the voices. In any case people were there; they might assist him. In
this hope he shouted for aid with all his might before he reached them.
But this was his last effort. It grew redder still in his eyes, breath
failed his lungs, strength failed his bones; he fell.
They heard him, however, or rather saw him. Two men ran with gourds full
of water. Vinicius, who had fallen from exhaustion, but had not lost
consciousness, seized a gourd with both hands and emptied one-half of
it.
"Thanks," said he; "place me on my feet; I can walk on alone."
The other laborer poured water on his head; the two not only placed him
on his feet, but raised him from the ground and carried him to the
others, who surrounded him and asked if he had suffered seriously. This
tenderness astonished Vinicius.
"People, who are ye?" asked he.
"We are breaking down houses, so that the fire may not reach the Via
Portuensis," answered one of the laborers.
"Ye came to my aid when I had fallen. Thanks to you."
"We are not permitted to refuse aid," answered a number of voices.
Vinicius, who from early morning had seen brutal crowds slaying and
robbing, looked with more attention on the faces around him and said:
"May Christ reward you."
"Praise to his name!" exclaimed a whole chorus of voices.
It was evening, but one could see as in daylight, for the conflagration
had increased. It seemed that not single parts of the city were burning,
but the whole city through the length and the breadth of it. The sky was
red as far as the eye could see it, and that night in the world was a
red night.
The light from the burning city filled the sky as far as human eye could
reach. The moon rose large and full from behind the mountains, and,
inflamed at once by the glare, took on the color of heated brass. It
seemed to look with amazement on the world-ruling city which was
perishing. In the rose-colored abysses of heaven rose-colored stars were
glittering; but in distinction from usual nights the earth was brighter
than the heavens. Rome, like a giant pile, illuminated the whole
Campania.
In the bloody light were seen distant mountains, towns, villas, temples,
monuments, and the aqueducts stretching toward the city from all the
adjacent hills; on the aqueducts were swarms of people who had gathered
there for safety or to gaze at the burning. Meanwhile the dreadful
element was embracing new divisions of the city. It was impossible to
doubt that criminal hands were spreading the fire, since new
conflagrations were breaking out all the time in places remote from the
principal fire.
From the heights on which Rome was founded the flames flowed like waves
of the sea into the valleys densely occupied by houses--houses of five
and six stories, full of shops, booths, movable wooden amphitheatres,
built to accommodate various spectacles; and finally storehouses of
wood, olives, grain, nuts, pine cones, the kernels of which nourished
the more needy population, and clothing, which through Cæsar's favor was
distributed from time to time among the rabble huddled into narrow
alleys. In those places the fire, finding abundance of inflammable
materials, became almost a series of explosions, and took possession of
whole streets with unheard-of rapidity. People encamping outside the
city or standing on the aqueducts knew from the color of the flame what
was burning. The furious power of the wind carried forth from the fiery
gulf thousands and millions of burning shells of walnuts and almonds,
which, shooting suddenly into the sky, like countless flocks of bright
butterflies, burst with a crackling, or, driven by the wind, fell in
other parts of the city, on aqueducts and fields beyond Rome.
All thought of rescue seemed out of place; confusion increased every
moment, for on one side the population of the city was fleeing through
every gate to places outside; on the other the fire had lured in
thousands of people from the neighborhood, such as dwellers in small
towns, peasants, and half-wild shepherds of the Campania brought in by
hope of plunder. The shout, "Rome is perishing!" did not leave the lips
of the crowd; the ruin of the city seemed at that time to end every rule
and loosen all bonds which hitherto had joined people in a single
integrity. The mob, in which slaves were more numerous, cared nothing
for the lordship of Rome. Destruction of the city could only free them;
hence here and there they assumed a threatening attitude.
Violence and robbery were extending. It seemed that only the spectacle
of the perishing city arrested attention, and restrained for the moment
an outburst of slaughter, which would begin as soon as the city was
turned into ruins. Hundreds of thousands of slaves, forgetting that
Rome, besides temples and walls, possessed some tens of legions in all
parts of the world, appeared merely waiting for a watchword and a
leader. People began to mention the name of Spartacus; but Spartacus was
not alive. Meanwhile citizens assembled and armed themselves each with
what he could. The most monstrous reports were current at all the gates.
Some declared that Vulcan, commanded by Jupiter, was destroying the city
with fire from beneath the earth; others that Vesta was taking vengeance
for Rubria. People with these convictions did not care to save anything,
but, besieging the temples, implored mercy of the gods. It was repeated
most generally, however, that Cæsar had given command to burn Rome, so
as to free himself from odors which rose from the Subura, and build a
new city under the name of Neronia. Rage seized the populace at thought
of this; and if, as Vinicius believed, a leader had taken advantage of
that outburst of hatred, Nero's hour would have struck whole years
before it did.
It was said also that Cæsar had gone mad, that he would command
prætorians and gladiators to fall upon the people and make a general
slaughter. Others swore by the gods that wild beasts had been let out of
all the _vivaria_ at Bronze-beard's command. Men had seen on the streets
lions with burning manes, and mad elephants and bisons, trampling down
people in crowds. There was even some truth in this; for in certain
places elephants, at sight of the approaching fire, had burst the
vivaria, and, gaining their freedom, rushed away from the fire in wild
fright, destroying everything before them like a tempest. Public report
estimated at tens of thousands the number of persons who had perished in
the conflagration. In truth a great number had perished. There were
people who, losing all their property, or those dearest their hearts,
threw themselves willingly into the flames from despair. Others were
suffocated by smoke. In the middle of the city, between the Capitol on
one side, and the Quirinal, the Viminal, and the Esquiline on the other,
as also between the Palatine and the Cælian hill, where the streets were
most densely occupied, the fire began in so many places at once that
whole crowds of people, while fleeing in one direction, struck
unexpectedly on a new wall of fire in front of them, and died a dreadful
death in a deluge of flame.
In terror, in distraction and bewilderment, people knew not where to
flee. The streets were obstructed with goods and in many narrow places
were simply closed. Those who took refuge in those markets and squares
of the city where the Flavian Amphitheatre stood afterward, near the
temple of the Earth, near the Portico of Silvia, and higher up, at the
temples of Juno and Lucinia, between the Clivus Virbius and the old
Esquiline gate, perished from heat, surrounded by a sea of fire. In
places not reached by the flames were found afterward hundreds of
bodies burned to a crisp, though here and there unfortunates tore up
flat stones and half buried themselves in defence against the heat.
Hardly a family inhabiting the centre of the city survived in full;
hence along the walls, at the gates, on all roads were heard howls of
despairing women, calling on the dear names of those who had perished in
the throng or the fire.
And so, while some were imploring the gods, others blasphemed them
because of this awful catastrophe. Old men were seen coming from the
temple of Jupiter Liberator, stretching forth their hands and crying,
"If thou be a liberator, save thy altars and the city!" But despair
turned mainly against the old Roman gods, who, in the minds of the
populace, were bound to watch over the city more carefully than others.
They had proved themselves powerless; hence were insulted. On the other
hand, it happened on the Via Asinaria that when a company of Egyptian
priests appeared conducting a statue of Isis, which they had saved from
the temple near the Porta Cælimontana, a crowd of people rushed among
the priests, attached themselves to the chariot, which they drew to the
Appian gate, and seizing the statue placed it in the temple of Mars,
overwhelming the priests of that deity who dared to resist them.
In other places people invoked Serapis, Baal, or Jehovah, whose
adherents, swarming out of the alleys in the neighborhood of the Subura
and the Trans-Tiber, filled with shouts and uproar the fields near the
walls. In their cries were heard tones as if of triumph; when,
therefore, some of the citizens joined the chorus and glorified "the
Lord of the World," others, indignant at this glad shouting, strove to
repress it by violence. Here and there hymns were heard, sung by men in
the bloom of life, by old men, by women and children--hymns wonderful
and solemn, whose meaning they understood not, but in which were
repeated from moment to moment the words "Behold the Judge cometh in the
day of wrath and disaster." Thus this deluge of restless and sleepless
people encircled the burning city, like a tempest-driven sea. But
neither despair nor blasphemy nor hymn helped in any way.
The destruction seemed as irresistible, perfect, and pitiless as
Predestination itself. Around Pompey's Amphitheatre stores of hemp
caught fire, and ropes used in circuses, arenas, and every kind of
machine at the games, and with them the adjoining buildings containing
barrels of pitch with which ropes were smeared. In a few hours all that
part of the city beyond which lay the Campus Martius was so lighted by
bright yellow flames that for a time it seemed to the spectators, only
half conscious from terror, that in the general ruin the order of night
and day had been lost, and that they were looking at sunshine. But later
a monstrous bloody gleam extinguished all other colors of flame. From
the sea of fire shot up to the heated sky gigantic fountains, and
pillars of flame spreading at their summits into fiery branches and
feathers; then the wind bore them away, turned them into golden threads,
into hair, into sparks, and swept them on over the Campania toward the
Alban hills. The night became brighter; the air itself seemed
penetrated, not only with light, but with flame. The Tiber flowed on as
living fire. The hapless city was turned into one pandemonium. The
conflagration seized more and more space, took hills by storm, flooded
level places, drowned valleys, raged, roared, and thundered.
The city burned on. The Circus Maximus had fallen in ruins. Entire
streets and alleys in parts which began to burn first were falling in
turn. After every fall pillars of flame rose for a time to the very sky.
The wind had changed, and blew now with mighty force from the sea,
bearing toward the Cælian, the Esquiline, and the Viminal rivers of
flame, brands, and cinders. Still the authorities provided for rescue.
At command of Tigellinus, who had hastened from Antium the third day
before, houses on the Esquiline were torn down so that the fire,
reaching empty spaces, died of itself. That was, however, undertaken
solely to save a remnant of the city; to save that which was burning was
not to be thought of. There was need also to guard against further
results of the ruin. Incalculable wealth had perished in Rome; all the
property of its citizens had vanished; hundreds of thousands of people
were wandering in utter want outside the walls. Hunger had begun to
pinch this throng the second day, for the immense stores of provisions
in the city had burned with it. In the universal disorder and in the
destruction of authority no one had thought of furnishing new supplies.
Only after the arrival of Tigellinus were proper orders sent to Ostia;
but meanwhile the people had grown more threatening.
Besides flour, as much baked bread as possible was brought at his
command, not only from Ostia, but from all towns and neighboring
villages. When the first instalment came at night to the Emporium, the
people broke the chief gate toward the Aventine, seized all supplies in
the twinkle of an eye, and caused terrible disturbance. In the light of
the conflagration they fought for loaves, and trampled many of them into
the earth. Flour from torn bags whitened like snow the whole space from
the granary to the arches of Drusus and Germanicus. The uproar continued
till soldiers seized the building and dispersed the crowd with arrows
and missiles.
Never since the invasion by the Gauls under Brennus had Rome beheld such
disaster. People in despair compared the two conflagrations. But in the
time of Brennus the Capitol remained. Now the Capitol was encircled by a
dreadful wreath of flame. The marbles, it is true, were not blazing; but
at night, when the wind swept the flames aside for a moment, rows of
columns in the lofty sanctuary of Jove were visible, red as glowing
coals. In the days of Brennus, moreover, Rome had a disciplined integral
people, attached to the city and its altars; but now crowds of a
many-tongued populace roamed nomad-like around the walls of burning
Rome, people composed for the greater part of slaves and freedmen,
excited, disorderly, and ready, under the pressure of want, to turn
against authority and the city.
But the very immensity of the fire which terrified every heart disarmed
the crowd in a certain measure. After fire might come famine and
disease; and to complete the misfortune the terrible heat of July had
appeared. It was impossible to breathe air inflamed both by fire and the
sun. Night brought no relief; on the contrary, it presented a hell.
During daylight an awful and ominous spectacle met the eye. In the
centre a giant city on heights was turned into a roaring volcano; round
about as far as the Alban hills was one boundless camp, formed of sheds,
tents, huts, vehicles, bales, packs, stands, fires, and all covered
with smoke and dust, lighted by sun rays reddened by passing through
smoke--everything filled with roars, shouts, threats, hatred, and
terror, a monstrous swarm of men, women, and children. Mingled with
_quirites_ were Greeks, shaggy men from the North with blue eyes,
Africans, and Asiatics; among citizens were slaves, freedmen,
gladiators, merchants, mechanics, servants, and soldiers--a real sea of
people, flowing around the island of fire.
Various reports moved this sea as wind does a real one. These reports
were favorable and unfavorable. People told of immense supplies of wheat
and clothing to be brought to the Emporium and distributed gratis. It
was said, too, that provinces in Asia and Africa would be stripped of
their wealth at Cæsar's command, and the treasures thus gained be given
to the inhabitants of Rome, so that each man might build his own
dwelling.
But it was noised about also that water in the aqueducts had been
poisoned; that Nero intended to annihilate the city, destroy the
inhabitants to the last person, then move to Greece or to Egypt, and
rule the world from a new place. Each report ran with lightning speed,
and each found belief among the rabble, causing outbursts of hope,
anger, terror, or rage. Finally a kind of fever mastered those nomadic
thousands. The belief of Christians that the end of the world by fire
was at hand spread even among adherents of the gods and extended daily.
People fell into torpor or madness. In clouds lighted by the burning,
gods were seen gazing down on the ruin; hands were stretched toward
those gods then to implore pity or send them curses.
Meanwhile soldiers, aided by a certain number of inhabitants, continued
to tear down houses on the Esquiline and the Cælian, as also in the
Trans-Tiber; these divisions were saved therefore in considerable part.
But in the city itself were destroyed incalculable treasures accumulated
through centuries of conquest--priceless works of art, splendid temples,
the most precious monuments of Rome's past and Rome's glory. They
foresaw that of all Rome there would remain barely a few parts on the
edges, and that hundreds of thousands of people would be without a roof.
Some spread reports that the soldiers were tearing down houses, not to
stop the fire, but to prevent any part of the city from being saved.
Tigellinus sent courier after courier to Antium, imploring Cæsar in each
letter to come and calm the despairing people with his presence. But
Nero moved only when fire had seized the _domus transitoria_ and he
hurried so as not to miss the moment in which the conflagration should
be at its highest.
Meanwhile fire had reached the Via Nomentana, but turned from it at once
with a change of wind toward the Via Lata and the Tiber. It surrounded
the Capitol, spread along the Forum Boarium, destroyed everything which
it had spared before, and approached the Palatine a second time.
Tigellinus, assembling all the prætorian forces, despatched courier
after courier to Cæsar with an announcement that he would lose nothing
of the grandeur of the spectacle, for the fire had increased.
But Nero, who was on the road, wished to come at night, so as to sate
himself all the better with a view of the perishing capital. Therefore
he halted, in the neighborhood of Aqua Albana, and, summoning to his
tent the tragedian Aliturus, decided with his aid on posture, look, and
expression; learned fitting gestures, disputing with the actor
stubbornly whether at the words, "O sacred city, which seemed more
enduring than Ida," he was to raise both hands, or, holding in one the
_forminga_, drop it by his side, and raise only the other. This question
seemed to him then more important than all others. Starting at last
about nightfall, he took counsel of Petronius also whether to the lines
describing the catastrophe he might add a few magnificent blasphemies
against the gods, and whether, considered from the standpoint of art,
they would not have rushed spontaneously from the mouth of a man in such
a position, a man who was losing his birthplace.
At length he approached the walls about midnight with his numerous
court, composed of whole detachments of nobles, senators, knights,
freedmen, slaves, women, and children. Sixteen thousand prætorians,
arranged in line of battle along the road, guarded the peace and safety
of his entrance, and held the excited populace at a proper distance. The
people cursed, shouted, and hissed on seeing the retinue, but dared not
attack it. In many places, however, applause was given by the rabble,
which, owning nothing, had lost nothing in the fire, and which hoped for
a more bountiful distribution than usual of wheat, olives, clothing, and
money. Finally, shouts, hissing, and applause were drowned in the blare
of horns and trumpets, which Tigellinus had caused to be sounded.
Nero, on arriving at the Ostian gate, halted, and said: "Houseless ruler
of a houseless people, where shall I lay my unfortunate head for the
night?"
After he had passed the Clivus Delphini, he ascended the Appian aqueduct
on steps prepared purposely. After him followed the Augustians and a
choir of singers, bearing _citharæ_, lutes, and other musical
instruments.
And all held the breath in their breasts, waiting to learn if he would
say some great words, which for their own safety they ought to remember.
But he stood solemn, silent, in a purple mantle and a wreath of golden
laurels, gazing at the raging might of the flames.
When Terpnos gave him a golden lute, he raised his eyes to the sky,
filled with the conflagration, as if he were waiting for inspiration.
The people pointed at him from afar as he stood in the bloody gleam. In
the distance fiery serpents were hissing. The ancient and most sacred
edifices were in flames; the temple of Hercules, reared by Evander, was
burning; the temple of Jupiter Stator was burning, the temple of Luna,
built by Servius Tullius, the house of Numa Pompilius, the sanctuary of
Vesta with the _penates_ of the Roman people; through waving flames the
Capitol appeared at intervals; the past and the spirit of Rome were
burning. But Cæsar was there with a lute in his hand and a theatrical
expression on his face, not thinking of his perishing country, but of
his posture and the prophetic words with which he might describe best
the greatness of the catastrophe, rouse most admiration, and receive the
warmest plaudits.
He detested that city, he detested its inhabitants, he loved only his
own songs and verses; hence he rejoiced in heart that at last he saw a
tragedy like that which he was writing. The poet was happy, the
declaimer felt inspired, the seeker for emotions was delighted at the
awful sight, and thought with rapture that even the destruction of Troy
was as nothing if compared with the destruction of that giant city. What
more could he desire? There was world-ruling Rome in flames, and he,
standing on the arches of the aqueduct with a golden lute, conspicuous,
purple, admired, magnificent, and poetic. Down below, somewhere in the
darkness, the people are muttering and storming; let them mutter! Ages
will elapse, thousands of years will pass, but mankind will remember and
glorify the poet who that night sang the fall and the burning of Troy.
What was Homer compared with him? What Apollo himself with his
hollowed-out lute?
Here he raised his hands, and, striking the strings, with an exaggerated
theatrical gesture pronounced the words of Priam:
"O nest of my fathers, O dear cradle!" His voice in the open air, with
the roar of the conflagration, and the distant murmur of crowding
thousands, seemed marvellously weak, uncertain, and low, and the sound
of the accompaniment like the buzzing of insects. But senators,
dignitaries, and Augustians, assembled on the aqueduct, bowed their
heads and listened in silent rapture. He sang long, and his motive was
ever sadder. At moments, when he stopped to catch breath, the chorus of
singers repeated the last verse; then Nero cast the tragic _syrma_ from
his shoulder with a gesture learned from Aliturus, struck the lute, and
sang on. When he had finished the lines composed, he improvised, using
grandiose comparisons in the spectacle unfolded before him. His face
began to change. He was not moved, it is true, by the destruction of his
country's capital; but he was delighted and moved with the pathos of his
own words to such a degree that his eyes filled with tears on a sudden.
At last he dropped the lute to his feet with a clatter, and, wrapping
himself in the syrma, stood as if petrified, like one of those statues
of Niobe which ornamented the courtyard of the Palatine. Soon a storm of
applause broke the silence. But in the distance this was answered by the
howling of multitudes. No one doubted then that Cæsar had given command
to burn the city, so as to afford himself a spectacle and sing a song at
it.
TACITUS