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THE TOUR
A Story of Ancient Egypt
By
LOUIS COUPERUS
Translated from the Dutch by
Alexander Teixeira de Mattos
Thornton Butterworth Ltd.
62 St. Martin's Lane London W.C.2
TRANSLATOR'S NOTE
I am greatly indebted to my friend John Sargeaunt for a number of
extremely useful comments and suggestions and to my friend Stephen
McKenna for his version of the Hymn to Aphrodite in Chapter VII. and
for assistance in the translation generally.
A. T. de M.
Crowborough, 10 July, 1920.
THE TOUR
CHAPTER I
The night that hung over the sea was windless and blissfully
silver-pure after the glowing splendour of the day; and the great
quadrireme glided evenly and softly, as though upon a lake, under a
wide firmament of stars. The thin horizon was purely outlined around
the oval sea; and on this wide world there was nothing but the stars
and the ship.
But the ship resounded with music. There was the constantly repeated
melodious phrase of the three hundred rowers, soft and monotone,
in a melancholy minor, with ever the same refrain, after which the
boatswain gave out the chant, after which the chorus of rowers
again threw back their long, hushed phrase of melancholy, the
soft, monotonous accompaniment of the wearying work, the musical
encouragement to repeat the same movement of the arms and the same
bending of the body over the loins.
This music rose in a mournful swell from the ship's lower deck and
harmonizing with it was the soft stroke of the oars, which were like
the legs of some graceful sea-animal; the ship herself, with her
swanlike raised prow, suggested an elegant monster swimming through
the lake-calm waters of that silvery night-world, a monster with a
swan's neck and hundreds of slender, evenly-moving legs and winged
with two rose-yellow sails, which rose and bellied gently at the
ship's own motion, but did not swell, because the wind lay still.
While the great, winged navigium glided upon that harmony of slaves'
song and oar-strokes, there came from the rear half-deck the blither
song of the sailors idling after their work. It sounded cheerful with
deep, bass male voices, without the rowers' melancholy; and there
was one sailor who gave the time in a higher voice, for the seamen
were at liberty to sing, but their singing must be artistically led,
because melodious music meant a prosperous voyage and averted evil
chances and did not let the shrill voices of the sirens ring from
under the waters and because the pure sound of the human voice kept
away the rocks drifting under the sea and compelled the sea-serpent
to dive back into the deep.
And through these two choirs, through the melancholy singing of the
rowers and the jubilant seamen's song, a delicate female voice let
fall clear, love-yearning notes, always with a playful and wanton
final phrase. It was--while as it were golden beads tinkled from
twanged harp-strings: those very bright gold beads which tinkle from
the strings of the little four-stringed Lesbian harp--a hymn to the
goddess Aphrodite, whose name constantly rang back, plaintively and
wantonly, in the singer's Greek, exotically soft against the harder
Latin of the men's joy-song and the melodious melancholy phrase of
the lower deck....
Publius Lucius Sabinus lay on the prow in a pavilion of Tyrian
red-silk curtains and listened. The music sounding up from his ship
in the silver-pure, windless night, through the blissful, wide-pure,
star-strewn air, brought him a moment's respite from grief. He lay
calmer now, sated with despair, with his soul of sorrow as it were
bathed in the melodious music. He stared, as though without thinking,
now almost free from grief, at the silver statue of Aphrodite, the
patroness of his ship, in front of which an alabaster lamp burned,
while a light spiral of nard curled around the goddess' feet from
an incense-boat.
It was not possible to feel always, always, the same vehement
grief. To-morrow, nay, in an hour, the sorrow would resume its
violence; now, in this night of coolness and melody, there was just
a brief rest, a moment of annihilation, almost a sense of wistful
well-being. And, in this calmer mood, Lucius felt a need to speak a
friendly word to his old friend and tutor, as he had not done since
the voyage began.
He struck the gong beside his couch; and a little black slave appeared.
"Tarrar," said Lucius, "find Thrasyllus for me and tell him that I
await him."
The little Libyan slave, looking like a monkey in his scanty,
many-coloured coat, made a drolly serious movement of reverence,
crept backwards and disappeared. It was not long before he lifted the
hanging and Thrasyllus stepped into the presence of his young master,
Publius Lucius Sabinus.
The pedagogue, or tutor, was an elderly freedman, tall, lean, serious,
grey-haired and grey-bearded. His eyes were kindly; his mouth wore
a fatherly smile.
Lucius, without rising, stretched out his hand to him:
"Thrasyllus," he said, "forgive me if I have been unkind."
This was all that he said. His voice sounded deep, manly and
earnest. The old tutor had taken a seat on a footstool beside his
master's couch. And, holding the other's hand for a moment in his own,
he said:
"Lucius, I thank you for that word. But I have nothing to forgive, dear
young master. You are the master, I am your slave, your slave still,
even though you have given me my freedom. I am your servant, but one
who has fatherly feelings for you. I feel a father's love towards you;
and you have never forbidden it. It is well; and I am content. I serve
you and I love you. But I thank you for that generous word. That is
what you are: generous, just. You are far above all pride. You know how
to admit when you are wrong. And I, on my side, if you think that you
need it, gladly grant you my forgiveness, though the word is unsuited
to my mouth. You were bitter and you were suffering: your sorrow
drove you mad. Your nature is violent in all things: in your love,
in your sorrow, in your hatred, in all your passions and angers...."
"I was not generous and not just, Thrasyllus, and I raised my hand
against you. Forgive me."
The old tutor shrugged his shoulders:
"I forgive you, I forgive you. Your blood flows hotly and the red
cloud sometimes blinds you. Certainly you must control and master
yourself. But I, I am your slave, though I feel for you like a father;
and that you raised your hand against me: what of it? It was a movement
of anger. You are as mettlesome as a young colt. And sorrow drove
you mad."
"It does so still. Sometimes, sometimes it is as though I felt a
fury of frenzy here, inside me, in my breast! Then I must have her,
have her back, have her here, beside me, in my arms, at my breast,
at my lips! O ye gods, ye gods, ye gods!"
He drew a deep breath, moaned and sobbed.
"Be still, dear young master," said the tutor. "Try to forget and try
to be resigned. She is gone. She is not to be found. We have searched
everywhere. You have vainly squandered treasures to find her. Ilia is
gone. It is three months now since she disappeared. She was probably
kidnapped by pirates while bathing. She used often to bathe in the sea,
among the rocks...."
"Is the villa at Baiae sold? I won't go back to it!... Since she is
no longer there, since she has disappeared, disappeared! She has
disappeared! She has disappeared without a trace! Just one sandal on
the shore. It was a calm sea. She cannot have been drowned!... In
my house she was queen! My Ilia: she was the queen of my house,
though she was a slave! Everything for her and because of her! She
was my slave, but she had slaves herself, male and female: she
had the jewels of an empress, she had the raiment of a goddess! I
worshipped her as I would Venus herself! And she has disappeared,
she has disappeared without a trace, without a trace! Not a thing
of hers has been found save a sandal, a sandal! Where can she be? Is
she dead, is she alive? Did she run away, was she kidnapped, has she
been murdered? Shall I never, never see her again? Here, here"--he
rose suddenly--"here, in my boiling breast, I feel it welling up now,
the fury of frenzy! I want her, I will have her! Ilia, Ilia, Ilia!"
And he uttered a despairing cry, a scream of anguish, and burst
into sobs.
His cry, his scream was heard in the night, throughout the ship.
And suddenly, because of his grief, all the music fell silent: the
melancholy chant of the rowers, the joy-song of the sailors and the
hymn to the goddess, sung to the twanging Lesbian harp.
Only the oars continued to beat the waves. For the rest, silence,
silence, silence ... over all the ship, under the starry dome....
Then the boatswain's voice made itself heard. The rowers' melodious
phrase rose in a mournful swell, always the same. And the high voice
of the sailor who led the singing set the time. The seamen took up the
chant. And bright, golden beads from the four-stringed harp fell like
clear drops through the night; and the Greek hymn of the songstress
pined away with love and tenderness, to ring out suddenly, imploringly:
"Aphrodite!... Aphrodite!..."