lighthouse. Is that because of the Pharos tower?”
Diana had a French governess, and to Rachel’s wonder and admiration,
spoke French, if not as well, at least as quickly as she talked in
English.
“Yes,” answered Dinocrates. “Every time French sailors use that
word, even though they have no knowledge of its meaning, the work of
Sostratus is mentioned by men who live to-day. His work is remembered,
his _name_ forgotten, even though he strove hard that this should not
be the case.
“Listen, and I will tell you what chanced. When the tower was at length
finished and stood gleaming white on this headland, the time had come
for an inscription to be placed upon it, and Ptolemy, King of Egypt,
ordered Sostratus to engrave these words upon the marble: _King Ptolemy
to the gods, the saviours, for the benefit of sailors_.
“Now Sostratus, to whom the lighthouse represented all that he now
cared for in life, was determined that his own name should be read, if
not at the moment, at least in time to come. Yet he dared not disobey
the King’s command. This, then, was the device by which he tried to
ensure remembrance.
“Deep in the marble he first engraved:
“‘_Sostratus, son of Dexiphanes_, to the gods, the saviours, for the
benefit of sailors.’
“Having thus placed his own, instead of the King’s name upon the tower,
he then covered up the whole inscription with mortar, and on the top of
it engraved the inscription commanded by Ptolemy. Well he knew, that
in the course of years, the mortar would decay and his own name become
visible.... Rise, make seven obeisances towards the sea, and you shall
behold, if it please you, the lighthouse as it appeared a hundred years
after Sostratus and King Ptolemy alike had left this world.”
The children lost no time in obeying, and when they opened their eyes
they found themselves, to their delight, standing at the foot of the
beautiful white tower. Dinocrates, smiling, stood beside them, and
pointed to some lettering upon the tower at a little height above his
own head. The inscription was cracked and defaced, and as the words
were in Greek, they could not read them, but in a hollow, where the
mortar had broken away at the beginning of the sentence, they saw a
name which Dinocrates pronounced aloud—the name of Sostratus, now at
last plainly to be seen.
The children gazed with interest upon the splendid graceful tower
springing high above their heads, and then looked from it across the
bridge to the city.
“Why, the town is ever so much bigger. Twice, three times as big,”
cried Rachel, as she saw the clustering houses and let her eyes wander
over the new domes and colonnades, courtyards and gardens visible on
the other side of the harbour.
“A hundred years have passed between the opening and shutting of your
eyes,” said the voice of Dinocrates. “The city founded by Alexander and
built by me has had time to grow and to become one of the most famous
homes of learning in the world. There great men have lived and died,
and been forgotten, even as Sostratus, despite this inscription made
in vanity, is forgotten. But Alexandria still lives, though the Pharos
Tower, the Wonder of the World, is no more. And there, to-day, men
who have fought in this last great war are planning to dig for buried
treasures under modern houses and squares. Time goes on and men are
forgotten, but the work of their brains lasts longer, and sometimes
bears fruit centuries after they themselves have departed.... Here, for
instance, we stand in this modern lighthouse....”
* * * * *
It was Mr. Sheston (no longer in the guise of Dinocrates) who uttered
the last words. Dinocrates, the Pharos Tower, the City of Alexandria
had vanished, and a moment later Rachel and Diana were listening to the
sailor-man.
“I don’t know who invented them,” he was saying, as though in answer
to a question, “but, whoever it was, he did a good piece of work.
There’s too many wrecks as it is, but there’d be a considerable number
more if it wasn’t for these ’ere light-’ouses.”
“_We_ know who invented them,” whispered Diana to Rachel, as they
clattered down the winding stairs of the tower.
“Didn’t I tell you that being away from London wouldn’t make any
difference?” demanded Rachel, triumphantly. “Sheshà can do _anything_!”
“Hush! Here comes Mr. Sheston,” Diana warned her in a low voice. “And
I suppose we mustn’t say anything. But _he_ knows that _we_ know he’s
Sheshà and Dinocrates—”
“And Cleon—and all the rest,” put in Rachel. “Isn’t it wonderful
and—and _fun_, you know?”
Mr. Sheston, who had lingered in talk with the old sailor upstairs, now
joined them, and all the way home the children chattered demurely about
the St. Mary’s Bay lighthouse. There was no mention of the Pharos at
Alexandria.
[Illustration]
SEVENTH WONDER
[Illustration: ·THE STATUE OF JUPITER·OLYMPUS]
Both the children were back again in London a few days later, sadly
missing the sea and the freedom of St. Mary’s Bay, of course, but
consoled by the knowledge that Mr. Sheston had also come back to town.
One afternoon, soon after their return, Rachel met Diana with a radiant
face.
“Dad and Mother are coming back,” she exclaimed joyfully. “They’re on
their way now. And Mother is ever so much better, Dad says. And this
day week I shall see them, and go home with them. Isn’t it perfectly
lovely?” But there were sudden tears in Diana’s eyes, and, in the midst
of her excited talk, Rachel paused. “You’re to come and stay with me,
of course,” she declared hastily. “Do you think I should be so glad
if I had to say good-bye to you? Mother says she’s writing to _your_
mother to ask her to let you stay for a month. And she will, won’t she?”
This announcement had the effect of making Diana’s face almost as
joyful as Rachel’s, and during their walk that afternoon their
chattering tongues never ceased. There was so much to talk about.
When Rachel had described all the delights of her country home, the
farm, the garden, the river with its punt, the woods in which they
could build huts of branches—the conversation turned, as usual, upon
the “adventures” in which Mr. Sheston was concerned.
“There’s still another one to come, you know,” Rachel presently
declared. “At least I expect so. I’ve been here six weeks now, and
every seventh day it’s—_happened_. And there’ll be another seventh day
on Wednesday.”
“I do wonder what it will be this time, don’t you?” said Diana. “It’s
so exciting not knowing where it will begin. Perhaps in the British
Museum again. I rather hope it will be there. It’s so jolly to go with
‘him’ just as other children go with grown-up people to the Museum,
and yet to know all the time that something frightfully interesting is
coming.”
“Yes, that’s just what _I_ feel is so jolly about it,” Rachel agreed.
“You go through all those rooms and you see statues and tombs and
stones and things, and they all look _dead_, and you can’t believe the
people who saw them thousands of years ago were just as much alive
as we are now. Every time I go to the Museum I feel like that at
first. Don’t you? And then it _happens_, you know. Quite suddenly. And
everything that looked all dull and dead comes to be _real_. I hope it
will begin in the Museum this time.”
It did. But before it happened, and as a last treat for her niece, Aunt
Hester took both children to the circus at Olympia.
“What is _Olympia_?” asked Diana, suddenly, when she and Rachel, full
of anticipation, were walking with Aunt Hester to the omnibus.
“It’s where the circus is held,” said Aunt Hester. “It’s a good long
ride, so we must make haste.”
“But I mean what _is_ it?” persisted Diana.
“Oh, it’s a great building. Big enough for all sorts of entertainments,
as well as the circus, to go on inside it.”
“Why is it called Olympia?” asked Rachel. “It’s such a funny name for a
place where there’s a circus.”
“You must ask Mr. Sheston,” returned Aunt Hester, vaguely. “He’ll tell
you why, better than I can. By the way, he’s going to take you both to
the Museum to-morrow. I had a note from him this morning. Come along,”
she exclaimed, hurriedly, as they turned a corner, “there’s the
omnibus just starting. We must run for it.”
Seated opposite to one another in the omnibus when rather breathlessly
they had settled down, Rachel and Diana exchanged meaning glances.
“It _is_ going to begin there, you see,” whispered Rachel at the
earliest opportunity, and Diana agreed with a nod and smile of secret
delight.
They enjoyed the circus immensely, but beautiful as the horses were,
and much as they admired them, both children thought of another and
still more wonderful horse than any that appeared in the ring.
“But, then, Bucephalus was the loveliest and cleverest thing in the
world,” observed Diana, in a low voice, after Rachel had murmured his
name. “And I’m sure he would hate to do tricks in a circus. He was a
_war_ horse.”
“And used to real battles,” agreed Rachel, in an answering whisper.
* * * * *
“Well,” said Mr. Sheston next day, when Miss Moore had left both the
children with him at the entrance to the Museum. “Well, how did you
like the circus at Olympia yesterday?”
“Oh, it was lovely!” they exclaimed together.
“Aunt Hester said we were to ask you why it’s called _Olympia_,” put in
Rachel, as they began to walk slowly through a statue-lined room that
had become familiar.
“We may find the answer this afternoon,” answered the old gentleman,
turning into a room that Rachel knew already. It was the room
containing the statues of the headless women clothed in beautiful
drapery.
“These are Greek statues, aren’t they?” she began, pointing to the
group in the middle of the room. “They were on the outside of a temple
once, weren’t they? I forget what it was called.”
“The Parthenon in Athens,” Mr. Sheston told her. “There’s a model
showing the temple as it stood in ancient days, over there in that
glass case. We’ll go and examine it in a minute. But first look up and
see those young men riding on horseback.”
He pointed to a frieze in marble which ran the length of the walls and
represented a procession of youths mounted upon beautiful horses.
“Now let us have a look at this model which shows part of Athens as it
appeared two thousand years or so ago,” he went on, after a moment.
The children followed him to a stand upon which, modelled in plaster,
was a rocky hill with various buildings like fair-sized toys scattered
over its slope. The names of these buildings were written below them,
on the white plaster hill, and Diana had just exclaimed, “_Here’s_
the Parthenon!” when a young voice, which neither of the children
recognised, but which sounded close at hand, said:
“_Seven times with closed eyes shall you bow._”
“Diana!” cried Rachel, a few seconds later, “It’s Athens. _Real_
Athens, you know!”
There was no doubt about its reality, for they felt the warmth of the
sun, saw the overarching blue sky, and gazed with wonder and delight
upon a beautiful scene.
A hill-side stretched before them, no longer of plaster, but a _real_
hill-side, scattered over with marvellous buildings in white marble,
with groves of trees, and stretches of gardens between them.
“Look! Look!” exclaimed Diana, recognising at least one of the
buildings. “That’s the Parthenon. There are the great beautiful women
up in that pointed place above the columns.”
“And they’re not broken!” cried Rachel, excitedly. “They’re quite
perfect. Look at their faces, and their arms. They had no faces and no
arms the last time we saw them.”
“And there’s the procession of boys on horseback!” cried Diana,
pointing to the frieze....
* * * * *
“Will it please you to come with me, O maidens?” enquired a voice, so
near that both the children started before they turned round.
Behind them stood a boy of perhaps eleven or twelve years old. He was
dressed in a shirt or tunic of white wool, without sleeves, and over it
a white purple-bordered cloak wrapped about him in such a way as to
leave his right arm and shoulder free. His legs were bare, but on his
feet were sandals fastened with slender cords of leather strapped about
his ankles.
His head was covered only by its thick crop of red-gold hair which
curled closely about his head, and was one of his many beauties. For he
was an exceedingly handsome boy—slim, yet strongly built. He held his
head and body well, and all his movements were quick and graceful.
“Who are you?” stammered Rachel, the first to recover from surprise.
“My name is Agis,” said the boy. “I am commanded by Sheshà, greatest
of magicians, to be your guide through our city of Athens. Later, I
understand, he himself will conduct you to the Olympian games.”
Again, as it had so often happened before, though the language spoken
by the boy was not her own, Rachel understood him perfectly.
“I suppose it’s Greek he’s talking,” she thought hurriedly before she
began to ask questions.
“That’s the Parthenon, isn’t it?” she asked, pointing to the gleaming
temple. “We’ve seen those statues up there before. At least, we’ve
seen——” She was going to say “bits of them,” but Diana pulled her
sleeve, and she stopped just in time to remember that it was no use
trying to explain to a boy who lived thousands of years ago, all about
the British Museum!
“Will you tell us what god is worshipped here?” put in Diana, politely.
“No god, but a goddess, the great Pallas Athene,” returned the boy,
glancing at her with his bright eyes.
“She’s the same as _Minerva_, you know,” whispered Diana quickly,
having learnt this from her father.
“Within,” the boy went on, “stands the statue of the goddess made by
Phidias, the wondrous sculptor.”
“Is he alive now?” enquired Rachel.
Agis laughed. “Nay. He has been dead two hundred years and more. You
must have come from a very far country, O maidens, to be so ignorant!”
“We have,” said Rachel, smiling in her turn. If only the boy could
have known. It was only two hundred years for _him_ since the sculptor
Phidias died, while for her and for Diana it was considerably more than
two _thousand_ years. “We don’t know anything about your country,” she
continued, “so will you please explain everything.”
“That would take me far too long, because I must soon return to the
gymnasium, whither you may accompany me. I have only brought you here
for a moment that you may glance at the most famous of our temples and
public buildings. The city itself lies down yonder.” He pointed to a
sea of white flat-roofed houses below.
“What is that place, high up on the hill?” asked Diana.
“The citadel—our fort of defence which we call the Acropolis. Beneath
it, as you see, and under its protection, as it were, are the other
buildings, of which the most precious is the Parthenon.”
“Can’t we go in, and look at the statue of the goddess?” begged Rachel.
Agis shook his curly head.
“Time is lacking. But it may be that, some days hence, you will see
another, and perhaps even more famous statue, carved also by Phidias.
It stands in the temple of Zeus at Olympia.”
The children exchanged quick glances at the mention of the word.
“What _is_ Olympia?” asked Diana, and as she put the question she
suddenly remembered asking it before. Yesterday, was it?... It seemed
ages and ages ago, or like something in a dream. She and Rachel had
been then on their way to the circus at _Olympia_, and she had asked
Aunt Hester——
Her bewildering thoughts were interrupted by a long shrill whistle from
Agis. It was so like the sort of whistle her brother Jack gave when he
was teasing her, that Rachel laughed. After all, Agis was very much
like an ordinary schoolboy, even though he did talk in what she called
“an old-fashioned long-ago” style.
“You know not _Olympia_, maidens? What then have you to live for, if
you know not the Olympic games?”
“We really _don’t_ know anything about them,” said Rachel,
apologetically. “You see we live in a different country, and—well, in
a different time.”
She couldn’t help adding this, in her desire to defend herself from the
charge of ignorance, but the boy took no notice of the last remark.
“Come with me, and by degrees it may be I shall enlighten you,” he
said, still in a mocking voice.
He turned quickly, and Rachel and Diana, after one backward glance at
the snow-white temple adorned with its perfect sculpture, followed him
meekly down the hill. In a few moments they found themselves threading
their way through the narrow streets of the city of Athens. These
streets were bounded on either side by blank walls, broken here and
there by a door.
“But where are the houses?” enquired Diana presently.
“These doors lead to our houses,” returned the boy, tapping one of them
as he passed.
“There aren’t any windows!” objected Rachel.
“Would you have windows upon the street?” said Agis. “An idea comic
indeed, O maidens!”
The children were too occupied with the strangeness of everything
around them to reply to this. Every now and then they emerged
from narrow roads between walls into a great square, and here the
surrounding buildings were magnificent. There were long colonnades
where people, dressed more or less in the same fashion as Agis, lounged
or walked, and often in the midst of the square they saw beautiful
statues.
“Look!” said Diana presently, pointing to a garland of leaves hung upon
the knocker of a door. “Why is that wreath put there?” They had turned
into another narrow street by this time.
“A new-born child is in the house without doubt,” returned Agis
carelessly. “A boy.”
“How do you know?” asked Rachel.
“If it had been a girl, there would be a wreath of wool, instead of
olive leaves. You may see such a one over there,” replied Agis,
nodding in the direction of another door further on, where a twisted
loop of violet wool hung from a knocker.
The children were much interested.
“It’s awfully nice to know like that about the babies,” declared
Diana.... “Where are we going, Agis? What is this place?” she added
curiously, as the boy ran on in front of them up a broad flight of
steps leading to an imposing building.
“This is the gymnasium, and unless we hasten, I shall be late, and my
instructor will be angered.” Agis looked over his shoulder to say this.
“Follow me, and pay no heed to anyone, for no one will pay heed to you.
Sheshà has put you under my guidance—I know not why. But I know that,
except to me, you are invisible. Go boldly into yonder courtyard and
watch. I must first leave my garments in the corridor.” He ran quickly
down a passage to the right, and the children, full of wonder, walked
on into a sunny square, enclosed by high walls, where little boys were
going through all sorts of exercises.
“Oh, don’t they look pretty without their clothes!” was Diana’s first
exclamation. For all the boys were naked, and as they ran and leapt,
and the sunshine fell upon their little white bodies, they did indeed
look beautiful.
“He said it was a _gymnasium_,” said Rachel. “But there aren’t any
rings and poles and things, like there are in our gymnasiums. I suppose
this was the _first_ sort of gymnasium, and ours are named after it?”
she went on suddenly, as the idea struck her.
“There’s Agis!” cried Diana, as the now naked boy appeared. “Doesn’t he
look like a statue come to life? Oh, look, Rachel! What is he going to
do? That man—I suppose he’s the master?—is rubbing him all over with
something. It’s oil, isn’t it? and those other boys are being rubbed
with it too.”
“It’s to make them move their bodies easily, I expect,” said Rachel.
“You know how oil makes stiff things like rusty locks quite smooth and
easy. I suppose it’s the same with people’s joints.”
“Now they’re throwing sand over one another!” Diana exclaimed. “What’s
that for, I wonder? Oh! they’re going to wrestle. Agis and that dark
boy together. Do you see?”
“That’s why they put sand on themselves then,” suggested Rachel.
“They’d be too slippery to hold one another without. Oh, _do_ look!
Isn’t it jolly to see them? Agis is winning! I’m sure he’s winning.”
[Illustration]
With breathless interest the children watched the boys as they turned
and twisted—all their movements swift and graceful as the movements
of beautiful wild forest animals. After the wrestling they saw several
races between companies of boys, and then looked on at exercises in
throwing a round object something like a quoit made in lead.
It was all wonderful to see. To sit in the sunshine, to hear the voices
and laughter of the boys, to watch their graceful movements, and yet to
know that the scene before them was really far away—back two thousand
years and more into the Past, indeed, was a strange-enough experience.
Every now and then, when they realised this, it made both of the
children very quiet, and even a little sad.
They forgot this impression however when, at last, the training over,
Agis beckoned to them to follow him out of the gymnasium.
In a few moments he was dressed again, and as the children walked on
either side of him, through squares and streets, they kept up a fire of
eager questions.
“This is the last day of our training,” explained Agis. “To-morrow
we start on our journey, and in three days begin the great games in
Olympia. May the gods grant me patience to live till then!” he went on
excitedly.
“But you haven’t yet told us what Olympia _is_,” urged Diana.
“Strange that you are ignorant of the Olympic Games which are renowned
throughout the world,” sighed Agis. “Yet do I remember that Sheshà bade
me have patience to tell you everything.
“Know then, as all the world but you, O maidens, are aware, that every
five years, at Olympia, which is in a part of Greece called Elis, games
are held at which it is the highest honour in the world to compete. For
the four years between the great year of the games, all youths who are
Grecian by birth are trained at schools called gymnasia—one of which
you have lately beheld.
“Towards the end of the fourth year, in every part of our country,
those who have best acquitted themselves in the training are chosen to
go to Olympia and contend for the prizes.”
“Then _you_ are chosen,” said Rachel joyfully.
“I to my great content am to run in the first race, and my elder
brother, Phidolas, is also among the athletes. _He_ is to compete in
the horse race, for he is a skilled rider, and has the most perfect
mare that was ever bred,” he added enthusiastically. “Her name is Aura,
and presently, if it please you, we will see her.”
“Oh, we _love_ horses!” exclaimed Diana. “Do tell us some more about
the games. Who began them? How long have they been going on?”
“For a thousand years and more. Zeus, father of all the gods, first
commanded them to take place, to celebrate his victory over the giants
who, before him, ruled the world. Since then, they have been held, as
I have already said, every four years, for the honour and glory of
heroes.”
“_Zeus_ is the same as Jupiter, I think,” whispered Diana to Rachel.
“Yes. I remember. Father told me so.”
By this time Agis had stopped at one of the doors set in the blank
wall of a narrow street, and he lifted and let fall the knocker with a
resounding clang.
“This is my home. I must set some repast before you, for indeed you
must need it, O strange and ignorant maidens,” he added, with his
teasing schoolboy smile.
The door was opened at the moment by an old man whom the children at
once guessed to be a servant.
“Or a _slave_, I expect,” said Rachel, as Agis hurried on in front.
“They had slaves in Greece, didn’t they?”
“Now we shall see the inside of a Greek house as it was thousands
of years ago,” returned Diana eagerly.... “Isn’t this a _splendid_
adventure?”
They found themselves in a passage which led into a square courtyard
roofed by the blue sky. A colonnade ran the length of the four sides of
this courtyard, and from it on the side away from the open space, they
saw various rooms. Agis pushed back a door, and called to the children
to follow him.
“It is past noon,” he said, “and our meal is already served. Enter and
eat with us.”