Late one evening in a marshy wood not far from the Rhine, between the
fortified post, _Tres Tabernæ_ and the Roman town of Argentoratum,[1]
conquered a short time previously by the _Alemanni_, two soldiers who
had lost their way were slouching along. One named Aragaris, an
awkward and red-headed giant, a Sarmatian in the Roman service; the
other Strombix, a lean and frowning little Syrian.
[1] Strasburg.
The spaces between the trunks of trees were densely dark. A fine rain
was falling through warm air. The birches diffused an odour of damp
leaves, and far off a cuckoo was calling.
At every crack of the branches the startled Strombix began to quake
and seized the fist of his companion.
"Oh, cousin! cousin!"
He used to call Aragaris cousin, not through blood relationship, but
for friendship's sake. They had been taken into the Roman army from
opposite ends of the world. The northern barbarian, a huge guzzler but
a chaste liver, despised the voluptuous and timid Syrian who was so
frugal in his eating and drinking. But while mocking him he pitied him
as a child.
"Cousin!" wailed Strombix.
"Well, what is it? Can't you be quiet?"
"Are there bears in this wood?"
"Yes!" answered Aragaris sullenly.
"And suppose we met one, eh?"
"We should knock him on the head, sell his skin, and go and drink."
"And suppose the bear, instead of being killed..."
"Poltroon! it isn't difficult to see that you're a Christian!"
"Why must a Christian be a coward?" said Strombix with a vexed air.
"You've told me yourself that in your Book it is written _whosoever
smiteth thee on thy right cheek turn to him the other also_."
"True."
"Well, I'm right; and if so, to my thinking you mustn't go to wars;
the enemy will strike you on one cheek and you turn him round the
other. You're a set of cowards, I say."
"The Cæsar Julian's a Christian, and _he_ isn't a coward!" retorted
Strombix.
"I know, my boy," continued Aragaris, "that you can pardon enemies
when you have to fight them, poor chicken! Your belly is no bigger
than my fist. With a clove in it you're fed up for the whole day; and
so your blood is no better than marsh-water!"
"Ah, cousin! cousin!" observed Strombix reproachfully, "why did you
talk about food? Now I've got another gnawing ache in my stomach. Give
me a little garlic! There's some left in your bag."
"If I give you what there's left we shall both starve to-morrow in
this forest!"
"Ah, but if you don't give me some now, I shall fall from weakness and
you will be obliged to carry me."
"Well, stuff and swill, dog!"
"And a little bread too," begged Strombix.
Aragaris gave him, with an oath, his last ration of biscuit. He
himself had eaten overnight enough for two days, of fat pork and bean
pottage.
"Attention! Hark!" he said halting. "There's a trumpet! We're not far
from the camp. We must steer round to the north.... I don't mind
bears," added Aragaris thoughtfully, "but that centurion..."
The soldiers had nicknamed this hated centurion "Cedo Alteram,"
because he used to cry out gleefully every time he broke the rod with
which he was striking a delinquent, _Cedo alteram!_ that is to say,
"Give us another!"
"I'm certain," said the barbarian--"I'll wager that Cedo Alteram will
tan my back as a tanner whacks a bullock's hide. It's abominable, my
friend, abominable."
The worthy pair were now stragglers behind the army, because Aragaris
according to his custom had got dead drunk in a plundered village and
Strombix had been thrashed. The little Syrian had made a fruitless
attempt to obtain the favours of a handsome Frankish girl. This
sixteen-year-old-beauty, daughter of a barbarian killed in the fight,
had administered to him two such blows that he had fallen on his back
and had then fairly stamped upon him.
"She wasn't a girl but a devil," declared Strombix. "I hardly took
hold of her and she nearly broke every rib in my body."
The note of the trumpet became more and more distinct. Aragaris,
sniffing the wind like a blood-hound, noticed the smell of smoke; the
bivouacs must be but a short way off.
The night became pitch dark. They could hardly make out the road; the
path was lost in marshes in which they leapt from tussock to tussock.
Fog began to rise. Suddenly from a great yew, with branches from which
moss hung like long grey beards, something fled away with a harsh cry.
Strombix crouched down with fear. It was a black cock.
They finally lost their bearings. Strombix climbed a tree.
"The bivouacs lie northwards--not far off. There's a wide river
below."
"The Rhine, the Rhine!" exclaimed Aragaris. "Now go ahead!"
They slid down through the birches and aspen trees a hundred years
old.
"Cousin, I'm drowning!" yelled Strombix. "Somebody's hauling me by the
feet!"
"Where are you?"
With great difficulty Aragaris extricated him, and, swearing, took him
on his shoulders. Under his feet the Sarmatian felt the stems of
faggots laid down by the Romans. This causeway of faggot work led to
the great road hewn not long before through the forest by the army of
Severus, Julian's general. The barbarians, according to their custom,
had blocked and encumbered the track with enormous trunks of trees.
These trunks had to be clambered over. Sometimes rotten, moss-covered,
and crumbling under foot, and sometimes hard and slippery with rain,
they made the march most difficult; and it was by roads like these,
always in fear of an attack, that the army of about thirteen thousand
men had to move. That army every Imperial general except Severus had
traitorously abandoned.