THE WORSHIP OF ISIS
It was the cool and calming hour of sunset. Esca was strolling quietly
homewards after the pursuits of the day. He had emptied a wineskin with
Hirpinus; and, resisting that worthy’s entreaties to mark so auspicious a
meeting by a debauch, had accompanied him to the gymnasium, where the
Briton’s magnificent strength and prowess raised him higher than ever in
the opinion of the experienced athlete. Untiring as were the trained
muscles of the professional, he found himself unable to cope with the
barbarian in such exercises as demanded chiefly untaught physical power
and length of limb. In running, leaping, and wrestling, Esca was more than
a match for the gladiator. In hurling the quoit, and fencing with wooden
foils, the latter’s constant practice gave him the advantage, and when he
fastened round his wrists and hands the leathern thong or _cestus_, used
for the same purpose as our modern boxing‐glove, and proposed a round or
two of that manly exercise to conclude with, he little doubted that his
own science and experience would afford him an easy victory. The result,
however, was far different from his expectations. His antagonist’s powers
were especially adapted to this particular kind of contest; his length of
limb, his quickness of eye, hand, and foot, his youthful elasticity of
muscle, and his unfailing wind, rendered him an invincible combatant, and
it was with something like pique that Hirpinus was compelled to confess as
much to himself.
At the end of the first round he was satisfied of his mistake in
underrating so formidable an opponent. Ere the second was half through, he
had exhausted all the resources of his own skill without gaining the
slightest advantage over his antagonist; and with the conclusion of a
third, he flung away the _cestus_ in well‐feigned disgust at the heat of
the weather, and proposed one more skin of wine before parting, to drink
success to the profession, and speedy employment for the gladiators at the
approaching games in the amphitheatre.
“Join us, man!” said Hirpinus, dropping something of the patronising air
he had before affected. “Thou wert born to be a swordsman. Hippias would
teach thee in a week to hold thine own against the best fencers in Rome. I
myself will look to thy food, thy training, and thy private practice. Thou
wouldst gain thy liberty easily, after a few victories. Think it over,
man! and when thou hast decided, come to the fencing‐school yonder, and
ask for old Hirpinus. The steel may have a speck of rust on it, but it’s
tough and true still; so fare thee well, lad. I count to hear from thee
again before long!”
The gladiator accordingly rolled off with more than his usual assumption
of manly independence, attributable to the measure of rough Sabine wine of
which he had drunk his full share, whilst the Briton walked quietly away
in the direction of his home, enjoying the cool breeze that fanned his
brow, and following out a train of vague and complicated reflections,
originating in the advice of his late companion.
The crimson glow of a summer evening had faded into the serene beauty of a
summer night. Stars were flashing out, one by one, with mellow lustre, not
glimmering faintly, as in our northern climate, but hanging like silver
lamps, in the infinity of the sky. The busy turmoil of the streets had
subsided to a low and drowsy hum; the few chance passengers who still
paced them, went softly and at leisure, as though enjoying the soothing
influence of the hour. Even here, in the great city, everything seemed to
breathe of peace, and contentment, and repose. Esca walked slowly on, lost
in meditation.
Suddenly, the clash of cymbals and the sound of voices struck upon his
ear. A wild and fitful melody, rising and falling with strange thrilling
cadence, was borne upon the breeze. Even while he stopped to listen, it
swelled into a full harmonious chorus, and he recognised the chant of the
worshippers of Isis, returning from the unholy celebration of her rites.
Soon the glare of torches heralded its approach, and the tumultuous
procession wound round the corner of the street with all the strange
grotesque ceremonies of their order. Clashing their cymbals, dashing their
torches together till the sparks flew up in showers, tossing their bare
arms aloft with frantic gestures, the smooth‐faced priests, having girt
their linen garments tightly round their loins, were dancing to and fro
before the image of the goddess with bacchanalian energy. Some were
bareheaded, some crowned with garlands of the lotus‐leaf, and some wore
masks representing the heads of dogs and other animals; but all, though
leaping wildly here and there, danced in the same step, all used the same
mysterious gestures of which the meaning was only known to the initiated.
The figure of the goddess herself was borne aloft on the shoulders of two
sturdy priests, fat, oily, smooth, and sensual, with the odious look of
their kind. It represented a stately woman crowned with the lotus, holding
a four‐barred lyre in her hand. Gold and silver tinsel was freely
scattered over her flowing garments, and jewels of considerable value, the
gifts of unusually fervent devotees, might be observed upon her bosom and
around her neck and arms. Behind her were carried the different symbols by
which her qualities were supposed to be typified; amongst these an image
of the sacred cow, wrought in frosted silver with horns and hoofs of gold,
showed the most conspicuous, borne aloft as it was by an acolyte in the
wildest stage of inebriety, and wavering, with the uncertain movements of
its bearer, over the heads of the throng. In the van moved the priests,
bloated eunuchs clad in white; behind these came the sacred images carried
by younger votaries, who, aspiring to the sacerdotal office, and already
prepared for its functions, devoted themselves assiduously in the meantime
to the orgies with which it was their custom to celebrate the worship of
their deity. Maddened with wine, bare‐limbed and with dishevelled locks,
they danced frantically to and fro, darting at intervals from their ranks,
and compelling the passengers whom they met to turn behind them, and help
to swell the rear of the procession. This was formed of a motley crew.
Rich and poor, old and young, the proud patrician and the squalid slave,
were mingled together in turbulent confusion; it was difficult to
distinguish those who formed a part of the original pageant from the
idlers who had attached themselves to it, and, having caught the
contagious excitement, vociferated as loudly, and leaped about as wildly,
as the initiated themselves. Amongst these might be seen some of the
fairest and proudest faces in Rome. Noble matrons reared in luxury, under
the very busts of those illustrious ancestors who had been counsellors of
kings, defenders of the commonwealth, senators of the empire, thought it
no shame to be seen reeling about the public streets, unveiled and flushed
with wine, in the company of the most notorious and profligate of their
sex. A multitude of torches shed their glare on the upturned faces of the
throng, and on one that looked, with its scornful lips and defiant brow,
to have no business there.
Amongst the wildest of these revellers, Valeria’s haughty head moved on,
towering above the companions, with whom she seemed to have nothing in
common, save a fierce determination to set modesty and propriety at
defiance. Esca caught her glance as she swept by. She blushed crimson, he
observed even in the torchlight, and seemed for an instant to shrink
behind the portly form of a priest who marched at her side; but,
immediately recovering herself, moved on with a gradually paling cheek,
and a haughtier step than before.
He had little leisure, however, to observe the scornful beauty, whose
charms, to tell the truth, had made no slight impression on his
imagination; for a disturbance at its head, which had now passed him some
distance, had stopped the progress of the whole procession, and no small
confusion was the result. The torch‐bearers were hurrying to the front.
The silver cow had fallen and been replaced in an upright position more
than once. The goddess herself had nearly shared the same fate. The sacred
chant had ceased, and instead a hundred tongues were vociferating at once,
some in anger, some in expostulation, some in maudlin ribaldry and mirth.
“Let her go!” cried one. “Hold her fast!” shouted another. “Bring her
along with you!” reasoned a drunken acolyte. “If she be worthy she will
conform to the worship of the goddess. If she be unworthy she shall
experience the divine wrath of Isis!” “Mind what you are about,”
interposed a more cautious votary. “She is a Roman maiden,” said one.
“She’s a barbarian!” shrieked another. “A Mede!” “A Spaniard!” “A
Persian!” “A Jewess! A Jewess!”
In the meantime the unfortunate cause of all this turmoil, a young girl
closely veiled and dressed in black, was struggling in the arms of a large
unwieldy eunuch, who had seized her as a hawk pounces on a pigeon, and
despite her agonised entreaties, for the poor thing was in mortal fear,
held her ruthlessly in his grasp. She had been surrounded by the lawless
band, ere she was aware, as she glided quietly round the street corner, on
her homeward way, had shrunk up against the wall in the desperate hope
that she might remain unobserved or unmolested, and found herself, as was
to be expected, an immediate object of insult to the dissolute and
licentious crew. Though her dress was torn and her arms bruised from the
unmanly violence to which she was subjected, with true feminine modesty
she kept her veil closely drawn round her face, and resisted every effort
for its removal, with a firm strength of which those slender wrists seemed
hardly capable. As the eunuch grasped her with drunken violence, bending
his huge body and bloated face over the shrinking figure of the girl, she
could not suppress one piercing shriek for help, though, even while it
left her lips, she felt how futile it must be, and how utterly hopeless
was her situation. It was echoed by a hundred voices in tones of mockery
and derision.
Little did Spado, for such was the eunuch’s name, little did Spado think
how near was the aid for which his victim called; how sudden would be the
reprisals that should astonish himself with their prompt and complete
redress, reminding him of what he had long forgotten, the strength of a
man’s blow, and the weight of a man’s arm. At the first sound of the
girl’s voice, Esca had forced his way through the crowd to her assistance.
In three strides he had come up with her assailant, and laid his heavy
grasp on Spado’s fat shoulder, while he bade him in low determined accents
to release his prey. The eunuch smiled insolently, and replied with a
brutal jest.
Valeria, interested in spite of herself, could not resist an impulse to
press forward and see what was going on. Long afterwards she delighted to
recall the scene she now beheld with far more of exultation and excitement
than alarm. It had, indeed, especial attraction for an imagination like
hers. Standing out in the red glare of the torches, like the bronze statue
of some demigod starting into life, towered the tall figure of Esca,
defiance in his attitude, anger on his brow, and resistless strength in
the quivering outline of each sculptured limb. Within arm’s length of him,
the obese, ungraceful shape of Spado, with his broad fat face, expressive
chiefly of gluttony and sensual enjoyment, but wearing now an ugly look of
malice and apprehension. Starting back from his odious embrace to the
utmost length of her outstretched arms, the veiled form of the frightened
girl, her head turned from the eunuch, her hands pressed against his
chest, every line of her figure denoting the extreme of horror, and
aversion, and disgust. Round the three, a shifting mass of grinning faces,
and tossing arms, and wild bacchanalian gestures; the whole rendered more
grotesque and unnatural by the lurid, flickering light. With an
unaccountable fascination Valeria watched for the result.
“Let her go!” repeated Esca, in the distinct accents with which a man
speaks who is about to strike, tightening at the same time a gripe which
went into the eunuch’s soft flesh like iron.
Spado howled in mingled rage and fear, but released the girl nevertheless,
who cowered instinctively close to her protector.
“Help!” shouted the eunuch, looking round for assistance from his
comrades. “Help! I say. Will ye see the priest mishandled and the goddess
reviled? Down with him! down with him, comrades, and keep him down!”
There is little doubt that had Esca’s head once touched the ground it had
never risen again, for the priests were crowding about him with wild yells
and savage eyes, and the fierce revelry of a while ago was fast warming
into a thirst for blood. Valeria thrust her way into the circle, though
she never feared for the Briton—not for an instant.
It was getting dangerous, though, to remain any longer amongst this
frantic crew. Esca wound one arm round the girl’s waist and opposed the
other shoulder to the throng. Spado, encouraged by his comrades, struck
wildly at the Briton, and made a furious effort to recover his prey. Esca
drew himself together like a panther about to spring, then his long sinewy
arm flew out with the force and impulse of a catapult, and the eunuch,
reeling backwards, fell heavily to the ground, with a gash upon his cheek
like the wound inflicted by a sword.
“_Euge!_” exclaimed Valeria, in a thrill of admiration and delight. “Well
struck, by Hercules! Ah! these barbarians have at least the free use of
their limbs. Why, the priest went down like a white ox at the Mucian Gate.
Is he much hurt, think ye? Will he rise again?”
The last sentence was addressed to the throng who now crowded round the
prostrate Spado, and was but the result of that pity which is never quite
dormant in a woman’s breast. The fallen eunuch seemed indeed in no hurry
to get upon his legs again. He rolled about in hideous discomfiture, and
gave vent to his feelings in loud and pitiful moans and lamentations.
After such an example of the Briton’s prowess, none of her other votaries
seemed to think it incumbent on them to vindicate the majesty of the
goddess by further interference with the maiden and her protector.
Supporting and almost carrying her drooping form, Esca hurried her away
with swift firm strides, pausing and looking back at intervals, as though
loth to leave his work half finished, and by no means unwilling to renew
the contest. The last Valeria saw of him was the turn of his noble head
bending down with a courteous and protecting gesture, to console and
reassure his frightened charge. All her womanly instincts revolted at that
moment from the odious throng with whom she was involved. She could have
found it in her heart to envy that obscure and unknown girl hurrying away
yonder through the darkening streets on the arm of her powerful
protector—could have wished herself a peasant or a slave, with some one
being in the world to look up to, and to love.
Valeria’s life had been that of a spoiled child from the day she left her
cradle—that gilded cradle over which the nurses had repeated their
customary Roman blessing with an emphasis that in her case seemed to be
prophetic—
“May monarchs woo thee, darling! to their bed,
And roses blossom where thy footsteps tread!”
The metaphorical flowers of wealth, prosperity, and admiration, did indeed
seem to spring up beneath her feet, and her stately beauty would have done
no discredit to an imperial bride; but it must have been something more
than outward pomp and show—something nobler than the purple and the
diadem—that could have won its way to Valeria’s heart.
She was habituated to the beautiful, the costly, the refined, till she had
learned to consider such qualities as the mere essentials of life. It
seemed to her a simple matter of course that houses should be noble, and
chariots luxurious, and horses swift, and men brave. The _nil admirari_
was the maxim of the class in which she lived; and whilst their standard
was thus placed at the superlative, that which came up to it received no
credit for excellence, that which fell short was treated with disapproval
and contempt. Valeria’s life had been one constant round of pleasure and
amusement; yet she was not happy, not even contented. Day by day she felt
the want of some fresh interest, some fresh excitement; and it was this
craving probably, more than innate depravity, which drove her, in common
with many of her companions, into such disgraceful scenes as were enacted
at the worship of Juno, Isis, and the other gods and goddesses of
mythology.
Lovers, it is needless to say, Valeria had won in plenty. Each new face
possessed for her but the attraction of its novelty. The favourite of the
hour had small cause to plume himself on his position. For the first week
he interested her curiosity, for the second he pleased her fancy, after
which, if he was wise, he took his leave gracefully, ere he was bidden to
do so with a frankness that admitted of no misconception. Perhaps the only
person in the world whom she respected was her kinsman Licinius; and this,
none the less, that she possessed no kind of influence over his feelings
or his opinions; that she well knew he viewed her proceedings often with
disapprobation, and entertained for her character a kindly pity not far
removed from contempt. Even Julius Placidus, who was the most persevering,
as he was the craftiest, of her adorers, had made no impression on her
heart. She appreciated his intellect, she was amused with his
conversation, she approved of his deep schemes, his lavish extravagance,
his unprincipled recklessness; but she never thought of him for an instant
after he was out of her sight, and there was something in the cold‐blooded
ferocity of his character from which, even in his presence, she
unconsciously recoiled. Perhaps she admired the person of Hippias, her
fencing‐master, a retired gladiator, who combined handsome regularity of
features with a certain worn and warlike air, not without its charm, more
than that of any man whom she had yet seen, and with all her pride and her
cold exterior, Valeria was a woman to be captivated by the eye; but
Hippias, from his professional reputation, was the darling of half the
matrons in Rome, and it may be that she only followed the example of her
friends, with whom, at this period of the Empire, it was considered a
proof of the highest fashion, and the best taste, to be in love with a
gladiator.
Strong in her passions, as in her physical organisation, the former were
only bridled by an unbending pride, and an intensity of will more than
masculine in its resolution. As under that smooth skin the muscles of the
round white arm were firm and hard like marble, so beneath that fair and
tranquil bosom there beat a heart that for good or evil could dare,
endure, and defy the worst. Valeria was a woman whom none but a very bold
or very ignorant suitor would have taken to his breast; yet it may be that
the right man could have tamed, and made her gentle and patient as the
dove. And now something seemed to tell her that the void in her heart was
filled at last. Esca’s manly beauty had made a strong impression on her
senses; the anomaly of his position had captivated her imagination; there
was something very attractive in the mystery that surrounded him; there
was even a wild thrill of pleasure in the shame of loving a slave. Then,
when he stood forth, the champion of that poor helpless girl, brave,
handsome, and victorious, the charm was complete; and Valeria’s eyes
followed him as he disappeared with a longing loving look, that had never
glistened in them in her life before.
The Briton hurried away with his arm round the drooping figure of his
companion, and for a time forbore to speak a word even of encouragement or
consolation. At first the reaction of her feelings turned her sick and
faint, then a burst of weeping came to her relief; ere long the tears were
flowing silently; and the girl, who indeed showed no lack of courage, had
recovered herself sufficiently to look up in her protector’s face, and
pour out her thanks with a quiet earnestness that showed they came direct
from the heart.
“I can trust you,” she said, in a voice of peculiar sweetness, though her
Latin, like his own, was touched with a slightly foreign accent. “I can
read a brave man’s face—none better. We have not far to go now. You will
take me safe home?”
“I will guard you to your very door,” said he, in tones of the deepest
respect. “But you need fear nothing now; the drunken priests and their
mysterious deity are far enough off by this time. ’Tis a noble worship,
truly, for such a city as this—the mistress of the world!”
“False gods! false gods!” replied the girl, very earnestly. “Oh! how can
men be so blind, so degraded?” Here she stopped suddenly, and clung closer
to her companion’s arm, drawing her veil tighter round her face the while.
Her quick ear had caught the sound of hurrying footsteps, and she dreaded
pursuit.
“’Tis nothing,” said Esca, encouraging her; “the most we have to dread now
is some drunken freedman or client reeling home from his patron’s supper‐
table. They are a weakly race, these Roman citizens,” he added good‐
humouredly; “I think I can promise to stave them off if they come not more
than a dozen at a time.”
The cheerful tone reassured her no less than the strong arm to which she
clung. It was delightful to feel so safe after the fright she had
undergone. The footsteps were indeed those of a few dissolute idlers
loitering home after a debauch. They had hastened forward on espying a
female figure; but there was something in the air of her protector that
forbade a near approach, and they shrank to the other side of the way
rather than come in contact with so powerful an opponent. The girl felt
proud of her escort, and safer every minute. By this time she had guided
him into a dark and narrow street, at the end of which the Tiber might be
seen gleaming under the starlit sky. She stopped at a mean‐looking door,
let into a dead‐wall, and applying her hand to a secret spring, it opened
noiselessly to her touch. Then she turned to face her companion, and said
frankly, “I have not thanked you half enough. Will you not enter our poor
dwelling, and share with us a morsel of food and a cup of wine, ere you
depart upon your way?”
Esca was neither hungry nor thirsty, yet he bowed his head, and followed
her into the house.