I
Hard by the stables, in the Hippodrome of Constantinople, there was a
room which served as a sort of common den for grooms, women-riders,
actors, and charioteers. Even in daytime lamps were kept burning in
this stifling resort, where the air smelt strongly of dung-heap and
stable. When the curtain at the door was lifted a dazzling flood of
light invaded this den; and in the sunny distance could be seen empty
tiers of seats, and the magnificent staircase joining the Imperial box
to the apartments of Constantine's palace. Egyptian obelisks also were
seen in the arena and in the centre, on the yellow sand, a gigantic
sacrificial altar of marvellous workmanship, wrought of three entwined
serpents of bronze, bearing on their flat heads a Delphian tripod.
Crackings of whips, shouts of riders, snortings of horses, came from
the arena, and the muffled sound of wheels on the soft sand went by
like a rushing of wings. No races were going on, but merely the
preparatory exercise for the races which were to take place a few days
later. In one corner of the stable a naked athlete, rubbed over with
oil and covered with dust, a girdle of leather round his hips, was
raising and lowering dumb-bells. Throwing back his shaggy head, he
arched his back till the joints cracked, and at every effort his face
grew crimson and the veins of his neck swelled.
Preceded by slaves, a young Byzantine woman of patrician rank
approached the athlete. She was dressed in a morning robe of delicate
hues; and a veil thrown over her head covered her aristocratic and
slightly-faded features.
She was a zealous Christian, widow of a Roman senator; beloved of
monks for her generous donations to monasteries, and abounding
charity. At first she concealed her escapades, but soon perceived that
to combine the love of the church with the love of the circus was
quite the fashion.
Everybody knew that Stratonice detested the coxcombs of
Constantinople, curled and painted, nervous and capricious as she was
herself; it was her temperament and fancy to mingle the most costly
perfumes of Arabia with the enervating heat of circus and stable. Hot
tears of repentance, fervent confessions to tactful confessors, were
of no avail; and this little woman, frail and delicate as some ivory
trinket, cared for nothing but the coarse caresses of a certain famous
circus-rider.
Stratonice was watching the exercises of the gymnast with a practised
eye, while he, preserving a stupid expression on his beefy face, paid
her not the slightest attention. She muttered something to her slave,
with simple wonder admiring the powerful back and the terrible
Herculean muscles rolling under the red skin of the shoulders, when,
bending with deep inhalations, like the wind of a forge, he raised the
iron weights above his handsome tawny head.
The curtain was lifted. The crowd of spectators recoiled, and two
Cappadocian mares, a white and a black, pushed into the stables,
ridden by a young horsewoman, who, with a guttural cry, adroitly leapt
from one beast to another, and thence to the ground.
She was solidly-built, hale and sprightly as her mares, and upon her
bare body shone fine drops of sweat.
Zephirinus, the elegant sub-deacon of the Basilica of the Holy
Apostles, smilingly hastened towards her. A great lover of the circus,
a frequenter of races and racing-stables, this young man would wager
heavy sums for the blue (_veneta_) against the green (_prasina_). With
his red-heeled morocco boots, his painted eyes, and curled hair,
Zephirinus had much more the appearance of a young girl than of a
servant of the church. Behind him stood a slave, burdened with packets
of pretty stuffs and boxes, purchases of every kind from famous shops.
"Krokala, here are the perfumes you asked for the day before
yesterday."
The sub-deacon offered the equestrienne a flask sealed with blue wax.
"I've been hunting in shops all the morning, and have only found it in
one. It is pure nard, and arrived yesterday from Apamea!"
"And what purchases are these?" demanded Krokala.
"Oh, the silks in fashion!... ornaments--sets of jewels!"
"All of them for your----?"
"Yes, all for my most noble sister, the devout matron Bezilla; one
_must_ help one's near relatives! She trusts nobody's taste but mine
for choosing stuffs. From early morning I am under her orders. My head
goes round, but I don't complain. No!... No!... Bezilla is so good ...
such a holy woman!"
"Unfortunately old," laughed Krokala. "Here, boy, wipe the sweat off
the black mare with fresh fig leaves."
"Old age also has its virtues," replied the sub-deacon, gently rubbing
together his white hands; they were loaded with rings.