the munitions of war--battering-rams, with their iron rams' heads,
and turtle-back shields to protect them from assault; catapults, with
their windlasses, to hurl rocks and bolts at the walls; cranes,
palisades, mallets, barrels, cables, spars, ropes, one hundred axes,
one hundred ship's adzes, three thousand pounds of lead, two hundred
pounds of zinc, two hundred pounds of tin, three thousand pounds of
iron, three thousand nails, one thousand spades, two thousand
buckets; and, for each ship, one hundred and twenty spare oars,
masts, sails, hawsers, and anchors--"
But here the poet was interrupted by shouts of laughter from the
women, who had been deluged with too much of his official catalogues.
"We are not in training for the admiral's cabinet!" cried they.
"And how will you get these uncouth names into the iambics of your
cantos, O friend of the Muses?" asked Nicetas, of the robing-room,
and turned the laugh against the poor deacon.
"Well," said he, "did not Homer fill the second _Iliad_ with his
catalogue of the ships and their captains? The world shall rehearse
my _Iliad--The Taking of Crete_--a thousand years hence. Have you
heard my invocation? Something new and sublime, I can assure you.
Listen to this:
"Old Rome, our mother, grudge not to thy child
That New Rome shall an equal glory boast.
Thy Scipios and thy Cæsars have not yet
Drained to the dregs the flowing cup of Fame--"
But before the poet could recite any more of his epic, which he
fondly believed would outlive the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_, and
which has certainly fulfilled his boast by surviving a thousand
years, the courtiers thronged to the upper terrace, where the heralds
and ushers announced the approach of their Majesties. Presently
Romanus appeared, in a magnificent tunic and robe of soft samite,
embroidered and brocaded with a pattern of the Basileus spearing a
lion, and with other quaint devices, and a light diadem that shone
with emeralds and rubies. He was surrounded by a suite of his
principal officials and not a few of his parasites, among whom the
fair young Glaucus of Miletus had been enrolled, much against his own
desire. And foremost rose the tall form of the parakeimomenos,
Joseph Bringas, to-day more than ever the real wielder of power.
"The saints above have vouchsafed to us a glorious morning for the
great start, most fortunate of lord chamberlains and most mighty of
eunuchs," said the prince, gayly. "At whose altar have you besought
such a boon?"
"At the shrine of St. Romanus, my sovereign lord, most fortunate of
kings," said the politic Joseph. "My task has been but to carry out
the orders of your Majesty, and to satisfy the demands of the soldier
to whom your wisdom has committed the fortune of Rome."
"Let the chief be summoned, then, that we may give him our royal
blessing and speed him on his enterprise, which you men of craft and
forebodings will not suffer me to lead in person."
"Rome and this city, which God guards, would not be safe if Cæsar had
quitted it, sire! The lord commander-in-chief waits your Majesty's
summons."
The crowds parted and formed in an expectant circle as the form of
Nicephorus was seen advancing to do homage to the Basileus. Arrayed
in resplendent armor, he looked grave, resolute, and confident as he
rose from the ceremonial obeisances that custom prescribed.
The Basileus received his great vassal with dignity, honor, and
friendliness, and addressed him his vows for his triumph with all the
graciousness that made Romanus popular with his servants and people.
"We envy you the honor of leading so vast a host, which my
taskmasters of the council will not permit me to join, greatly as I
desire to fight by the side of so illustrious a warrior. Nor need I
tell you, my lord general, that the whole resources of our empire are
committed to your charge, and that Rome has now no other army, and no
second fleet."
"Most gracious sovereign, no man knows so well as Nicephorus himself
how great a trust has been committed to his hands; and no man is more
sensible of the supreme confidence with which his king has honored
his demands for men, arms, ships, and material, nor of the zeal with
which your Majesty's council have supplied him with all that he
required. We whose lives have been passed on the Asian frontier, in
battling with the ever-increasing hordes of the False Prophet, well
know that Rome or Islam must fall in the end; that this royal city
itself must become one day the chief throne of the infidel, unless we
drive him back into his deserts and his steppes. For some hundred
and fifty years he has been master of Crete, and has continually
strengthened his power, and defied all our efforts to recover it.
While he holds it, thy empire is being bled to death, O king! It
must be won back, or Rome is ruined. We must stake our all on this
venture, and no sacrifice is too great for such an end. My lord
Basileus, we go forth with the aid of Christ and His Blessed Mother
to save the Cross and His people. We will win back Crete for the
Cross and for Rome, or I and my men, or such parts of us as the
Hagarene dogs have not devoured, will lie rotting on the soil of that
island. God be merciful to us miserable sinners, and strengthen the
hands of us weak servants of His holy name!"
But here, as the chief ended his audience with the Basileus and was
passing away with the official reverences in use, he received a
special summons from the empress, who, with her officers and ladies,
was standing apart in a more retired part of the royal portico.
Theophano was radiant in her most lovely smile and in her most airy
draperies of summer. She was wrapped in diaphanous clouds of silk
gauze, dyed with the hues of the softest sunrise, and all dazzling
with pendent jewels and patins of gold. She beamed on the hero, as
he advanced to her feet, and overwhelmed him with her praises and
fervent prayers for his return in triumph. Nicephorus prostrated
himself before her, and seized the hand she permitted him to kiss.
She bent over him till her lips almost touched his head, and she
whispered in his ear, as her perfumed breath filled the soul of the
warrior to intoxication: "Come back to us, thou new Belisarius, in
glory, and thou wilt find in the Sacred Palace a more generous
Theodora. Forget not that the savior of Rome is ever destined to
become its master!--master of Rome, and master of Rome's mistress."
Stunned by the manner of his reception, with these mysterious words
ringing in his ears, the chief bowed himself from the presence and
nerved his whole nature to the great task he had in hand. His
officers and staff, after the prescribed ceremonies of presentation
and leave-taking were fulfilled, followed him to the port of
Boucoleon, with its marble quays and staircase, whence the barges in
waiting took them to their ships. When the commander-in-chief and
his captains were on board and all was ready to weigh anchor, the
Basileus and Basilissa, each surrounded with a brilliant court,
mounted the imperial stand that had been built up at the water's edge
to witness the scene. It was surely one of the most magnificent that
the eye of man had ever till that day beheld. Far out to sea, across
that grand bay, now glancing in the morning sun and surrounded with
mountains, headlands, and distant towers and churches, the vast fleet
was spreading its colored sails. The decks were crowded with
soldiers in various arms and accoutrements; some were the mail-clad
cataphracti, the Varangian guards, with huge axes and gilt corselets,
the Thracians in their stout jerkins of leather and sheepskins, the
Scythians and Russ in bearskin and sables, the Isaurian mountaineers
in white capotes. The masts of the war-ships were topped with
emblems and banners of fantastic design, and their gilt and bronze
prows represented the gaping jaws of beasts of prey. The shouts of
the captains standing on high in their turrets, re-echoed by the
boatswains below, as the anchors and hawsers were swung in to the
monotonous songs of the seamen, resounded across the waters. And now
the rowers settled down in their benches and the huge sweeps slowly
began to plunge through the foaming waves in response to the rhythmic
beat of their leaders. At the appointed moment the Basileus himself
gave the sign to the patriarch, who was stationed in a commanding
spot, surrounded by his prelates, clergy, deacons, choir, and
acolytes, who carried aloft the most venerated ikons, pictures, and
crucifixes that the sacred edifices could yield.
A profound hush then fell on the vast throng, and the rowers held up
their vessels on their oars, as one by one the captains ceased to
shout and commanded a solemn silence for prayer. Then was heard far
across the waters the shrill voice of the aged Polyeuctus, blessing
the fleet and invoking the Divine aid, and ending with the "Holy!
Holy! Holy! Triune God and Blessed Mother of God, preserve in Thy
holy keeping this army and this fleet which goes forth to save Thy
people from the apostate children of Ismael!" Then the choir took up
the words, and thrice repeated the invocation of the patriarch. This
was followed by a hymn, wherein the immense body of monks, churchmen,
and catechumens joined, so that the volume of voices rang out across
the sea to the shores on the other side of the strait. And as the
last notes of the choir died away, a roar of cheers broke forth in
endless bursts of farewell and godspeed from the hundreds of
thousands who lined the walls and terraces and who had been gathered
to see the great departure--from the point where the light-house
stands on the Golden Horn at the eastern corner of the city, round to
the shore of Hebdomon on the western plain beyond the walls. As each
battle-ship and transport passed within hearing of the mighty roar of
voices, the crews and troops on board returned the shout, and the
trumpets and cymbals, drums and fifes, rang out their martial notes
with a crashing sound. They were followed for some short distance by
crowds of light-sailing craft and gayly trimmed caiques, which
carried out to the fleet the holiday sight-seers from the city. And
so, with wild hopes, resounding cheers, and solemn anthems of prayer
and blessing, the great crusade of the tenth century sailed forth to
do battle with the Saracen.
All through the day the vast fleet of war-ships and lighter vessels
kept on their southwesterly course in the bright sunshine, with a
gentle breeze that blew down the straits from the Euxine Sea, and
till late in the evening eager crowds from the city remained watching
the sight on the walls and on the open terraces above. As the last
battle-ship disappeared in the offing they gathered in the fora and
porticos discussing the event, while the churches, shrines, and
wayside oratories were filled with worshippers in supplication and
silent prayer. All through that eventful day, and far into the
night, the priests and monks throughout the city kept pouring forth
their endless chants and monotonous invocations to all the saints and
divinities in turn, amid ten thousand Trisagions and Kyries, clouds
of incense and procession of ikons.
But all this time of national exultation and hope, gloom and despair
hung heavily in the massive convents wherever women who had been
forced to take the veil as nuns lived out their dreary lives "with
the angels," as the euphemism in use would put it. And in none was
there a deeper despair than in the Myrelaeon convent, where the
princesses Anna and Agatha were immured. After the terrible scene
with their brother, as told in the last chapter, the queen-mother and
her five daughters had been dragged forth by the eunuchs and
cubiculars of the Sacred Palace and carried off to the convent of
Canicleion (or the Rubric). It had once been the palace of the
magnificent Theoctistus, the finance minister, who held the vermilion
seals and had been murdered under Michael the Drunkard, when the
Basileus had converted his victim's splendid abode into a monastery.
Once within its fatal portals, the royal ladies were at the mercy of
the inexorable John, the abbot of the Stoudion, who had torn them
from the weakness of Romanus. In spite of their protests, their
shrieks of rage, and on the part of the younger women their
convulsive struggles, the monk had their long hair cut short, their
royal vesture taken off; and while three sturdy sisters held them by
main force, they were dressed in the coarse brown serge robes of the
order of St. Basil. They were literally dragged to the altar and the
mockery of the consecration service was gone through, the fanatic
John troubling himself little that the vows of the order were not
distinctly uttered by any of them, and were not uttered at all, even
as a pretence, by the two youngest princesses, who obstinately
refused to give any consent to the act of their immolation as brides
of Christ.
It was soon found that the queen-mother was so cruelly affected in
mind and in body by all that she had suffered that her very life and
reason were despaired of, and Romanus was easily induced by her
entreaties to suffer her to return to a secluded wing of the palace,
where she remained in strict retirement and a hopeless invalid for
the few months that she had still to breathe. Nor did Theophano
herself offer any opposition to this, when she found the queen-mother
so utterly fallen from power and so feeble in body and mind.
The five princesses in the Canicleion nunnery were enabled to meet
and take counsel together, and by their prestige as sisters of the
reigning emperor, their rank as undoubted porphyrogennetoi, and their
own ability and force of character, they soon recovered much of their
influence. It became known to the confidantes of the empress that
they were conspiring to recover their liberty and rank, that in spite
of all the exhortations and orders of the abbot, who insisted on
confessing them himself, they still retained in private their lay
dresses and habits, and obstinately declined to observe the fastings
and austere rules of the order to which they were supposed to be
vowed. Secret friends and partisans of influence obtained the ear of
the politic Joseph, who thought it high time to have some
counterpoise to the ambition of the empress; and at length, by his
secret connivance, the good-natured Romanus was willing to mitigate
his cruel decree, and a tacit compromise was effected. The
princesses were allowed to inhabit royal palaces and to receive the
appanages and privileges of their rank, upon their formal consent to
accept their consecration to the virgin life of professed nuns. The
three elder princesses outwardly conformed to this arrangement. They
were installed in the palace of Antiochus, near the Hippodrome and
the great church of St. Sophia, living like the noble and royal
canonesses of western Europe, but, except in the matter of betrothal
and marriage, not otherwise deprived of their imperial honors. And
ultimately, as we know, the Princess Theodora became herself empress,
as wife of John Tzimisces.
The two younger princesses stoutly refused the compromise, and would
not accept the obligation of nunship; and Agatha, her father's
favorite and the most thoughtful of the whole family, insisted on
treating the ceremony of her consecration as a blasphemous mockery.
She persuaded her sister Anna to join her in the refusal. Both of
them were therefore removed to a still more secluded nunnery, that of
Myrelaeon, a palace formerly built by their mother's father,
Lecapenus, when regent. It stood on the upper reaches of the Golden
Horn, at the water-side, not far from the walls beyond Blachernæ. In
that which once was the guard-room of old, a chamber which hung over
the sea and was far removed from the sights and gayeties of the city,
the Princess Agatha was immured as a prisoner of state, but even
there she was able to have occasional intercourse with her sister
Anna, and also with her aunt, the ex-Empress Augusta Sophia, widow of
Christopher, eldest son of Romanus Lecapenus. She also, at the fall
of that family from the purple, had been consigned to the life of a
strict nun in the same convent of Myrelaeon. It was, in truth, a
kind of suttee of Byzantine manners that the widow or discarded wife
of a fallen prince or noble should be consigned to a nunnery in some
secluded monastery near the capital. The fall of the House of
Lecapenus had been so complete, and the good-will of the Empress
Helena towards her unfortunate sister-in-law was so effective, that
the ex-Empress Augusta Sophia was still able, through the old
adherents of her family, to obtain very considerable authority,
always short of her own delivery from the convent, which at her age
she no longer sought.
This night she was exerting all her powers of persuasion to induce
the sisters Anna and Agatha to accept the conditions of comparative
restoration to lay life to which the three elder princesses had
already consented. She pressed them to remember the youth, generous
nature, and unquestioned autocracy of their brother, the emperor, the
hope of gradual improvement in their terms, and the danger of further
incensing so terrible a woman as the empress.
"Twenty years have passed," said the aged ex-empress, "since I, too,
was thrust from the Sacred Palace, where I once was honored as the
wife of a Cæsar. I have grown accustomed to my quiet lot in my old
age, and I would not now exchange these sombre robes for those of an
Augusta, even if I could. I, too, once had a proud spirit, but it is
broken and dead as I am to the world. My sweet child, you will never
be able to endure the trial. Yield to your brother, who with all his
faults has a heart to be touched, and you may yet find a happy life,
and, who knows, perhaps an illustrious marriage, worthy of your birth
in the purple and your royal race."
The clear-sighted Agatha might feel the worldly wisdom of her aunt's
advice, which had already brought the gentle Anna to the melting
mood, but the last words of the ex-Empress Augusta Sophia, about her
birth and royal race, touched a secret chord in the heart of the girl
who had so often quivered when she heard it said that few were fit to
mate with princesses of the House of Basil.
She flushed, and with a look of resolution and fire that would become
a virgin martyr, she replied: "Never will I dishonor myself and
forswear the teaching that my mother gave me, by consenting to treat
as a consecration to Christ the outrage inflicted on me when the monk
and his nuns forced on me the mockery of this garb. I have poured
out my soul in prayer to my Saviour and to His Blessed Mother in
heaven. They have heard my cries and my sorrows, and a spirit within
me has revealed it to my heart, that the good Lord Himself does not
vouchsafe to accept the forced sacrifice of his devoted handmaiden.
No, my dear aunt, they may imprison me, they may torture me, they may
kill me, but they shall never force me to profess myself by a lie the
bride of Christ!" This conversation was now interrupted by the
entrance of one of the sisters of the nunnery who had been assigned
as attendants of the princess. She came, she said, with a peremptory
message from the Abbot John himself, who required the immediate
presence of the nun, Sister Euphemia, the name given to Agatha "in
religion," in the confessional of the chapel. This unexpected
summons the princess was inclined to defy, but her aunt warned her of
the danger of flagrant disobedience to the all-powerful prelate, and
the attendant sister whispered in her ear that a great surprise and
unexpected deliverance might yet be in store for her. The princess
accordingly submitted to the command, and was conducted through the
corridors to the darkened chapel of the convent, where she took her
place on her knees in the accustomed place of confession. The
prelate was already seated in his recess, and as usual had chosen to
cover his whole person in his monastic garb, and to conceal his face
in his cowl.
"My daughter," he began, in a voice purposely simulated and subdued
to a whisper, "I have called thee to confession to learn if thou art
still resolved to resist the superior of thy order, and to defy the
mandates of Mother Church in repudiating thy consecration to Christ
as His bride."
"Father, I tell thee plainly, for I will treat thee with more
frankness and with more courtesy than thou hast treated me--I am no
bride of Christ. No threat and no cruelty shall ever force me to
utter or to act a falsehood, which I hold to be a profanation of His
holy name. I am no bride in heaven--no, nor shall I ever be a bride
on earth," she uttered, with a deep sigh that she could not restrain,
and abruptly ended her half-spoken sentence.
"My daughter, hast thou indeed registered a vow to lead a solitary
life, and never to listen to the love of any man?" said the monk,
with a new eagerness in his voice, that seemed to tremble at his own
words.
"No man has ever sought my love, I tell thee," she said haughtily to
such a question, "nor will I, even in confession, bring my lips to
utter what Agatha might answer if he did. If she ever had such
dreams, they are vanished in the black night that has fallen upon my
miserable life. But what means, my father abbot, this sudden summons
to me this night, and what are my maiden dreams or vows to thee or to
thine? Why am I here? What is it that thou askest of me?"
"Royal lady," said the monk, now dropping his voice to an impassioned
whisper, "thy maiden dreams are all in all to one who loves thee
better than his own soul, and who is at this moment risking life,
torture, and mutilation, in the effort to protect and save thee.
Nay, do not start or flee, noblest, purest, bravest of women! Steel
thy nerves to be still, and listen to our schemes to rescue thee from
this dungeon of the priests. Nay, by the Mother of God! do not move
or cry out, for three sisters of the convent wait within sight of us,
and only one of them is in our plot. Remain as thou art, and listen
to one who, on the field of battle, on the stormy seas, on the
solitary mountains of his home, has learned to pray to thy image
along with that of the blessed Agatha, whose name thou bearest, as
the true saint of his faith and his hope. Listen to him now, for he
has come through fire and water to save thee!"
At the first words of this most startling address the maiden had
detected the manly tones of the young hero of her day-dreams, and
wild hopes and exultation thrilled through her veins as she steeled
herself to retain her attitude of a penitent, and to hear out the
mysterious story of the confessor.
"See who it is that has dared to seek thee thus," said he, as he
threw back the cowl and showed her the gallant features of Basil
Digenes, the Romanized son of the emir of Edessa.
"By the aid of the venerable princess, thy aunt and fellow-prisoner,
I have matured a plan of escape for thee. Three of the sisters of
this convent are our confederates in the scheme, and by their help I
have succeeded to-night in assuming the part of thy tyrant, the
abbot. My own lady-sister, Theodosia, as thou knowest, the wife of
the patrician, George Comnenus, is now in her summer palace on the
island of Proconnesus, where she will receive and conceal thee until
the heart of Romanus is softened, for the family of the Comneni is
too powerful to be defied. To-night, at midnight, I will be waiting
beneath thy chamber window with two of thy ladies who served thee in
the palace, and a stout crew of boatmen. The three sisters of this
convent who are entirely devoted to our service will supply thee with
fitting lay dress, and also with a rope-ladder to descend from the
window on to the waters below, where the boat shall be ready to
convey thee to my sister. Thou hast heart for such an enterprise,
true daughter of the lion race of Basil, I know full well, if thou
canst trust the honor of the son of the Saracen," said the enamored
young hero of the marches, who, even in his stormy life of adventure,
had never embarked upon a more chivalrous escapade. He gazed on the
maiden with a deep and rapturous appeal in his countenance.
Agatha paused and communed with herself. Then without a word she
took the hand of the pretended confessor, and gently pressed it with
her own.
"And can Agatha learn to love him whom she has already learned to
trust?" said her ardent lover, as he kissed her hand again and again.
"It will be time to speak to her of love," she said, softly, "when
Agatha has put off the garb of Euphemia the nun. But that I will do
this very night, with the help of Our Lady in heaven above. Into her
holy keeping I commit my body and my soul!"
X
The Conquest of Crete