JUCUNDUS BAITS HIS TRAP.
Agellius is busily employed upon his farm. While the enemies of his faith
are laying their toils for him and his brethren in the imperial city, in
the proconsular _officium_, and in the municipal curia,—while Jucundus is
scheming against him personally in another way and with other
intentions,—the unconscious object of these machinations is busy about his
master’s crops, housing the corn in caves or pits, distilling the roses,
irrigating the _khennah_, and training and sheltering the vines. And he
does so, not only from a sense of duty, but the more assiduously, because
he finds in constant employment a protection against himself, against idle
thoughts, wayward wishes, discontent, and despondency. It is doubtless
very strange to the reader how any one who professed himself a Christian
in good earnest should be open to the imputation of resting his hopes and
his heart in the tents of paganism; but we do not see why Agellius has not
quite as much right to be inconsistent in one way as Christians of the
present time in another, and perhaps he has more to say for himself than
they. They have not had the trial of solitude, nor the consequent
temptation to which he has been exposed, of seeking relief from his own
thoughts in the company of unbelievers. When a boy he had received his
education at that school in the Temple of Mercury of which we heard in the
foregoing chapter; and though happily he had preserved himself from the
contagion of idolatry and sin, he had on that very account formed no
friendships with his schoolfellows. Whether there were any Christians
there besides himself he did not know; but while the worst of his
schoolfellows were what heathen boys may be supposed to be, the lightest
censure which could be passed on any was that they were greedy, or
quarrelsome, or otherwise unamiable. He had learned there enough to open
his mind, and to give him materials for thinking, and instruments for
reflecting on his own religion, and for drawing out into shape his own
reflections. He had received just that discipline which makes solitude
most pleasant to the old, and most insupportable to the young. He had got
a thousand questions which needed answers, a thousand feelings which
needed sympathy. He wanted to know whether his guesses, his perplexities,
his trials of mind, were peculiar to himself, or how far they were shared
by others, and what they were worth. He had capabilities for intellectual
enjoyment unexercised, and a thirst after knowledge unsatisfied. And the
channels of supernatural assistance were removed from him at a time when
nature was most impetuous and most clamorous.
It was under circumstances such as these that two young Greeks, brother
and sister, the brother older, the sister younger, than Agellius, came to
Sicca at the invitation of Jucundus, who wanted them for his trade. His
nephew in time got acquainted with them, and found in them what he had
sought in vain elsewhere. It is not that they were oracles of wisdom or
repositories of philosophical learning; their age and their calling
forbade it, nor did he require it. For an oracle, of course, he would have
looked in another direction; but he desiderated something more on a level
with himself, and that they abundantly supplied. He found, from his
conversations with them, that a great number of the questions which had
been a difficulty to him had already been agitated in the schools of
Greece. He found what solutions were possible, what the hinge was on which
questions turned, what the issue to which they led, and what the principle
which lay at the bottom of them. He began better to understand the
position of Christianity in the world of thought, and the view which was
taken of it by the advocates of other religions or philosophies. He gained
some insight into its logic, and advanced, without knowing it, in the
investigation of its evidences.
Nor was this all; he acquired by means of his new friends a great deal
also of secular knowledge as well as philosophical. He learned much of the
history of foreign countries, especially of Greece, of its heroes and
sages, its poets and its statesmen, of Alexander, of the Syro-Macedonic
empire, of the Jews, and of the series of conquests through which Rome
advanced to universal dominion.
To impart knowledge is as interesting as to acquire it; and Agellius was
called upon to give as well as to take. The brother and sister, without
showing any great religious earnestness, were curious to know about
Christianity, and listened with the more patience that they had no special
attachment to any other worship. In the debates which ensued, though there
was no agreement, there was the pleasure of mental exercise and
excitement; he found enough to tell them without touching upon the more
sacred mysteries; and while he never felt his personal faith at all
endangered by their free conversation, his charity, or at least his
good-will and his gratitude, led him to hope, or even to think, that they
were in the way of conversion themselves. In this thought he was aided by
his own innocence and simplicity; and though, on looking back afterwards
to this eventful season, he recognized many trivial occurrences which
ought to have put him on his guard, yet he had no suspicion at the time
that those who conversed so winningly, and sustained so gracefully and
happily the commerce of thought and sentiment, might in their actual
state, nay, in their governing principles, be in utter contrariety to
himself when the veil was removed from off their hearts.
Nor was it in serious matters alone, but still more on lighter occasions
of intercourse, that Aristo and Callista were attractive to the solitary
Agellius. She had a sweet thrilling voice, and accompanied herself on the
lyre. She could act the _improvisatrice_, and her expressive features were
a running commentary on the varied meaning, the sunshine and the shade, of
her ode or her epic. She could relate how the profane Pentheus and the
self-glorious Hippolytus gave a lesson to the world of the feebleness of
human virtue when it placed itself in opposition to divine power. She
could teach how the chaste Diana manifests herself to the simple shepherd
Endymion, not to the great or learned; and how Tithonus, the spouse of the
Morn, adumbrates the fate of those who revel in their youth, as if it were
to last for ever; and who, when old, do nothing but talk of the days when
they were young, wearying others with tales of “their amours or their
exploits, like grasshoppers that show their vigour only by their
chirping.”(3) The very allegories which sickened and irritated Arnobius
when spouted out by Polemo, touched the very chords of poor Agellius’s
heart when breathed forth from the lips of the beautiful Greek.
She could act also; and suddenly, when conversation flagged or suggested
it, she could throw herself into the part of Medea or Antigone, with a
force and truth which far surpassed the effect produced by the male and
masked representations of those characters at the theatre. Brother and
sister were Œdipus and Antigone, Electra and Orestes, Cassandra and the
Chorus. Once or twice they attempted a scene in Menander; but there was
something which made Agellius shrink from the comedy, beautiful as it was,
and clever as was the representation. Callista could act Thais as truly as
Iphigenia, but Agellius could not listen as composedly. There are certain
most delicate instincts and perceptions in us which act as first
principles, and which, once effaced, can never, except from some
supernatural source, be restored to the mind. When men are in a state of
nature, these are sinned against, and vanish very soon, at so early a date
in the history of the individual that perhaps he does not recollect that
he ever possessed them; and since, like other first principles, they are
but very partially capable of proof, a general scepticism prevails both as
to their existence and their truth. The Greeks, partly from the vivacity
of their intellect, partly from their passion for the beautiful, lost
these celestial adumbrations sooner than other nations. When a collision
arose on such matters between Agellius and his friends, Callista kept
silence; but Aristo was not slow to express his wonder that the young
Christian should think customs or practices wrong which, in his view of
the matter, were as unblamable and natural as eating, drinking, or
sleeping. His own face became almost satirical as Agellius’s became grave;
however, he was too companionable and good-natured to force another to be
happy in his own way; he imputed to the extravagance of his friend’s
religion what in any but a Christian he would have called moroseness and
misanthropy; and he bade his sister give over representations which,
instead of enlivening the passing hour, did but inflict pain.
This friendly intercourse had now gone on for some months, as the leisure
of both parties admitted. Once or twice brother and sister had come to the
suburban farm; but for the most part, in spite of his intense dislike of
the city, he had for their sake threaded its crowded and narrow
thoroughfares, crossed its open places, and presented himself at their
apartments. And was it very strange that a youth so utterly ignorant of
the world, and unsuspicious of evil, should not have heard the warning
voice which called him to separate himself from heathenism, even in its
most specious form? Was it very strange, under these circumstances, that a
sanguine hope, the hope of the youthful, should have led Agellius to
overlook obstacles, and beguile himself into the notion that Callista
might be converted, and make a good Christian wife? Well, we have nothing
more to say for him; if we have not already succeeded in extenuating his
offence, we must leave him to the mercy, or rather to the justice, of his
severely virtuous censors.
But all this while Jucundus had been conversing with him; and, unless we
are quick about it, we shall lose several particulars which are necessary
for those who wish to pursue without a break the thread of his history.
His uncle had brought the conversation round to the delicate point which
had occasioned his visit, and had just broken the ice. With greater tact,
and more ample poetical resources than we should have given him credit
for, he had been led from the scene before him to those prospects of a
moral and social character which ought soon to employ the thoughts of his
dear Agellius. He had spoken of vines and of their culture, _apropos_ of
the dwarf vines around him, which stood about the height of a
currant-bush. Thence he had proceeded to the subject of the more common
vine of Africa, which crept and crawled along the ground, the extremity of
each plant resting in succession on the stock of that which immediately
preceded it. And now, being well into his subject, he called to mind the
high vine of Italy, which mounts by the support of the slim tree to which
it clings. Then he quoted Horace on the subject of the marriage of the elm
and the vine. This lodged him _in medias res_; and Agellius’s heart beat
when he found his uncle proposing to him, as a thought of his own, the
very step which he had fancied was almost a secret of his own breast,
though Juba had seemed to have some suspicion of it.
“My dear Agellius,” said Jucundus, “it would be a most suitable
proceeding. I have never taken to marrying myself; it has not lain in my
way, or been to my taste. Your father did not set me an encouraging
example; but here you are living by yourself, in this odd fashion, unlike
any one else. Perhaps you may come in time and live in Sicca. We shall
find some way of employing you, and it will be pleasant to have you near
me as I get old. However, I mean it to be some time yet before Charon
makes a prize of me; not that I believe all that rubbish more than you,
Agellius, I assure you.”
“It strikes me,” Agellius began, “that perhaps you may think it
inconsistent in me taking such a step, but—”
“Ay, ay, that’s the rub,” thought Jucundus; then aloud, “Inconsistent, my
boy! who talks of inconsistency? what superfine jackanapes dares to call
it inconsistent? You seem made for each other, Agellius—she town, you
country; she so clever and attractive, and up to the world, you so fresh
and Arcadian. You’ll be quite the talk of the place.”
“That’s just what I don’t want to be,” said Agellius. “I mean to say,” he
continued, “that if I thought it inconsistent with my religion to think of
Callista—”
“Of course, of course,” interrupted his uncle, who took his cue from Juba,
and was afraid of the workings of Agellius’s human respect; “but who knows
you have been a Christian? no one knows anything about it. I’ll be bound
they all think you an honest fellow like themselves, a worshipper of the
gods, without crotchets or hobbies of any kind. I never told them to the
contrary. My opinion is, that if you were to make your libation to Jove,
and throw incense upon the imperial altar to-morrow, no one would think it
extraordinary. They would say for certain that they had seen you do it
again and again. Don’t fancy for an instant, my dear Agellius, that you
have anything whatever to get over.”
Agellius was getting awkward and mortified, as may be easily conceived,
and Jucundus saw it, but could not make out why. “My dear uncle,” said the
youth, “you are reproaching me.”
“Not a bit of it,” said Jucundus, confidently, “not a shadow of reproach;
why should I reproach you? We can’t be wise all at once; _I_ had my
follies once, as you may have had yours. It’s natural you should grow more
attached to things as they are,—things as they are, you know,—as time goes
on. Marriage, and the preparation for marriage, sobers a man. You’ve been
a little headstrong, I can’t deny, and had your fling in your own way; but
‘nuces pueris,’ as you will soon be saying yourself on a certain occasion.
Your next business is to consider what kind of a marriage you propose. I
suppose the Roman, but there is great room for choice even there.”
It is a proverb how different things are in theory and when reduced to
practice. Agellius had thought of the end more than of the means, and had
had a vision of Callista as a Christian, when the question of rites and
forms would have been answered by the decision of the Church without his
trouble. He _was_ somewhat sobered by the question, though in a different
way from what his uncle wished and intended.
Jucundus proceeded—“First, there is _matrimonium confarreationis_. You
have nothing to do with that: strictly speaking, it is obsolete; it went
out with the exclusiveness of the old patricians. I say ‘strictly
speaking’; for the ceremonies remain, waiving the formal religious rite.
Well, my dear Agellius, I don’t recommend this ceremonial to you. You’d
have to kill a porker, to take out the entrails, to put away the gall, and
to present it to Juno Pronuba. And there’s fire, too, and water, and
frankincense, and a great deal of the same kind, which I think
undesirable, and you would too; for there, I am sure, we are agreed. We
put this aside then, the religious marriage. Next comes the marriage _ex
coemptione_, a sort of mercantile transaction. In this case the parties
buy each other, and become each other’s property. Well, every man to his
taste; but for me, I don’t like to be bought and sold. I like to be my own
master, and am suspicious of anything irrevocable. Why should you commit
yourself (do you see?) for ever, _for ever_, to a girl you know so little
of? Don’t look surprised: it’s common sense. It’s very well to buy _her_;
but to be bought, that’s quite another matter. And I don’t know that you
can. Being a Roman citizen yourself, you can only make a marriage with a
citizen; now the question is whether Callista is a citizen at all. I know
perfectly well the sweeping measure some years back of Caracalla, which
made all freemen citizens of Rome, whatever might be their country; but
that measure has never been carried out in fact. You’d have very great
difficulty with the law and the customs of the country; and then, after
all, if the world were willing to gratify you, where’s your proof she is a
freewoman? My dear boy, I must speak out for your good, though you’re
offended with me. I wish you to have her, I do; but you can’t do
impossibilities—you can’t alter facts. The laws of the empire allow you to
have her in a certain definite way, and no other; and you cannot help the
law being what it is. I say all this, even on the supposition of her being
a freewoman; but it is just possible she may be in law a slave. Don’t
start in that way; the pretty thing is neither better nor worse for what
she cannot help. I say it for your good. Well, now I’m coming to my point.
There is a third kind of marriage, and that is what I should recommend for
you. It’s the _matrimonium ex usu_, or _consuetudine_; the great advantage
here is, that you have no ceremonies whatever, nothing which can in any
way startle your sensitive mind. In that case, a couple are at length man
and wife _præscriptione_. You are afraid of making a stir in Sicca; in
this case you would make none. You would simply take her home here; if, as
time went on, you got on well together, it would be a marriage; if
not,”—and he shrugged his shoulders—“no harm’s done; you are both free.”
Agellius had been sitting on a gate of one of the vineyards; he started on
his feet, threw up his arms, and made an exclamation.
“Listen, listen, my dear boy!” cried Jucundus, hastening to explain what
he considered the cause of his sudden annoyance; “listen, just one moment,
Agellius, if you can. Dear, dear, how I wish I knew where to find you!
What _is_ the matter? I’m not treating her ill, I’m not indeed. I have not
had any notion at all even of hinting that you should leave her, unless
you both wished the bargain rescinded. No, but it is a great rise for her;
you are a Roman, with property, with position in the place; she’s a
stranger, and without a dower: nobody knows whence she came, or anything
about her. She ought to have no difficulty about it, and I am confident
will have none.”
“O my good, dear uncle! O Jucundus, Jucundus!” cried Agellius, “is it
possible? do my ears hear right? What is it you ask me to do?” and he
burst into tears. “Is it conceivable,” he said, with energy, “that you are
in earnest in recommending me—I say in recommending me—a marriage which
really would be no marriage at all?”
“Here is some very great mistake,” said Jucundus, angrily; “it arises,
Agellius, from your ignorance of the world. You must be thinking I
recommend you mere _contubernium_, as the lawyers call it. Well, I confess
I did think of that for a moment, it occurred to me; I should have liked
to have mentioned it, but knowing how preposterously touchy and skittish
you are on supposed points of honour, or sentiment, or romance, or of
something or other indescribable, I said not one word about that. I have
only wished to consult for your comfort, present and future. You don’t do
me justice, Agellius. I have been attempting to smooth your way. You
_must_ act according to the received usages of society! you cannot make a
world for yourself. Here have I proposed three or four ways for your
proceeding: you will have none of them. What _will_ you have? I thought
you didn’t like ceremonies; I thought you did not like the established
ways. Go, then, do it in the old fashion; kill your sheep, knead your
meal, light your torches, sing your song, summon your flamen, if he’ll
come. Any how, take your choice; do it either with religion or without.”
“O Jucundus!” said the poor fellow, “am I then come to this?” and he could
say no more.
His distress was not greater than his uncle’s disappointment, perplexity,
and annoyance. The latter had been making everything easy for Agellius,
and he was striking, do what he would, on hidden, inexplicable
impediments, whichever way he moved. He got more and more angry the more
he thought about it. An unreasonable, irrational coxcomb! He had heard a
great deal of the portentous stubbornness of a Christian, and now he
understood what it was. It was in his blood, he saw; an offensive, sour
humour, tainting him from head to foot. A very different recompense had he
deserved. There had he come all the way from his home from purely
disinterested feelings. He had no motive whatever, but a simple desire of
his nephew’s welfare; what other motive could he have? “Let Agellius go to
the crows,” he thought, “if he will; what is it to me if he is seized for
a Christian, hung up like a dog, or thrown like a dead rat into the
_cloaca_ of the prison? What care I if he is made a hyæna’s breakfast in
the amphitheatre, all Sicca looking on, or if he is nailed on a cross for
the birds to peck at before my door? Ungrateful puppy! it is no earthly
concern of mine what becomes of him. I shall be neither better nor worse.
No one will say a word against Jucundus; he will not lose a single
customer, or be shunned by a single jolly companion, for the exposure of
his nephew. But a man can’t be saved against his will. Here am I, full of
expedients and resources for his good; there is he, throwing cold water on
everything, and making difficulties as if he loved them. It’s his
abominable pride, that’s the pith of the matter. He could not have behaved
worse though I had played the bully with him, and had reproached him with
his Christianity. But I have studiously avoided every subject which could
put his back up. He’s a very Typhon or Enceladus for pride. Here he’d give
his ears to have done with Christianity; he wants to have this Callista;
he wants to buy her at the price of his religion; but he’d rather be
burned than say, I’ve changed! Let him reap as he has sown; why should I
coax him further to be merciful to himself? Well Agellius,” he said aloud,
“I’m going back.”
Agellius, on the other hand, had his own thoughts; and the most urgent of
them at the moment was sorrow that he had hurt his uncle. He was sincerely
attached to him, in consequence of his faithful guardianship, his many
acts of kindness, the reminiscences of childhood, nay, the love he bore to
the good points of his character. To him he owed his education and his
respectable position. He could not bear his anger, and he had a fear of
his authority; but what was to be done? Jucundus, in utter insensibility
to certain instincts and rules which in Christianity are first principles,
had, without intending it, been greatly dishonouring Agellius, and his
passion, and the object of it. Uncle and nephew had been treading on each
other’s toes, and each was wincing under the mischance. It was Agellius’s
place, as the younger, to make advances, if he could, to an adjustment of
the misunderstanding; and he wished to find some middle way. And, also, it
is evident he had another inducement besides his tenderness to Jucundus to
urge him to do so. In truth, Callista exerted a tremendous sway over him.
The conversation which had just passed ought to have opened his eyes, and
made him understand that the very first step in any negotiations between
them was her _bonâ fide_ conversion. It was evident he could not, he
literally had not the power of marrying her as a heathen. Roman might
marry a Roman; but a degradation of each party in the transaction was the
only way by which a Roman could make any sort of marriage with a Greek. If
she were converted, they would be both of them under the rules of the
Catholic Church. But what prospect was there of so happy an event? What
had ever fallen from her lips which looked that way? Could not a clever
girl throw herself into the part of Alcestis, or chant the majestic verses
of Cleanthes, or extemporize a hymn upon the spring, or hold an argument
on the _pulchrum_ and _utile_, without having any leaning towards
Christianity? A calm, sweet voice, a noble air, an expressive countenance,
refined and decorous manners, were these specific indications of heavenly
grace? Ah, poor Agellius! a fascination is upon you; and so you are
thinking of some middle term, which is to reconcile your uncle and you;
and therefore you begin as follows:—
“I see by your silence, Jucundus, that you are displeased with me, you who
are always so kind. Well, it comes from my ignorance of things; it does
indeed. I ask your forgiveness for anything which seemed ungrateful in my
behaviour, though there is not ingratitude in my heart. I am too much of a
boy to see things beforehand, and to see them in all their bearings. You
took me by surprise by talking on the subject which led to our
misunderstanding. I will not conceal for an instant that I like Callista
very much; and that the more I see her, I like her the more. It strikes me
that, if you break the matter to Aristo, he and I might have some talk
together, and understand each other.”
Jucundus was hot-tempered, but easily pacified; and he really did wish to
be on confidential terms with his nephew at the present crisis; so he
caught at his apology. “Now you speak like a reasonable fellow, Agellius,”
he answered. “Certainly, I will speak to Aristo, as you wish; and on this
question of _consuetudo_ or prescription. Well, don’t begin looking queer
again. I mean I will speak to him on the whole question and its details.
He and I will talk together for our respective principals. We shall soon
come to terms, I warrant you; and then _you_ shall talk with him. Come,
show me round your fields,” he continued, “and let me see how you will be
able to present things to your bride. A very pretty property it is. I it
was who was the means of your father thinking of it. You have heard me say
so before now, and all the circumstances.
“He was at Carthage at this time, undecided what to do with himself. It so
happened that Julia Clara’s estates were just then in the market. An
enormous windfall her estates were. Old Didius was emperor just before my
time; he gave all his estates to his daughter as soon as he assumed the
purple. Poor lady! she did not enjoy them long; Severus confiscated the
whole, not, however, for the benefit of the state, but of the _res
privata_. They are so large in Africa alone, that, as you know, you are
under a special procurator. Well, they did not come into the market at
once; the existing farmers were retained. Marcus Juventius farmed a very
considerable portion of them; they were contiguous, and dovetailed into
his own lands, and accordingly, when he got into trouble, and had to sell
his leases, there were certain odds and ends about Sicca which it was
proposed to lease piecemeal. Your employer, Varius, would have given any
money for them, but I was beforehand with him. Nothing like being on the
spot; he was on business of the proconsul at Adrumetum. I sent off Hispa
instantly to Strabo; not an hour’s delay after I heard of it. The sale was
at Carthage; he went to his old commander, who used his influence, and the
thing was done.
“I venture to say there’s not such a snug little farm in all Africa; and I
am sanguine we shall get a renewal, though Varius will do his utmost to
outbid us. Ah, my dear Agellius, if there is but a suspicion you are not a
thorough-going Roman! Well, well,—here! ease me through this gate,
Agellius; I don’t know what’s come to the gate since I was here.
Indeed!—yes! you have improved this very much. That small arbour is
delicious; but you want an image, an Apollo or a Diana. Ah! do now stop
for a moment; why are you going forward at such a pace? I’ll give you an
image: it shall be one that you will really like. Well, you won’t have it?
I beg you ten thousand pardons. Ha, ha! I mean nothing. Ha, ha, ha! Oh,
what an odd world it is! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Well, I am keeping you from
your labourers. Ha, ha, ha!”
And having thus smoothed his own ruffled temper, and set things right, as
he considered, with Agellius, the old pagan took his journey homewards,
assuring Agellius that he would make all things clear for him in a very
short time, and telling him to be sure to make a call upon Aristo before
the ensuing calends.