Two circuits were accomplished during which the competitors preserved pretty nearly their respective positions; however, the quality of the teams began to be distinguishable to the eyes of such of the spectators as were judges of horseflesh. The Syrian had difficulty in controlling his head-strong steeds with their slender legs, habituated to run wild in the desert, and which by dint of patience and skill he had trained, from a wild state, to bear the yoke; and you felt that, when he gave them full liberty, they would carry him as swiftly as the simoon, which they had often outstripped in those vast sandy plains stretching from the foot of the mountains of Judaea to the shores of the Dead Sea. The Athenian had brought his horses from Thrace; but, voluptuous and proud as the hero from whom he boasted descent, he had left the task of training them to his slaves, and you felt that his team, guided by a hand and animated by a voice to which they were strangers, would support him badly at a critical moment. The Thessalian, on the contrary, seemed to be one in spirit with his steeds, which came from Elis, and which he had fed with his own hand and trained a hundred times on the very ground where Achilles trained his, between the Peneus and the Enipeus. As for Lucius, he had assuredly found again the breed of Mysian horses mentioned by Virgil, whose dams were fertilised by the wind; for, though he had the longest distance to cover, yet he maintained his position and even seemed to have gained rather than lost ground, and this without any effort, neither checking his horses nor pressing them, but letting them gallop at what appeared to be their ordinary pace.

  At the third round the advantages, real or apparent, were more clearly pronounced; the Athenian had gained two spear-lengths on the Thessalian, the foremost of his competitors; the Syrian, holding in his Arab steeds with all his might, had allowed himself to be passed in the certainty of being able to regain his lead; while Lucius, calm and quiet as the god whose statue he seemed to be, appeared to be watching a contest to which he was a stranger and in which he took no special interest, — so smiling was his countenance, so studied his attitude in accordance with the most precise rules of mimetic action.

  At the fourth turn, an incident diverted attention from the other three competitors and fixed it more especially on Lucius: his whip, which had a lash of rhinoceros’ skin and was inlaid with gold, fell from his hand to the ground. Instantly Lucius pulled up his horses, sprang into the arena, picked up the whip which hitherto had seemed a quite unnecessary instrument, and, mounting his chariot, found himself left about thirty yards behind his rivals. Short as the delay had been, it had struck a terrible blow at the hopes and interests of the green faction; but their fear disappeared like a flash of lightning, for Lucius leaned over his horses, and, without using the whip or exciting them by gestures, contented himself with giving a peculiar whistle. Instantly they set off as though endowed with the wings of Pegasus, and before the fourth round was finished, Lucius had regained his accustomed position amid loud shouts of applause.

  At the fifth round the Athenian lost all control of his horses, which broke away at their utmost speed; true, he had left his rivals far behind, but this apparent advantage deceived nobody, and could not deceive himself. Accordingly you saw him every now and then turn round uneasily, and, estimating all the possibilities of the actual situation, instead of trying to restrain his already tired horses, he even lashed them with his triple-thonged whip, calling them by their name and hoping that before they were quite used up he would have gained enough ground to prevent his being overtaken. Moreover, he realised so fully his lack of control over the animals that, although he might have drawn closer to the wall and consequently have diminished the distance to be traversed, he made no attempt to do so for fear of coming to grief at the turning-post, but continued his course at the same distance from the wall which the lots had assigned to him at the start.

  Only two circuits now remained to be made, and from the excitement of both spectators and combatants the decisive crisis was felt to be approaching. The supporters of the blue, represented by the Athenian, appeared visibly uneasy at their momentary success, and shouted to him to pull his horses in, but the animals taking these shouts as signs of encouragement, quickened their pace, and foaming and sweating, showed that they would speedily exhaust their remaining strength.

  It was at this moment that the Syrian gave the rein to his coursers and that the sons of the desert, left to their own free will, began to encroach on the Athenian’s lead. The Thessalian was for a moment taken aback by the speed at which they went, but immediately letting his faithful companions hear his voice, he too dashed forward as though borne by a whirlwind. As for Lucius, he contented himself with the whistle with which he had already urged his horses on, and, without their even yet appearing to exert their full strength, kept his position.

  The Athenian, however, saw the two rivals whom the lots had placed to right and left of him dash upon him like a tempest; he realised that he was done for if he allowed space for a chariot to pass between the wall and himself; so he drew towards it just in time to prevent the Syrian from passing him, whereupon the latter pulled his horses to the right and tried to pass between the Athenian and the Thessalian; but the space was too narrow. With a quick glance he perceived that the Thessalian’s chariot was lighter and less solid than his own; forming an instant resolve he drove sideways at him, and crushing wheel against wheel, broke his axle tree and overturned driver and chariot in the sand. Cleverly as this manoeuvre had been executed, rapid as had been the collision and the overthrow occasioned by it, the Syrian had nevertheless been retarded by it; but he soon regained his advantage, and the Athenian saw the two rivals whom he had so long left in the rear arrive at the sixth turn all but simultaneously with himself. Before he had accomplished the sixth part of this last circuit, he was overtaken and instantly passed. The struggle thenceforward lay between the white and the green drivers, between the Syrian and Lucius.

  Then ensued a grand spectacle; the speed of the eight horses was so swift and so even that you might have thought they were harnessed abreast; a cloud of dust surrounded them, and as in a tempest you hear the rattle of the thunder and see the lightning rend the sky, so you heard the rattle of the wheels, and seemed to perceive through the whirlwind of dust the horses breathing flames. The whole assemblage rose to its feet, those who had laid wagers waved their veils and their green and white cloaks frantically, and even those who had lost through backing the blue of the Thessalian or the yellow of the Athenian, forgetful of their recent defeat, encouraged the two rivals with shouts and applause. At last, it seemed as though the Syrian must win the day, for his horses passed those of his adversary by a head; but at the same instant, and as though he had only been waiting for this to happen, Lucius with one stroke of the whip drew a bloody line across the hind-quarters of his horses. The noble beasts neighed shrilly with surprise and pain; then, with a simultaneous spring, dashing away like the eagle, like the arrow, like the thunderbolt, they passed the vanquished Syrian, accomplished the required distance, and, leaving him more than fifty yards behind, stopped at the goal, after completing the entire course, that is to say, seven times the circuit of the arena.

  Deafening shouts of admiration rent the air, and the excitement rose almost to frenzy. This young Roman, victor in the previous day’s wrestling, victor in the race to-day, was Theseus, was Castor, perhaps Apollo come down to earth once more; but assuredly he was a favourite of the gods. Meanwhile, as though accustomed to such triumphs, he had leapt lightly from his chariot on to the wall, mounted some steps leading to a pedestal where he exhibited himself to the gaze of the spectators, while a herald proclaimed his name and victory, and Lentulus, descending from his box, went and placed in his hand an Idumaean palm and surrounded his head with a crown of gold and silver leaves interlaced with purple fillets. As for the money prize, which consisted of gold coins brought to him in a brass vessel, Lucius handed it back to the Proconsul to be distributed in his name to the aged poor and the orphans of the city.

  Then he immediately made a rapid sign to Sporus, who ran rapidly towards him, holding in his hands a pigeon which he had taken that morning from Acté’s pigeon-house. Lucius passed round the neck of the bird of Venus a purple string to which were tied two leaves from the golden crown, and released the messenger of victory, which flew off swiftly towards that quarter of the city where the house of Amycles was situated.

  CHAPTER V

  THE two successive victories of Lucius and the strange circumstances accompanying them had produced, as we have said, a profound impression on the minds of the spectators. Greece had been formerly the land beloved of the gods; Apollo, when banished from heaven, had turned shepherd and had kept the flocks of Admetus, King of Thessaly; Venus, born on the bosom of the waves and drawn by the Tritons towards the nearest shore, had landed near Helos, and, though free to choose the places for her worship, had preferred Cnidus, Paphos, Idalia and Cythera to all the countries of the earth. Finally, the Arcadians, when disputing with the Cretans the honour of being the compatriots of the king of the gods, asserted that Jupiter was born on Mount Lycseus, and, even were this claim a false one, certain it is that when he had to choose a seat of empire he placed his throne, in dutiful recollection of the past, on the summit of Olympus. Well, all these reminiscences of the ages of myth and fable had presented themselves, thanks to Lucius, to the poetic imagination of this favoured nation, whom the Romans had disinherited of their future, but had been unable to despoil of their past. So the competitors who had presented themselves to strive with him for the prize of song, one and all retired from the field on seeing the bad fortune of those who had contested with him the prize of wrestling and the chariot race. They recalled the fate of Marsyas contending with Apollo, and the Pierides challenging the Muses. Lucius therefore remained the sole competitor out of the five who had originally entered their names. Nevertheless, the Proconsul decided that the performance should take place on the day and at the hour that had been announced.

  The subject chosen by Lucius was one that interested the Corinthians keenly, being a poem on Medea, the authorship of which was attributed to the Emperor Nero himself. That enchantress, as you know, having been brought to Corinth by Jason, who had carried her off, and having been deserted by him at that city, had laid her two sons on the steps of the altar, committing them to the protection of the gods, while she destroyed her rival by sending her a garment poisoned like that of Nessus. But the Corinthians, aghast at the crime of the mother, had torn the children from the temple and stoned them to death. This act of sacrilege did not go unpunished; the gods avenged their outraged majesty, and an epidemic disease attacked all the Corinthian children. However, as more than fifteen centuries had elapsed since that date, the descendants of the murderers denied this crime of their forefathers. Still, an annual festival on the day of the massacre of the two victims, the custom of making children wear a black robe, and of shaving their heads up to the age of five as an act of expiation, — these were evident proofs that the dreadful truth had prevailed over all these denials. Easy, therefore, to understand how this circumstance added to the curiosity of the spectators.

  Since the crowds of people who had swarmed to Corinth could not all find room in the theatre, which, far smaller than the running-ground or the hippodrome, only held twenty thousand spectators, there had been distributed among the chief inhabitants of Corinth and the most distinguished of the visitors, small ivory tablets on which numbers were engraved corresponding to similar numbers carved upon the seats. Stewards, placed at the different blocks, were charged with the duty of seating the audience and of seeing that nobody intruded into the reserved places; consequently, in spite of the surging crowd outside, everything was arranged in the most orderly manner within.

  To mitigate the glare of the May sun, the theatre was covered with an enormous awning; this was a blue covering, composed of silk material interspersed with golden stars, at the centre of which, within a radiant circle, was seen a representation of Nero in the costume of a triumphant general and mounted on a chariot drawn by four horses. In spite of the shade which this kind of tent afforded to the theatre, the heat was so great that many of the younger members of the audience held in their hands large fans of peacocks’ feathers, with which they cooled the ladies, who reclined, rather than sat, on purple cushions or on Persian rugs which had been placed beforehand by slaves upon the seats reserved for them. Among these was to be seen Acté, who, not venturing to wear the crowns with which the victor had presented her, had intertwined in her hair the two golden leaves brought her by the pigeon. Instead, however, of being surrounded by a court of young people toying with her, as was the case with the majority of ladies present at the spectacle, she had by her side only her father, whose handsome and grave, but at the same time smiling face indicated the interest which he took in the triumphs of his guest and the pride which he felt in them. He it was who, confident in Lucius’ good fortune, had persuaded his daughter to be present in the certainty that on this occasion too they would witness his success.

  The hour announced for the performance was approaching, and every one was on the tiptoe of expectation, when a noise like thunder was heard, and a light shower fell on the spectators and refreshed the atmosphere, perfuming it at the same time. All the spectators clapped their hands, for the thunder, produced by two men rolling stones in a brazen vase behind the scenes, was that of Claudius Pulcher, its inventor, and announced that the performance was about to begin; while the shower was nothing but a perfumed dew composed of an infusion of Cilician saffron which escaped by spouts from the statues which crowned the periphery of the theatre. A moment later the curtain was lowered, and Lucius appeared with a lyre in his hand, having on his right the actor Paris, whose duty it was to make appropriate gestures while Lucius sang, and behind him the chorus, led by the choragus, to the accompaniment of a flute and conducted by a pantomime actor.

  At the first notes let fall by the young Roman it was easy to recognise a skilled and practised singer; for instead of at once attacking his subject he preceded it by a kind of scale containing two octaves and the fifth of a third octave, that is to say, the greatest compass of the human voice that had been heard since Timotheus. Then, and then only, after executing this prelude with as much ease as correctness, he entered upon his theme.

  This was, as we have said, the adventures of Medea, the woman of entrancing beauty, the magician with terrible enchantments. A skilful master of the dramatic art, the Emperor Claudius Nero had taken up the legend at the moment when Jason on board his good ship Argo, lands on the coast of Colchis and encounters Medea, the daughter of King Aetes, gathering flowers by the sea-shore. At his first notes Acté started. Was it not just so she herself had seen Lucius arrive? She too was gathering flowers when the gilded bireme touched the strand of Corinth, and she recognised in Jason’s questions and the answers of Medea the very words exchanged between herself and the young Roman.

  At this moment, and as though a special harmony were required to express such tender sentiments, Sporus, taking advantage of a pause made by the chorus, came forward with a lyre strung in the Ionian manner, that is to say, with eleven strings, resembling the instrument with which Timotheus made his soft music ring in the ears of the Lacedaemonians, and which the Ephors pronounced so dangerously enervating that they declared the singer had wounded the majesty of the ancient music, and attempted to corrupt the young Spartans, albeit the Lacedaemonians had issued this decree about the very time of the battle of Aegospotami, which made them masters of Athens.

  Well, four centuries had elapsed since that day; Sparta had been levelled to the ground, Athens was the slave of Rome, Greece reduced to the rank of a province; the prophecy of Euripides had been fulfilled, and, instead of the corrupting lyre being curtailed of four strings by public decree, Lucius was applauded with an enthusiasm amounting to frenzy! As for Acté, she listened, voiceless and breathless; for it seemed to her that it was her own story which her lover had begun to tell in song.

  And indeed, like Jason, Lucius came to carry off a wonderful prize, and already two attempts, crowned with success, had announced that, like Jason, he would prove victorious; but to celebrate the victory, he needed another lyre than that on which he had sung of love. So from the moment when, having met Medea in the temple of Hecaté, he had obtained from his fair mistress the aid of her magic art, and the three talismans that would help him to surmount the terrible obstacles which stood in the way of his gaining the golden fleece, it is with a Lydian lyre, with tones now deep, now piercing, that he engages in his enterprise. A shudder runs through Acté’s frame, for her thoughts cannot separate Jason from Lucius; she follows her hero, who has been anointed with magic juices to render him invulnerable, into the first lists, where he encounters two Vulcanian bulls of gigantic size, with brazen hoofs and horns and mouths that breathe flames. Yet scarce has Jason touched them with the enchanted whip than they allow themselves to be quietly harnessed to a plough adamant, and the heroic husbandman ploughs up the four acres consecrated to Mars. Thence he passes to the second lists, whither Acté follows him in spirit; scarce has he entered ere a gigantic serpent rears its head amid a wood of olives and oleanders that forms its lair, and hissing felly, advances against the hero. Then begins a terrible struggle, but Jason is invulnerable, the serpent breaks its teeth in vain attempts to bite, exhausts itself in fruitless efforts to crush him in its coils, while on the other hand each stroke of Jason’s sword inflicts deep gashes. Soon it is the monster that retreats while Jason attacks, the reptile that flees and the man who pursues. The reptile enters a dark and narrow cavern; Jason, crawling like the serpent, enters after it, and presently comes forth again, holding in his hand the head of his grim adversary. Then he returns to the field that he has ploughed, and sows the monster’s teeth in the deep furrows traced in the earth by the ploughshare. Instantly from the magic furrow springs a living crop of armed warriors, who rush upon him. But Jason has only to throw amongst them the stone given by Medea, to make them turn their weapons against each other, and, busied with mutual slaughter, they leave him to penetrate to the third lists, in the centre of which rises a tree with silver trunk bearing emerald foliage and ruby fruit, from the branches of which hangs the golden fleece shorn from the ram of Phrixus. But there remains yet a last enemy, more terrible and hard to overcome than any that Jason has yet contended with; a gigantic dragon with prodigious wings all covered with scales of adamant, that render it as invulnerable as is he who attacks it. Accordingly he employs a different weapon for dealing with this adversary, in the shape of a golden cup filled with magic milk which Jason puts upon the ground, and out of which the monster drinks a soporific beverage, that produces a heavy sleep, during which the adventurous son of Aeson carries off the golden fleece. Then Lucius resumes the Ionian lyre, for Medea awaits the victor, and Jason must find words of love potent enough to make his mistress resolve to quit father and country, and follow him over the waves. The struggle is long and hard, but at length love gains the day; Medea, trembling and half-clad, leaves her old father while he is asleep. But lo! on reaching the Palace gates, she is seized with a longing to see the author of her being once again; she goes back with timid step and suspended breathing, enters the old man’s chamber and approaches his bed, leans over him and presses a kiss of eternal farewell on his white locks, utters a sobbing cry, which the old man takes for a voice in dreamland, and returns to throw herself into the arms of her lover, who awaits her at the gate, and carries her off swooning in that strange vessel built by Minerva herself in the dockyards of Iolcus, and beneath whose keel the waves run so obediently, that when Medea awakens, she sees the paternal shore fading from view on the horizon, and quits Asia for Europe, father for husband, the past for the future.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22