The Upper Walks of Society
I
It was very early in the morning. From the streets, far below, a dull
rumbling was drifting in at the small, dim windows. On the couch,
behind some faded curtains, a man turned and yawned, grunted and
rubbed his eyes. The noise of the heavy timber, stone, and merchandise
wagons hastening out of the city before daybreak,[25] jarred the room,
and made sleep almost impossible. The person awakened swore quietly to
himself in Greek.
[25] No teaming was allowed in Rome by day.
"_Heracles!_ Was ever one in such a city! What malevolent spirit
brought me here? Throat-cutting on the streets at night; highwaymen in
every foul alley; unsafe to stir at evening without an armed band! No
police worth mentioning; freshets every now and then; fires every day
or else a building tumbles down. And then they must wake me up at an
unearthly hour in the morning. Curses on me for ever coming near the
place!" And the speaker rolled over on the bed, and shook himself,
preparatory to getting up.
"Bah! Can these Roman dogs never learn that power is to be used, not
abused? Why don't they spend some of their revenues to level these
seven hills that shut off the light, and straighten and widen their
abominable, ill-paved streets, and keep houses from piling up as if to
storm Olympus? Pshaw, I had better stop croaking, and be up and
about."
The speaker sat up in bed, and clapped his hands. Into the ill-lighted
and unpretentiously furnished room came a tall, bony, ebon-skinned old
Ethiopian, very scantily attired, who awaited the wishes of his
master.
"Come, Sesostris," said the latter, "get out my best
_himation_[26]--the one with the azure tint. Give me a clean
_chiton_,[27] and help me dress."
[26] Greek outer mantle.
[27] Greek under garment.
And while the servant bustled briskly about his work, Pratinas, for
such was his lord's name, continued his monologue, ignoring the
presence of his attendant. "Not so bad with me after all. Six years
ago to-day it was I came to Rome, with barely an obol of ready money,
to make my fortune by my wits. Zeus! But I can't but say I've
succeeded. A thousand sesterces here and five hundred there, and now
and then a better stroke of fortune--politics, intrigues, gambling;
all to the same end. And now?--oh, yes, my 'friends' would say I am
very respectable, but quite poor--but they don't know how I have
economized, and how my account stands with Sosthenes the banker at
Alexandria. My old acquaintance with Lucius Domitius was of some use.
A few more months of this life and I am away from this beastly Rome,
to enjoy myself among civilized people."
Pratinas went over to a large wooden chest with iron clasps, unlocked
it, and gazed for a moment inside with evident satisfaction. "There
are six good talents in there," he remarked to himself, "and then
there is Artemisia."
He had barely concluded this last, hardly intelligible assertion, when
the curtain of the room was pushed aside, and in came a short, plump,
rosy-faced little maiden of twelve, with a clearly chiselled Greek
profile and lips as red as a cherry. Her white chiton was mussed and a
trifle soiled; and her thick black hair was tied back in a low knot,
so as to cover what were two very shapely little ears. All in all, she
presented a very pretty picture, as the sunlight streamed over her,
when she drew back the hangings at the window.
"Good morning, Uncle Pratinas," she said sweetly.
"Good morning, Artemisia, my dear," replied the other, giving her
round neck a kiss, and a playful pinch. "You will practise on your
lyre, and let Sesostris teach you to sing. You know we shall go back
to Alexandria very soon; and it is pleasant there to have some
accomplishments."
"And must you go out so early, uncle?" said the girl. "Can't you stay
with me any part of the day? Sometimes I get very lonely."
"Ah! my dear," said Pratinas, smoothly, "if I could do what I wished,
I would never leave you. But business cannot wait. I must go and see
the noble Lucius Calatinus on some very important political matters,
which you could not understand. Now run away like a good girl, and
don't become doleful."
Artemisia left the room, and Pratinas busied himself about the fine
touches of his toilet. When he held the silver mirror up to his face,
he remarked to himself that he was not an unhandsome man. "If I did
not have to play the philosopher, and wear this thick, hot beard,[28]
I would not be ashamed to show my head anywhere." Then while he
perfumed himself with oil of saffron out of a little onyx bottle, he
went on:--
[28] At an age when respectable men were almost invariably smooth
shaven, the philosophers wore flowing beards, as a sort of professional
badge.
"What dogs and gluttons these Romans are! They have no real taste for
art, for beauty. They cannot even conduct a murder, save in a bungling
way. They have to call in us Hellenes to help them. Ha! ha! this is
the vengeance for Hellas, for the sack and razing of Corinth and all
the other atrocities! Rome can conquer with the sword; but we Greeks,
though conquered, can, unarmed, conquer Rome. How these Italians can
waste their money! Villas, statues, pretty slaves, costly vases, and
tables of mottled cypress,[29] oysters worth their weight in gold, and
I know not what else! And I, poor Pratinas, the Greek, who lives in an
upper floor of a Subura house at only two thousand sesterces rental,
find in these noble Roman lords only so much plunder. Ha! ha! Hellas,
thou art avenged!"
[29] A "fad" of this time. Such tables often cost $20,000.
And gathering his mantle about him, he went down the several flights
of very rickety stairs, and found himself in the buzzing street.
II
The Romans hugged a fond belief that houses shut out from sunlight and
air were extremely healthy. If such were the fact, there should have
been no sickness in a great part of the capital. The street in which
Pratinas found himself was so dark, that he was fain to wait till his
eyes accommodated themselves to the change. The street was no wider
than an alley, yet packed with booths and hucksters,--sellers of
boiled peas and hot sausage, and fifty other wares. On the worthy
Hellene pressed, while rough German slaves or swarthy Africans jostled
against him; the din of scholars declaiming in an adjoining school
deafened him; a hundred unhappy odors made him wince. Then, as he
fought his way, the streets grew a trifle wider; as he approached the
Forum the shops became more pretentious; at last he reached his
destination in the aristocratic quarter of the Palatine, and paused
before a new and ostentatious mansion, in whose vestibule was swarming
a great bevy of clients, all come in the official calling costume--a
ponderous toga--to pay their respects to the great man. But as the
inner door was pushed aside by the vigilant keeper, all the rest of
the crowd were kept out till Pratinas could pass within.
The atrium of the house was a splendid sight, with its veined marble
pillars, mosaic floor, bubbling fountain, choice frescoes, and
expensive furniture upholstered in Tyrian purple. A little in the rear
of this gorgeous room was seated in a high armchair the individual who
boasted himself the lord of this establishment, Lucius Atilius
Calatinus. He was a large, coarse man, with a rough, bull-dog face and
straight red hair. He had been drinking heavily the night before, and
his small bluish eyes had wide dark circles beneath them, and his
breath showed strongly the garlic with which he had seasoned the bread
and grapes of his early lunch. He was evidently very glad to see his
Greek visitor, and drove the six large, heavily gemmed rings which he
wore on one of his fat fingers, almost into the other's hand when he
shook it.
"Well met, Pratinas!" was his salutation. "Tell me, is that little
affair of yours settled? Have you stopped the mouth of that beastly
fellow, Postumus Pyrgensis, who said that I was a base upstart, with
no claim to my gentile name, and a bad record as a tax farmer in
Spain, and therefore should not be elected tribune[30]?"
[30] The ten tribunes had power to convene the people and Senate,
propose laws and "veto" the actions of other magistrates.
"I have stopped him," said Pratinas, with a little cough. "But it was
expensive. He stuck out for ten thousand sesterces."
"Oh, cheaply off," said Calatinus, laughing. "I will give you my
cheque on Flaccus the banker. But I want to know about the other
matter. Can you make sure of the votes of the Suburana tribe? Have you
seen Autronius?"
"I have seen him," said Pratinas, dryly.
"And he said?"
"Twenty thousand sesterces for him to deposit with trustees[31] until
the election is over. Then he as go-between[32] will make sure of a
majority of the tribesmen, and distribute to them the money if all
goes well at the _comitia_.[33] It was the best bargain I could make;
for Autronius really controls the tribe, and some one might outbid us."
[31] _Sequestres_.
[32] _Interpres_.
[33] Assembly of the Roman tribes for election.
"All right," broke out Calatinus with a laugh, "another cheque on
Flaccus."
"One thing else," said Pratinas; "I must have a little money to shut
up any complaints that those ridiculous anti-bribery Licinian and
Pompeian Laws are being broken. Then there is my fee."
"Oh, yes," replied the other, not to be daunted in his good humour,
"I'll give you fifty thousand in all. Now I must see this rabble."
And the mob of clients swept up to the armchair, grasping after the
great man's hand, and raining on him their _aves_, while some daring
mortals tried to thrust in a kiss.
Pratinas drew back and watched the crowd with a smile half cynical,
half amused. Some of the visitors were regular hangers-on, who perhaps
expected an invitation to dine; some were seekers of patronage; some
had an eye to political preferment, a few were real acquaintances of
Calatinus or came on some legitimate business. Pratinas observed three
friends waiting to speak with Calatinus, and was soon in conversation.
The first of the trio was known as Publius Gabinius, who was by far
the oldest. Coarse-featured, with broken complexion, it needed but a
glance to proclaim him as gifted with no other distinctions than those
of a hard drinker, fast liver, and the owner of an attenuated
conscience. Servius Flaccus, the second, was of a different type. He
was languid; spirited only when he railed at a slave who brushed
against his immaculate toga. The frills on his robes made him almost
feminine; and he spoke, even in invective, in a soft, lisping voice.
Around him floated the aroma of countless rare unguents, that made his
coming known afar off. His only aim in life was evidently to get
through it with as little exertion of brain or muscle as was possible.
The third friend was unlike the others. Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus
clearly amounted to more than either of his companions. A constant
worship of three very popular gods of the day--Women, Wine, and
Gaming--with the other excitements of a dissipated life, had ruined a
fine fair complexion. As it was, he had the profile of a handsome,
affable man; only the mouth was hard and sensual, and his skin was
faded and broken. He wore a little brown beard carefully trimmed
around his well-oiled chin after the manner of Roman men of fashion;
and his dark hair was crimped in regular steps or gradations, parting
in the middle and arranged on both sides like a girl's.[34]
[34] Suet., "Nero," 51.
"Good morning, Pratinas!" said Lucius, warmly, taking the Greek's
hand. "How glad we are to find you here. I wanted to ask you around to
Marcus Laeca's to-night; we think he will give something of a feast,
and you must see my latest sweetheart--Clyte! She is a little pearl. I
have had her head cut in intaglio on this onyx; is she not pretty?"
"Very pretty," said Pratinas, looking at the engraving on the ring.
"But perhaps it is not right for me, a grave philosopher, to go to
your banquet."
"How (h)absurd! (H)of c(h)ourse you c(h)an!" lisped Flaccus, who
affected Greek so far as to aspirate every word beginning with a
vowel, and to change every _c_ into a _ch_.
"Well," said Pratinas, laughing, for he was a dearly loved favourite
of all these gilded youth, "I will see! And now Gabinius is inviting
Calatinus also, and we are dispersing for the morning."
"Alas," groaned Ahenobarbus, "I must go to the Forum to plead with
that wretch Phormio, the broker, to arrange a new loan."
"And I to the Forum, also," added Calatinus, coming up, "to continue
this pest of a canvass for votes."
The clients fell into line behind Calatinus like a file of soldiers,
but before Pratinas could start away with the other friends, a
slave-boy came running out from the inner house, to say that "the Lady
Valeria would be glad of his company in her boudoir." The Greek bowed
his farewells, then followed the boy back through the court of the
peristylium.[35]
[35] An inner private court back of the atrium.
III
The dressing room occupied by Valeria--once wife of Sextus Drusus and
now living with Calatinus as her third husband in about four
years--was fitted up with every luxury which money, and a taste which
carried refinement to an extreme point, could accomplish. The walls
were bright with splendid mythological scenes by really good artists;
the furniture itself was plated with silver; the rugs were
magnificent. The mistress of this palatial abode was sitting in a low
easy-chair, holding before her a fairly large silver mirror. She wore
a loose gown of silken texture, edged to an ostentatious extent with
purple. Around her hovered Arsinoe and Semiramis, two handsome Greek
slave-girls, who were far better looking than their owner, inasmuch as
their complexions had never been ruined by paints and ointments. They
were expert hairdressers, and Valeria had paid twenty-five thousand
sesterces for each of them, on the strength of their proficiency in
that art, and because they were said to speak with a pure Attic Greek
accent. At the moment they were busy stripping off from the lady's
face a thick layer of dried enamel that had been put on the night
before.
Had Valeria been willing, she might have feared no comparison with her
maids; for from a merely sensuous standpoint, she would have been
reckoned very beautiful. She had by nature large brown eyes, luxuriant
brown hair, and what had been a clear brunette skin, and well-rounded
and regular features. But her lips were curled in hard, haughty lines,
her long eyelashes drooped as though she took little interest in life;
and, worse than all, to satisfy the demands of fashion, she had
bleached her hair to a German blonde, by a process ineffective and
injurious. The lady was just fuming to herself over a gray hair
Arsinoe had discovered, and Arsinoe went around in evident fear lest
Valeria should vent her vexation on her innocent ministers.
Over in one corner of the room, on a low divan, was sitting a
strange-looking personage. A gaunt, elderly man clothed in a very
dingy Greek himation, with shaggy grey hair, and an enormous beard
that tumbled far down his breast. This personage was Pisander,
Valeria's "house-philosopher," who was expected to be always at her
elbow pouring into her ears a rain of learned lore. For this worthy
lady (and two thousand years later would she not be attending lectures
on Dante or Browning?) was devoted to philosophy, and loved to hear
the Stoics[36] and Epicureans expound their varying systems of the
cosmos. At this moment she was feasting her soul on Plato. Pisander
was reading from the "Phaidros," "They might have seen beauty shining
in brightness, when the happy band, following in the train of Zeus (as
we philosophers did; or with the other gods, as others did), saw a
vision, and were initiated into most blessed mysteries, which we
celebrated in our state of innocence; and having no feeling of evils
yet to come; beholding apparitions, innocent and simple and calm and
happy as in a mystery; shining in pure light; pure ourselves, and not
yet enchained in that living tomb which we carry about, now that we
are imprisoned in the body ..."
[36] The opponents of the Epicureans; they nobly antagonized the mere
pursuit of pleasure held out as the one end of life by the Epicurean,
and glorified duty.
"Pratinas, to see her ladyship!" bawled a servant-boy[37] at the
doorway, very unceremoniously interrupting the good man and his
learnedly sublime lore. And Pratinas, with the softest and sweetest of
his Greek smiles, entered the room.
[37] _Cubicularius_.
"Your ladyship does me the honour," he began, with an extremely
deferential salutation.
"Oh, my dear Pratinas," cried Valeria, in a language she called Greek,
seizing his hand and almost embracing him, "how delighted I am to see
you! We haven't met since--since yesterday morning. I did so want to
have a good talk with you about Plato's theory of the separate
existence of ideas. But first I must ask you, have you heard whether
the report is true that Terentia, Caius Glabrio's wife, has run off
with a gladiator?"
"So Gabinius, I believe," replied Pratinas, "just told me. And I heard
something else. A great secret. You must not tell."
"Oh! I am dying to know," smirked Valeria.
"Well," said the Greek, confidentially, "Publius Silanus has divorced
his wife, Crispia. 'She went too much,' he says, 'with young
Purpureo.'"
"You do not say so!" exclaimed the lady. "I always knew that would
happen! Now tell me, don't you think this perfume of iris is delicate?
It's in that little glass scent bottle; break the neck.[38] I shall
use it in a minute. I have just had some bottles sent up from Capua.
Roman perfumes are so vulgar!"
[38] To let out the ointment. Capua was a famed emporium for perfumes
and like wares.
"I fear," said Pratinas, doing as bidden, and testing the essence with
evident satisfaction, "that I have interrupted your philosophical
studies." And he glanced at Pisander, who was sitting lonesome and
offended in his corner.
"Oh! not in the least," ran on Valeria; "but though I know you are
Epicurean, surely you enjoy Plato?"
"Certainly," said Pratinas, with dramatic dignity, "I suck the sweets
from the flowers left us by all the wise and good. Epicurean though I
am, your ladyship must permit me to lend you a copy of an essay I have
with me, by that great philosopher, the Stoic Chrysippos,[39] although
I cannot agree with all his teachings; and this copy of Panaitios, the
Eclectic's great _Treatise on Duty_, which cannot fail to edify your
ladyship." And he held out the two rolls.
[39] Born 180 B.C.
"A thousand thanks," said Valeria, languidly, "hand them to Pisander.
I will have him read them. A little more white lead, Arsinoe, I am too
tanned; make me paler. Just run over the veins of my temples with a
touch of blue paint. Now a tint of antimony on my eyelids."
"Your ladyship seems in wonderfully good spirits this morning,"
insinuated Pratinas.
"Yes," said Valeria, with a sigh, "I endure the woes of life as should
one who is consoled by philosophy."
"Shall I continue the Plato?" edged in poor Pisander, who was raging
inwardly to think that Pratinas should dare to assume the name of a
"lover of learning."
"When you are needed, I can tell you," snapped Valeria, sharply, at
the feeble remonstrance. "Now, Semiramis, you may arrange my hair."
The girl looked puzzled. To tell the truth, Valeria was speaking in a
tongue that was a babel of Greek and Latin, although she fondly
imagined it to be the former, and Semiramis could hardly understand
her.
"If your ladyship will speak in Latin," faltered the maid.
"Speak in Latin! Speak in Latin!" flared up Valeria. "Am I deceived?
Are you not Greeks? Are you some ignorant Italian wenches who can't
speak anything but their native jargon? Bah! You've misplaced a curl.
Take that!" And she struck the girl across the palms, with the flat of
her silver mirror. Semiramis shivered and flushed, but said nothing.
"Do I not have a perfect Greek pronunciation?" said the lady, turning
to Pratinas. "It is impossible to carry on a polite conversation in
Latin."
"I can assure your ladyship," said the Hellene, with still another
bland smile, "that your pronunciation is something exceedingly
remarkable."
Valeria was pacified, and lay back submitting to her hairdressers[40],
while Pratinas, who knew what kind of "philosophy" appealed most to
his fair patroness, read with a delicate yet altogether admirable
voice, a number of scraps of erotic verse that he said friends had
just sent on from Alexandria.
[40] _Ornatrices_.
"Oh! the shame to call himself a philosopher," groaned the neglected
Pisander to himself. "If I believed in the old gods, I would invoke
the Furies upon him."
But Valeria was now in the best of spirits. "By the two
Goddesses,"[41] she swore, "what charming sentiments you Greeks can
express. Now I think I look presentable, and can go around and see
Papiria, and learn about that dreadful Silanus affair. Tell Agias to
bring in the cinnamon ointment. I will try that for a change. It is in
the murrhine[42] vase in the other room."
[41] Demeter and Persephone, a Greek woman's oath.
[42] A costly substance, probably porcelain agate.
Iasus the serving-boy stepped into the next apartment, and gave the
order to one of his fellow slaves. A minute later there was a crash.
Arsinoe, who was without, screamed, and Semiramis, who thrust her head
out the door, drew it back with a look of dismay.
"What has happened?" cried Valeria, startled and angry.
Into the room came Arsinoe, Iasus, and a second slave-boy, a
well-favoured, intelligent looking young Greek of about seventeen. His
ruddy cheeks had turned very pale, as had those of Iasus.
"What has happened?" thundered Valeria, in a tone that showed that a
sorry scene was impending.
The slaves fell on their knees; cowered, in fact, on the rugs at the
lady's feet.
"_A! A! A!_ Lady! Mercy!" they all began in a breath. "The murrhina
vase! It is broken!"
"Who broke it?" cried their mistress, casting lightning glances from
one to another.
Now the truth had been, that while Agias was coming through a door
covered with a curtain, carrying the vase, Iasus had carelessly
blundered against him and caused the catastrophe. But there had been
no other witnesses to the accident; and when Iasus saw that his
mistress's anger would promptly descend on somebody, he had not the
moral courage to take the consequences of his carelessness. What
amounted to a frightful crime was committed in an instant.
"Agias stumbled and dropped the vase," said Iasus, telling the truth,
but not the whole truth.
"Send for Alfidius the _lorarius_,"[43] raged Valeria, who, with the
promptness that characterizes a certain class of women, jumped at a
conclusion and remained henceforth obstinate. "This shall not happen
again! Oh! my vase! my vase! I shall never get another one like it! It
was one of the spoils of Mithridates, and"--here her eye fell on
Agias, cringing and protesting his innocence in a fearful agony.
[43] Whipper; many Roman houses had such a functionary, and he does
not seem to have lacked employment.
"Stand up, boy! Stop whining! Of course you broke the vase. Who else
had it? I will make you a lesson to all the slaves in my house. They
need one badly. I will get another serving-boy who will be more
careful."
Agias was deathly pale; the beads of sweat stood out on his forehead;
he grasped convulsively at the hem of his mistress's robe, and
murmured wildly of "mercy! mercy!" Pratinas stood back with his
imperturbable smile on his face; and if he felt the least pity for his
fellow-countryman, he did not show it.
"Alfidius awaits the mistress," announced Semiramis, with trembling
lips.
Into the room came a brutish, hard-featured, shock-headed man, with a
large scar, caused by branding, on his forehead. He carried a short
rope and scourge,[44]--a whip with a short handle to which were
attached three long lashes, set at intervals with heavy bits of
bronze. He cast one glance over the little group in the room, and his
dull piglike eyes seemed to light up with a fierce glee, as he
comprehended the situation.
[44] _Flagellum_.
"What does your ladyship wish?" he growled.
"Take this wretched boy," cried Valeria, spurning Agias with her foot;
"take him away. Make an example of him. Take him out beyond the Porta
Esquilina and whip him to death. Let me never see him again."
Pisander sprang up in his corner, quivering with righteous wrath.
"What is this?" he cried. "The lad is not guilty of any real crime. It
would be absurd to punish a horse for an action like his, and a slave
is as good as a horse. What philosopher could endure to see such an
outrage?"
Valeria was too excited to hear him. Pratinas coolly took the
perturbed philosopher round the waist, and by sheer force seated him
in a chair.
"My friend," he said calmly, "you can only lose your place by
interfering; the boy is food for the crows already. Philosophy should
teach you to regard little affairs like this unmoved."
Before Pisander could remonstrate further Alfidius had caught up Agias
as if he had been an infant, and carried him, while moaning and
pleading, out of the room. Iasus was still trembling. He was not a
knave--simply unheroic, and he knew that he had committed the basest
of actions. Semiramis and Arsinoe were both very pale, but spoke never
a word. Arsinoe looked pityingly after the poor boy, for she had grown
very fond of his bright words and obliging manners. For some minutes
there was, in fact, perfect silence in the boudoir.
Alfidius carried his victim out into the slaves' quarters in the rear
of the house; there he bound his hands and called in the aid of an
assistant to help him execute his mistress's stern mandate.
Agias had been born for far better things than to be a slave. His
father had been a cultured Alexandrine Greek, a banker, and had given
his young son the beginnings of a good education. But the rascality of
a business partner had sent the father to the grave bankrupt, the son
to the slave-market to satisfy the creditors. And now Alfidius and his
myrmidon bound their captive to a furca, a wooden yoke passing down
the back of the neck and down each arm. The rude thongs cut the flesh
cruelly, and the wretches laughed to see how the delicate boy writhed
and faltered under the pain and the load.
"Ah, ha! my fine _Furcifer_,"[45] cried Alfidius, when this work was
completed. "How do you find yourself?"
[45] Furca-bearer, a coarse epithet.
"Do you mock at me, you '_three letter man_'?" retorted Agias in grim
despair, referring cuttingly to FVR[46] branded on Alfidius's
forehead.
[46] Thief. Branding was a common punishment for slaves.
"So you sing, my pretty bird," laughed the executioner. "I think you
will croak sorrowfully enough before long. Call me '_man of letters_'
if you will; to-night the dogs tear that soft skin of yours, while my
hide is sound. Now off for the Porta Esquilina! Trot along with you!"
and he swung his lash over the wretched boy's shoulders.
Agias was led out into the street. He was too pained and numbed to
groan, resist, or even think and fear. The thongs might well have been
said to press his mind as much as his skin.