REUS
“Master!” said the old slave, moving uneasily on his stiff joint, before
the even more nervously agitated master, “Master, there is the freedwoman
Glyceria below, who comes in charing. She has brought an idol of Tarranus
under her cloak, and offers to set that with a lamp before the door. She
is not a believer, she worships devils, but is a good soul and would save
us. She awaits your permission.”
The deacon was profoundly moved.
“It must not be! It may not be! I—I am a deacon of the Church. This is
known to be a Christian household. The Church is in my house, and here the
divine mysteries are celebrated. If she had not asked my leave, and
had—if—but no, I cannot sanction this. God strengthen me, I am distracted
and weak.” The slave remained. He expected that his master in the end
would yield.
“And yet,” stammered Baudillas, “He hath compassion on the infirm and
feeble. He forgave Peter. May He not pardon me if—? Glyceria is a heathen
woman. She does not belong to my family. I did not propose this. I am not
responsible for her acts. But no—it would be a betrayal of the truth, a
dishonor to the Church. He that confesseth me before men—no, no, Pedo, it
may not be.”
“And now it is too late,” said the slave. “They are at the door.”
Blows resounded through the house, and the roar of voices from the street
surged up over the roof, and poured in through the opening over the
_impluvium_. It was as though a mighty sea were thundering against the
house and the waves curled over it and plunged in through the gap above
the court.
“You must open, Pedo. I will run upstairs for a moment and compose myself.
Then—if it must be—but do not suffer the rabble to enter. If a prefect be
there, or his underling and soldiers, let them keep the door. Say I shall
be down directly. Yet stay—is the _posticum_ available for escape?”
“Sir—the mob have detailed a party to go to the backs of the houses and
watch every way of exit.”
“Then it is God’s will that I be taken. I cannot help myself. I am glad I
said No to the offer of Glyceria.”
The deacon ascended a flight of limestone steps to the upper story. The
slabs were worn and cracked, and had not been repaired owing to his
poverty. He entered a room that looked out on the street, and went to the
window.
The street above his doorway was dense with people, below it was
completely empty. Torches threw up a glare illumining the white façades of
the houses. He saw a sea of heads below. He heard the growl of voices
breaking into a foam of coarse laughter. Curses uttered against the
Christians, blasphemies against Christ, words of foulness, threats, brutal
jests, formed the matter of the hubbub below. A man bearing a white wand
with a sprig of artificial mistletoe at the end, gave directions to the
people where to go, where to stop, what to do. He was the head of the
branch of the guild of the Cultores Nemausi for that portion of the town.
Someone in the mob lifting his face, looked up and saw the deacon at the
window, and at once shouted, “There! there he is! Baudillas Macer, come
down, sacrilegious one! That is he who carried the maiden away.”
Then rose hoots and yells, and a boy putting his hands together and
blowing produced an unearthly scream.
“He is one of them! He is a ringleader! He has an ass’s head in the house
to which he sacrifices our little ones. He it was who stuck needles into
the child of the potter Fusius, and then gnawed off the cheeks and
fingers. He can inform where is the daughter of Aulus Harpinius who was
snatched from the basin of the god. Let us avenge on him the great
sacrilege that has been committed. It was he who struck off the head of
the god.”
Then one flung a stone that crashed into the room, and had not Baudillas
drawn back, it would have struck and thrown him down stunned.
“Let the house be ransacked!” yelled the mob. “We will seek in it for the
bones of the murdered children. Break open the door if he will not
unfasten. Bring a ladder, we will enter by the windows. Someone ascend to
the roof and drop into the _atrium_.”
Then ensued a rush against the valves, but they were too solid to yield;
and the bars held them firm, run as they were into their sockets in the
solid wall.
The slave Pedo now knocked on the inside. This was the signal that he was
about to open.
The soldiers drew up across the entrance, and when the door was opened,
suffered none to enter the house save the deputy of the prefect with four
of his police, and some of the leaders of the Cultores Nemausi. And now a
strange calm fell on the hitherto troubled spirit of Baudillas. He was
aware that no effort he could make would enable him to escape. His knees,
indeed, shook under him as he went to the stairs to descend, and
forgetting that the tenth step was broken, he stumbled at it and was
nearly precipitated to the bottom. Yet all wavering, all hesitation in his
mind was at an end.
He saw the men in the court running about, calling to each other, peering
into every room, cubicle, and closet; one called that the cellar was the
place in which the infamous rites of the Christians were performed and
that there would be found amphoræ filled with human blood. Then one
shouted that in the _tablinum_ there was naught save a small table.
Immediately after a howl rose from those who had penetrated to the
_triclinium_, and next moment they came rushing forth in such excitement
that they dragged down the curtain that hung before the door and entangled
their feet in it. One, not staying to disengage himself, held up his hands
and exhibited the broken head of the statue, that had been brought there
by Marcianus, and by him left on the floor.
“It is he who has done it! The sacrilegious one! The defacer of the holy
image!” howled the men, and fell upon the deacon with their fists. Some
plucked at his hair; one spat in his face. Others kicked him, and tripping
him up, cast him his length on the ground, where they would have beaten
and trampled the life out of him, had not the deputy of the ædile
interfered, rescued him from the hands of his assailants and thrust him
into a chamber at the side of the hall, saying: “He shall be brought
before the magistrate. It is not for you to take into your hands the
execution of criminals untried and uncondemned.”
Then one of the officers of the club ran to the doorway of the house, and
cried: “Citizens of Nemausus, hearken. The author of the egregious impiety
has been discovered. It is Cneius Baudillas Macer, who belongs to an
ancient, though decayed, family of this town. He who should have been the
last to dishonor the divine founder has raised his parricidal hand against
him. He stands convicted. The head of the god has been found in the house;
it is that recently broken off from the statue by the baths. Eheu! Eheu!
Woe be to the city, unless this indignity be purged away.”
A yell of indignation rose as an answer.
The slave Pedo was suffered to enter the bedroom, on the floor of which
lay his master bruised and with his face bleeding; for some of his front
teeth had been broken and his lips were cut.
“Oh master! dear master! What is to be done?” asked the faithful creature,
sobbing in his distress.
“I wonder greatly, Pedo, how I have endured so much. My fear is lest in
the end I fall away. I enjoin you—there is naught else you can do for
me—seek the bishop, and ask that the prayers of the Church may go up to
the Throne of Grace for me. I am feeble and frail. I was a frightened shy
lad in old times. If I were to fall, it would be a shame to the Church of
God in this town, this Church that has so many more worthy than myself in
it.”
“Can I bring thee aught, master? Water and a towel?”
“Nay, nothing, Pedo! Do as I bid. It is all that I now desire.”
The soldiers entered, raised the deacon, and made him walk between them. A
man was placed in front, another behind to protect him against the people.
As Baudillas was conveyed down the _ostium_, the passage to the door, he
could see faces glowering in at him; he heard angry voices howling at him;
an involuntary shrinking came over him, but he was irresistibly drawn
forward by the soldiers. On being thrust through the doorway before all,
then a great roar broke forth, fists and sticks were shaken at him, but
none ventured to cast stones lest the soldiers should be struck.
One portion of the mob now detached itself from the main body, so as to
follow and surround the deacon and assure itself that he did not escape
before he was consigned to the prison.
The city of Nemausus, capital of the Volcæ Arecomici, though included
geographically in the province of Narbonese Gaul, was in fact an
independent republic, not subject to the proconsul, but under Roman
suzerainty. With twenty‐four _comæ_ or townships under it, it governed
itself by popular election, and enjoyed the _lex Italica_. This little
republic was free from land tax, and it was governed by four
functionaries, the Quatuor‐viri, two of whom looked after the finances,
and two, like the _duum‐viri_ elsewhere, were for the purpose of
maintaining order, and the criminal jurisdiction was in their hands. Their
title in full was _duum viri juri dicendo_, and they were annually elected
by the senate. Their function was much that in small of the Roman consuls,
and they were sometimes in joke entitled consuls. They presided over the
senate and had the government of the town and state in their hands during
their tenure of office. On leaving their office they petitioned for and
received the right to ride horses, and were accounted knights. They wore
the dignified _præ texta_, and were attended by two lictors.
Baudillas walked between his escort. He was in a dazed condition. The
noise, the execrations cast at him, the flashing of the torches on the
helmets and breastplates of the guard, the glittering eyes and teeth of
the faces peering at him, the pain from the contusions he had received
combined to bewilder him. In the darkness and confusion of his brain, but
one thought remained permanent and burnt like a brilliant light, his
belief in Christ, and one desire occupied his soul, to be true to his
faith. He was too distracted to pray. He could not rally his senses nor
fix his ideas, but the yearning of his humble soul rose up, like the steam
from a new turned glebe in the sun of a spring morning.
In times of persecution certain strong spirits had rushed to confession
and martyrdom in an intoxication of zeal, such as Baudillas could not
understand. He did not think of winning the crown of martyrdom, but he
trembled lest he should prove a castaway.
Thrust forward, dragged along, now stumbling, then righted by the soldiers
sustaining him, Baudillas was conveyed to the forum and to the basilica
where the magistrate was seated.
On account of the disturbance, the Duum‐vir—we will so term him though he
was actually one of the Quatuor‐viri—he whose turn it was to maintain
order and administer justice, had taken his place in the court, so as to
be able to consign to custody such as were brought in by the guard on
suspicion of being implicated in the outrage; he was there as well for the
purpose of being ready to take measures promptly should the mob become
unmanageable. So long as it was under control, he did not object to its
action, but he had no thought of letting it get the upper hand. Rioters,
like children, have a liking for fire, and if they were suffered to apply
their torches to the houses of Christians might produce a general
conflagration.
Although the magistrates were chosen by popular election, it was not those
who constituted the rabble who had votes, and had to be humored, but the
citizen householders, who viewed the upheaval of the masses with jealous
suspicion.
That the proceedings should be conducted in an orderly manner,
instructions had been issued that no arrest was to be made without there
being someone forthcoming to act as accuser, and the soldiers were
enjoined to protect whosoever was menaced against whom no one was prepared
to formulate a charge which he would sustain in court.
In the case of Baudillas there would be no difficulty. The man—he was the
treasurer of the guild—who had found the mutilated head was ready to
appear against him.
The court into which the deacon was brought rapidly filled with a crowd,
directly he had been placed in what we should now call the dock. Then the
accuser stood up and gave his name. The magistrate accepted the
accusation. Whereupon the accuser made oath that he acted from no private
motive of hostility to the accused, and that he was not bribed by a third
person to delate him. This done, he proceeded to narrate how he had
entered the house of Baudillas, surnamed Macer, who was generally believed
to be a minister of the sect of the Christians; how that in searching the
house he had lighted on a mutilated head on the pavement of the
_triclinium_. He further stated that he well knew the statue of the god
Nemausus that stood by the fountain which supplied the lower town, and
that he was firmly convinced that the head which he now produced had
belonged to the statue, which statue had that very night been wantonly and
impiously defaced. He therefore concluded that the owner of the house,
Baudillas Macer, was either directly or indirectly guilty of the act of
sacrilege, and he demanded his punishment in accordance with the law.
This sufficed as preliminary.
Baudillas was now _reus_, and as such was ordered to be conveyed to
prison, there to be confined until the morning, when the interrogation
would take place.