AN ALEXANDRIAN CHARACTERISTIC
Nothing but prescience could have inspired Alexander, the young
Macedonian conqueror, to decide to plant a city on the sandy peninsula
which lay hot, flat, low and unproductive between the glassy waters of
Lake Mareotis and the tumble of the Mediterranean.
For a century previous, a straggling Egyptian village, called Rhacotis,
eked out a precarious existence by fisheries; the port was filled with
shoals or clogged with water-growth, and the voluptuous fertility of
the Nile margin followed the slow sweep of the great river into the sea
twelve miles farther to the east. No other port along the coast
presented a more unattractive appearance. But Alexander, having no
more worlds to conquer, turned his opposition upon adverse conditions.
So he struck his spear into the sand, and there arose at the blow a
city having the spirit of its founder--great, splendid, contentious,
contradictory, impetuous and finally self-destructive through its
excesses.
He enlarged and embellished Rhacotis, which lay to the west of the new
city and left it to the tenantry of the Egyptians, poor remnants of
that haughty race which had been aristocrats of the world before Troy.
In its center arose that solemn triumph of Pharaonic architecture, the
Serapeum.
But it was they who approached from the south, with the sand of the
Libyan desert in their locks, who saw noble Alexandria. Between them
and the city was first the strength of its fortifications, prodigious
lengths of wall, beautiful with citadels and towers. Within was the
Brucheum, with the splendor of the Library, for the Alexandrian spirit
of contentiousness sharpened and forced the intellect of her
disputants, till her learning was the most faultless of the time and
its house a fit shape for its contents. After the Library the pillared
facade of the Court of Justice; next the unparalleled Museum, and,
interspersed between, were the glories of four hundred theaters, four
thousand palaces, four thousand baths. Against the intense blue of the
rainless Egyptian sky were imprinted the sun-white towers, pillars,
arches and statues of the most comely city ever builded in Africa.
Memphis, lost and buried in the sand, and Thebes, an echoing nave of
roofless columns, were never so instinct with glory as Egypt's splendid
recrudescence on the coast of the Middle Sea.
To the northeast, there was abatement of pagan grandeur. Here were
quaint solid masses of Syriac architecture, with gowned and bearded
dwellers and a general air of oriental decorum and religious rigor
which did not mark the other quarters of the city. In this spot the
Jews of the Diaspora had been planted, had multiplied and strengthened
until there were forty thousand in the district.
Those turning the beaks of their galleys into the Alexandrian roadstead
saw first the Pharos, a mist-embraced and phantom tower, rising out of
the waves; after it, the Lochias, wading out into the sea that the
palaces of the Ptolemies might hold in mortmain their double empire of
land and water; on the other hand the trisected Heptistadium; between,
the acreage of docking and out of the amphitheatrical sweep of the
great city behind, standing huge, white and majestic, the grandest
Jewish structure, next to Herod's Temple, that the world has ever
known--the Synagogue.
The Jews of Alexandria; as a class of peculiar and emphatic
characteristics, a class toward which consideration was due in
deference to its numbers, its wealth and its sensitiveness, were
necessarily the object of particular provision. Therefore, that they
might be intelligently handled as to their prejudices, they were
provided with a special governor from among their own--an alabarch;
permitted to erect their own sanctuaries and to practise the customs of
race and the rites of religion in so far as they did not interfere with
the government's interests.
Thus much their privileges; their oppressions were another story.
Peopled by three of the most aggressive nations on the globe, the
Greek, the Roman and the Jew, Alexandria seemed likewise to attract
representatives of every country that had a son to fare beyond its
borders. Drift from the dry lands of all the world was brought down
and beached at the great seaport. It ranged in type from the
fair-haired Norseman to the sinewy Mede on the east, from the Gaul on
the west to the huge Ethiopian with sooty shining face who came from
the mysterious and ancient land south of the First Cataract.
It followed that such a heterogeneous mass did not effect union and
amity. That was a spiritual fusion which had to await a perfect
conception of liberty and the brotherhood of man. The racial mixture
in Alexandria was, therefore, a prematurity, subject to disorder.
So long as a Jew may have his life, his faith and his chance at
bread-winning, he does not call himself abused. These things the Roman
state yielded the Jew in Alexandria. But he was haughty, refined,
rich, religious, exclusive, intelligent and otherwise obnoxious to the
Alexandrians, and, being also a non-combatant, the Jew was the common
victim of each and all of the mongrel races which peopled the city.
The common port of entry was an interesting spot. The prodigious
stretches of wharf were fronted by packs of fleets, ranging in class
from the visiting warrior trireme from Ravenna or Misenum, to the squat
and blackened dhow from up the Nile or the lateen-sailed fishing-smack
from Algeria to the papyrus punt of home waters. Its population was
the waste of society, fishers, porters, vagabonds, criminals, ruffian
sea-faring men, dockmen, laborers of all sorts, men, women and
children--the pariahs even of the rabble and typically the Voice of
Revilement.
Agrippa, landing with his party, attracted no more attention than any
other new-comer would have done, until Silas gravely inquired the way
into the Regio Judaeorum.
"Jupiter strike you!" roared the man whom the sober Silas had
addressed. "Do I look like a barbarian Jew that I should know anything
about the Regio Judaeorum!"
His words, purposely loud, did not fail to excite the interest he meant
they should.
"Regio Judaeorum!" cried a woman under foot, filling her basket with
fish entrails. "What say you, Gesius? Who, these? Look,
Alexandrians, what tinsel and airs are hunting the Regio Judaeorum!"
"Purple, by my head!" the man exclaimed. "Roman citizens with the bent
nose of Jerusalem!"
"Agrippa, or I am a landsman!" a sailor shouted. "Fugitive from
debtors, or I am a pirate!"
"Jews!" another woman screamed; "coming to collect usury!"
A howl of rage, threatening and lawless, greeted this cry, out of which
rose the sailor's voice with a shout of laughter.
"Usury! Ha, ha! He has not a denarius on him that is not borrowed!"
The Jewish prince had lived a life of diverse fortune, but never until
then had he been the object of popular scorn. A surprise was aroused
in him as great as his indignation; he stood transfixed with emotion.
Cypros, thoroughly terrified, came out from among her servants and
clung to his arm. On her the eyes of the fishwives alighted.
[Illustration: Cypros, thoroughly terrified, clung to his arm (missing
from book)]
"Look! Look!" they cried. "Sparing us our husbands by hiding her
beauty! The rag over her face! Bah! for a plaster of mud!"
"Fish-scales will serve as well," another cried, snatching up a handful
and throwing it at the princess.
"Have mine, too, Bassia! Thou art a better thrower than I!" a third
shouted, handing up her basket.
"Be sure of your aim, Bassia!"
The uproar became general.
"A handful for the simpering hand-maid, too!"
"Don't miss the she-Herod!"
"Fall to, wives; don't leave it all to Bassia!"
"'Way for the proconsul!"--a distant roar came up from the water's edge.
"Bilge-water in my jar, there, mate; it will mix their perfumes!"
"'Way for the proconsul!" the distant roar insisted.
"Don't soil the proconsul, women!"
"'Ware, Bassia! The proconsul is coming!"
"Perpol! he will not see! He is the best Jew-baiter in all Alexandria!
Sure aim, O Phoebus of the bow!"
"'Way for the proconsul!"
"Pluto take the legionaries; here they come!"
"One more pitch at them, though Caesar were coming!"
"No privileges exclusive for thyself, Bassia! _Habet_! More scales!"
"Scales; shells; water! Scales; sh--"
"Fish-heads! _Habet_!"
"Entrails--"
"'Way for the proconsul!"
"Directly, comrades! Shells, water!"
"Ow! You hit a soldier!"
"Bad aim, Bassia!"
"The legionaries! Scatter!"
The centurion at the head of a column now appeared, with his brasses
dripping with dirty water, threw up his sword and shouted. The column
flung itself out of line and went into the mob with pilum butt or point
as the spirit urged.
Pell-mell, tumbling, screaming, scrambling, the wharf-litter fled,
parting in two bodies as it passed Agrippa's demoralized group, one
half plunging off the masonry on the sands or into the water, the other
scattering out over the great expanse of dock. The soldiers pressed
after, and, following in the space they had cleared, came a chariot, a
legate in full armor driving, his charioteer crouching on his haunches
in the rear of the car.
His apparitors brought up against Agrippa's party. They did not
hesitate at the rank of the strangers; it was part of the blockade.
Eutychus took to his heels and Silas went down under a blow from a
reversed javelin. Agrippa, besmirched with the missiles of his late
assailants and blazing with fury, breasted the soldiers and cursed them
fervently. Two of them sprang upon him, and Cypros, screaming wildly,
threw off her veil and seized the foremost legionary.
The legate pulled up his horses and looked at the struggle. Cypros'
bared face was presented to him. With a cry of astonishment, he threw
down the lines and leaped from the chariot.
"Back, comrades!" he shouted, running toward them. "Touch her not!
Unhand the man! Ho! Domitius, call off your tigers!"
"How now, Flaccus!" Agrippa raged. "Is this how you receive Roman
citizens in Alexandria?"
The legate stopped short and his face blackened.
"Agrippa, by the furies! I knew the lady, but--" with a motion of his
hand he seemed to put off his temper and to recover himself. "Tut,
tut! Herod, you will not waste good serviceable wrath on an
Alexandrian uproar when you have lived among them a space. They are no
more to be curbed than the Nile overflow, and are as natural to the
place. But curse them, they shall answer for this! Welcome to
Alexandria! Beshrew me, but the sight of your lady's face makes me
young again! Come, come; bear me no ill will. Be our guest, Herod,
and we shall make back to you for all this mob's inhospitality. Ah, my
lady, what say you? Urge my pardon for old time's sake!"
He turned his face, which filled with more sincerity toward Cypros than
was visible in his voluble cordiality to Agrippa. Cypros, supported by
the trembling Drumah, put her hand to her forehead and tried to smile
bravely.
"But thou hast saved us, noble Flaccus; why should we bear thee ill
will? Blessed be thou for thy timely coming, else we had been killed!"
Agrippa, still smoldering, with Silas at his feet, alternately brushing
the prince's dress and rubbing his bruises, took the word from Cypros.
"What do Roman citizens, arriving in Alexandria, and no proconsul to
meet them? Perchance Rome's sundry long missing citizens have been
lost here!" intimated Agrippa.
"Ho, no! They never kill except under provocation. Yet I shall have a
word with the wharf-master and the praetor. But come, have my chariot,
lady. Apparitor," addressing one of his guards, "send hither
conveyance for my guests!"
"Thy pardon and thanks, Flaccus," Agrippa objected shortly, "we are
expected by the alabarch."
"Then, by the Horae, he should have been here to meet you. Forget him
for his discourtesy and come with me. Beseech your husband, sweet
lady; you were my confederate in the old days."
She smiled, in a pleased way. "But we did not inform the alabarch when
we expected to arrive," she answered. "He hath not failed us."
"And perchance," Agrippa broke in, "it might disturb Alexandria again
to know that the proconsul had entertained Jews!"
"Still furious!" Flaccus cried jocosely. "Oh, where is that elastic
temper which made thee famous in youth, Herod? But here are our
curricles; at least thou wilt permit me to conduct thy party to the
alabarch's."
It was the bluff courtesy of a man who assumes polish for necessity's
sake, and suddenly envelopes himself with it, momentarily for a
purpose. Agrippa, looking up from under his brows, glanced critically
at the proconsul's face for some light on his unwonted amiability, but,
failing to discover it, submitted with better grace to the Roman's
offers.
The proconsul was near Agrippa's age, and on his face and figure was
the stamp of unalloyed Roman blood. He was of average height, but so
solidly built as to appear short. His head was round and covered with
close, black curls; his brows were straight thick lines which met over
his nose, and his beardless face was molded with strong muscles on the
purple cheek and chin. He was powerful in neck and arm and leg, and
prominent in chest and under-jaw. Yet the brute force that published
itself in all his atmosphere was dominated by intellect and giant
capabilities.
He was Flaccus Avillus, Proconsul of Egypt, finishing now his fourth
year as viceroy over the Nile valley. One of the few who stood in the
wintry favor of Tiberius, the imperial misanthrope of Capri, his was
the weightiest portfolio in all colonial affairs; his state little less
than Caesar's.
Wherever he walked, industry, pleasure and humankind, low or lofty,
stood still to do him honor. So, when he headed a procession of
curricles and chariots up from the wharves of Alexandria, he did not go
unseen. Many of the late disturbers watched with strained eyes and
gaping mouths and saw him turn his horses into the street which was the
first in the Regio Judaeorum, and not a few stared at one another and
babbled, or pointed taut or shaking fingers at the prodigy. Flaccus,
the most notorious persecutor of the Jews among the long list of
Egyptian governors, was visiting the Regio Judaeorum escorting Jews!
The sight created no less wonder and astonishment under the eaves of
the Jewish houses, and throughout their narrow passages, but there was
no demonstration. Each retired quietly to his family, or to his
neighbor, and gravely asked what new trickery was this.
But Agrippa's party, following their conductor, proceeded through the
less densely settled portion of the quarter into a district where the
streets opened up into a stately avenue, lined by the palaces of the
aristocratic Jews of Alexandria.
Before one, not in the least different from half a dozen surrounding
it, their guide halted. The residence was square, with an unbroken
front, except for a porch, the single attribute characteristic of
Egypt, and the window arches and parapet relieved the somber masonry
with checkered stone. The flight of steps leading up to the porch was
of white marble.
One of the proconsul's apparitors knocked and stiffly announced his
mission to the Jewish porter that answered. Immediately the master of
the house came forth, followed by a number of servants to take charge
of the prince's effects.
The master of the house, Alexander Lysimachus, alabarch of Alexandria,
was a Jew by feature and by dress, but sufficiently Romanized in
disposition to propitiate Rome. He wore a cloak, richly embroidered,
over a long white under-robe; and the magisterial tarboosh, with a
bandeau of gold braid, was set down over his fine white hair. His
figure was lean and aged, a little bent, but every motion was as steady
as that of a young man, and his air had that certain ease and grace
which mark the courtier.
His first quick glance sought Flaccus, for the visit was without
precedent and highly significant. But there was neither hauteur nor
suspicion in his manner. The bluff countenance of the proconsul showed
a little expectancy, but there was even less to be seen on the Jew's
face that should betray his interpretation of the visit. The
magistrates bowed, each after his own manner of salutation--the Jew
with oriental grace, the Roman with an offhand upward jerk of his head
and a gesture of his mailed hand.
"Behold your guests, Lysimachus," Flaccus said, "or what is left of
them after an encounter with the rabble at the wharf. You should have
been there to meet them."
"So I should, had I been forewarned," the alabarch explained, the
peculiar music of the Jewish intonation showing in mellow contrast to
the Roman's blunt voice. "What! Is this how the accursed vermin have
used you!"
He put out his old waxen hands to the prince and searched his face.
"O thou son of Berenice!" he said softly. "Welcome to the worshiping
hearts of Jews, once more."
"Thanks," replied Agrippa, embracing the old man. "My latest adventure
with Gentiles has well-nigh persuaded me to remain there!"
"God grant it; God grant it! And thy princess?"
Cypros had uncovered her face and was reaching him her hands.
"Mariamne!" he exclaimed in a startled way. "Mariamne, as I live!"
Flaccus, who had fixed his eyes on Cypros the instant her veil was
lifted, started.
"Mariamne! The murdered Mariamne!" he repeated.
"Ah, sir!" the alabarch protested, smiling. "Thou wast not born then.
But I knew her: as a young man I knew her! But enter, enter! Pray
favor us with thy presence at supper, noble Flaccus. It shall be an
evening of festivity."
He led them through a hall so dimly lighted as to appear dark after the
daylight without, and into one of the noble chambers characteristic of
the opulent Orient. The whole interior was lined with yellow marble,
and the polish of the pavement was mirror-like. The lattice of the
windows, the lamps, the coffers of the alabarch's records, the layers
for the palms and plantain, the clawed feet of the great divan were all
of hammered brass. The drapery at arch and casement, the cushions and
covering of the divan were white and yellow silk, and, besides a
sprawling tiger skin on the floor, the alabarch's chair of authority,
and a table of white wood, there was no other furniture.
The alabarch gave Flaccus his magistrate's chair, and, seating his two
noble guests and their children, clapped his hands in summons.
A brown woman, with eyes like chrysolite and the lithe movements of a
panther, was instantly at his elbow.
The alabarch spoke to her in a strange tongue, and the servant
disappeared.
"I send for my daughter," he explained to his guests. "The
waiting-woman does not understand our tongue. My daughter--the only
one I have, and unmarried!"
"I remember her," Agrippa said with a smile.
At that moment in the archway leading into the interior of the house a
girl appeared. She lifted her eyes to her father's face, and between
them passed the mute evidence of dependence and vital attachment.
She wore the classic Greek chiton of white wool without relief of color
or ornament, a garb which, by its simplicity, intensified the first
impression that it was a child that stood in the archway. She was a
little below average height, with almost infantile shortening of curves
in her pretty, stanch outlines. But the suppleness of waist and the
exquisite modeling of throat and wrist were signs that proved her to be
of mature years.
Her hair was of that intermediate tint of yellow-brown which in adult
years would be dark. It fell in girlish freedom, rough with curls, a
little below her shoulders. There was a boyishness in the noble
breadth of her forehead, full of front, serene almost to seriousness,
and marked by delicate black brows too level to be ideally feminine.
Her eyes were not prominent but finely set under the shading brow,
large of iris, like a child's, and fair brown in color. In their
scrutiny was not only the wisdom of years but the penetration of a
sage. Though her tips were not full they were perfectly cut, and
redder than the heart of any pomegranate that grew in the alabarch's
garden.
But it was not these certain signs of strength which engaged Agrippa.
Beyond the single glance to note how much the girl had developed in
four years he gave his attention to certain physical characteristics
which called upon his long experience with women to catalogue.
As she stood in the archway, the prince had let his glance slip down to
her feet, shod in white sandals, and her ankles laced about with white
ribbon. One small foot upbore her weight, the other unconsciously, but
most daintily, poised on a toe. She swayed once with indescribable
lightness, but afterward stood balanced with such preparedness of young
sinew that at a motion she could have moved in any direction. Foremost
in summing these things, Agrippa observed that she was wholly
unconscious of how she stood.
"Terpsichore!" he said to himself, "or else the goddess hath withdrawn
the gift of dancing from the earth!"
"Enter, Lydia, and know the proconsul, the noble Flaccus," the alabarch
said. The girl raised her eyes to the proconsul's face and salaamed
with enchanting grace. Flaccus checked a fatherly smile. He would
wait before he patronized a girl-child of uncertain age.
"And this," the alabarch went on, "thou wilt remember as our prince,
Herod Agrippa."
"Alas! sweet Lydia," Agrippa said, fixing soft eyes upon her. "Must I
be introduced? Am I in four years forgotten?"
"No, good my lord," she answered in a voice that was mellow with the
music of womanhood--a voice that almost startled with its abated
strength and richness, since the illusion of her youth was hard to
shake off, "thou art identified by thy sweet lady!"
Agrippa stroked his smooth chin and Flaccus shot an amused glance at
him. Meanwhile the girl had opened her arms to Cypros. The children,
one by one, greeted her. The alabarch went on.
"My sons are no longer with us," he said. "They are abroad in the
world, preparing themselves to be greater men than their father. But
go, be refreshed; it shall be an evening of rejoicing. Lydia, be my
right hand and give my guests comfort."
He bowed the Herod and his family out of the chamber and they followed
the girl to various apartments for rest and change of raiment.
The alabarch turned to the proconsul.
"If thou wilt follow me, sir--"
"No; I thank thee; I shall return to my house and prepare for thy
hospitality. But tell me this: what does Agrippa here?"
"He comes to borrow money, I believe."
"Of you?"
"Doubtless."
"Put him off until you have consulted me. He is not a safe borrower."