retires with his worsted antagonist from the contest; but more [pg 152]generally the fallen man’s signal for mercy is neglected; ere the shout “A hit!” has died upon his ears, his despairing eye marks the thumbs of his judges pointing upwards, and he disposes himself to welcome the steel with a calm courage, worthy of a better cause.
The reserve, consisting of ten pairs of picked gladiators, has not yet been engaged. The green and the red have fought with nearly equal success; but when the trumpet has sounded a halt, and the dead have been dragged away by grappling-hooks, leaving long tracks of crimson in their wake, a careful enumeration of the survivors gives the victory by one to the latter colour. Hippias, coming forward in a suit of burnished armour, declares as much, and is greeted with a round of applause. In all her preoccupation, Valeria cannot refrain from a glance of approval at the handsome fencing-master; and Mariamne, who feels that Esca’s life hangs on the man’s skill and honesty, gazes at him with mingled awe and horror, as on some being of another world. But the populace have little inclination to waste the precious moments in cheering Hippias, or in calculating loss and gain. Fresh wagers are, indeed, made on the matches about to take place; but the prevailing feeling over that numerous assemblage is one of morbid excitement and anticipation. The ten pairs of men now marching so proudly into the centre of the lists, are pledged to fight to the death.
It would be a disgusting task to detail the scene of bloodshed; to dwell on the fierce courage wasted, and the brutal useless slaughter perpetrated in those Roman shambles; yet, sickening as was the sight, so inured were the people to such exhibitions, so completely imbued with a taste for the horrible, and so careless of human life, that scarcely an eye was turned away, scarcely a cheek grew paler, when a disabling gash was received, or a mortal blow driven home; and mothers with babies in their arms would bid the child turn its head to watch the death-pang on the pale stern face of some prostrate gladiator.
Licinius had looked upon carnage in many forms, yet a sad, grave disapproval sat on the general’s noble features. Once, after a glance at his kinswoman’s eager face, he turned from her with a gesture of anger and disgust; but Valeria was too intent upon the scene enacted within a few short paces to spare attention for anything besides, except, perhaps, the vague foreboding of evil that was gnawing at her heart, and to which such a moment of suspense as the present afforded a temporary relief.
[pg 153]Rufus and Manlius had been pitted against each other by lot. The taller frame and greater strength of the former were supposed to be balanced by the latter’s exquisite skill. Collars and bracelets were freely offered at even value amongst the senators and equestrians on each. While the other pairs were waging their strife with varying success in different parts of the amphitheatre, these had found themselves struggling near the barrier close under the seat occupied by Valeria. She could hear distinctly their hard-drawn breath; could read on each man’s face the stern set expression of one who has no hope save in victory; for whom defeat is inevitable and instant death. No wonder she sat, so still and spell-bound, with her pale lips parted and her cold hands clenched.
The blood was pouring from more than one gash on the giant’s naked body, yet Rufus seemed to have lost neither coolness nor strength. He continued to ply his adversary with blow on blow, pressing him, and following him up, till he drove him nearly against the barrier. It was obvious that Manlius, though still unwounded, was overmatched and overpowered. At length Valeria drew in her breath with a gasp, as if in pain. It seemed as if she, the spectator, winced from that fatal thrust, which was accepted so calmly by the gladiator whom it pierced. Rufus could scarcely believe he had succeeded in foiling his adversary’s defence, and driving it deftly home, so unmoved was the familiar face looking over its shield into his own—so steady and skilful was the return which instantaneously succeeded his attack. But that face was growing paler and paler with every pulsation. Valeria, gazing with wild fixed eyes, saw it wreathed in a strange sad smile, and Manlius reeled and fell where he stood, breaking his sword as he went down, and burying it beneath his body in the sand. The other strode over him in act to strike. A natural impulse of habit or self-preservation bade the fallen man half raise his arm, with the gesture by which a gladiator was accustomed to implore the clemency of the populace, but he recollected himself, and let it drop proudly by his side. Then he looked kindly up in his victor’s face.
“Through the heart, comrade,” said he quietly, “for old friendship’s sake;” and he never winced nor quailed when the giant drove the blow home with all the strength that he could muster.
They had fed at the same board, and drunk from the same winecup for years; and this was all he had it in his power to bestow upon his friend. The people applauded [pg 154]loudly, but Valeria, who had heard the dead man’s last appeal, felt her eyes fill with tears; and Mariamne, who had raised her head to look, at this unlucky moment, buried it once more in her kinsman’s cloak, sick and trembling, ready to faint with pity, and dismay, and fear.