ST. PATRICK’S CHILDREN IN ST. LEO’S CITY.
Great was the exultation in Rome at the news of the victory on the
Catalaunian plains, the defeat of Attila, and his retreat with his Huns
to their camps beyond the Danube.
The echo of the triumph soon reached the quiet portico of the palace on
the Aventine, where Damaris and Lucia were sitting together in the hush
of a July noon. Fabricius came in with the news.
“Attila is in retreat; there has been a battle, with the slaughter of
hundreds of thousands, and here is a letter for thee.”
It was the one Marius had written from the battle-field. In a few days
followed the second from Troyes. It was to Lucia, and she read it as they
sat together in the quiet evening.
“‘The wound was worse than I knew.’”
“I felt sure of that,” said the mother.
“‘But I have had tender care and nursing in the house of a Jew called
Eleazar, from his wife Miriam and two young Christian captives.’”
“In the house of a Jew!” exclaimed Fabricius, doubtfully. “God grant they
dealt fairly by him. The Jews have many wrongs to avenge on us and ours.”
Lucia read on—“‘I am quite strong again,’” and then she paused a moment
before she proceeded, “‘I think I have found the Fountain of Youth, and I
hope to bring some drops home to thee.’”
“A curious mixture of religions,” said Fabricius. “A Jew, and the old
Pagan fountain. What can he mean?”
“He means, I suppose,” said Lucia, “that the world around us seems rather
old, and that he has found among these new people some freshness of new
life.”
“I understand,” said Damaris.
Lucia read on—“‘Tell my mother of the two young Christian captives, the
son and daughter of a king or chieftain from the farthest West, the
land of the Scots, Hibernia, the island Rome never conquered. They were
kidnapped by British pirates, and bought by the old Jew Eleazar, who,
with his wife Miriam, lives at Rome, and is taking them thither. They
must be ransomed.’”
“It seems a very wild story,” said Fabricius. “Are you quite sure it is
from Marius?”
“Quite sure,” said Lucia; and she resumed, “There is a postscript. He
thinks the sister would be delightful to me, and that the brother would
be invaluable to our father on his lands among the Sabine hills. There is
also a dog, a deer-hound of the purest Scottish breed, that he thinks
would be priceless for the chase.”
“A wonderful treasure-trove, in good sooth,” said Fabricius, rather
grimly. “A dog, two captives to ransom, and a Fountain of Youth.”
Afterwards he said to his wife when they were alone, “Dilectissima,
understandest thou what this means? Art thou ready to have thy youth
renewed by a daughter-in-law from the Scottish wilds?”
“We will wait and see,” she replied. “Marius is no dreamer. If he thinks
he has found a treasure, I believe he has.”
“The Scots are many of them Pelagian heretics,” Fabricius replied, not
without malice.
“Then we must bring them under the instruction of our Pope Leo,” she
said. “We will wait and see.”
They had not long to wait. The very next evening Damaris and Lucia were
in their lectica, with its purple curtains and golden lattices, on the
great road leading northward, when they met a little company of four,
walking beside two strong, heavily-laden mules. The old man who led
the way, walking alone, had the dark, Oriental colouring and aquiline
features which they recognized as Hebrew. Behind him walked two women,
with veils drawn around the head and shoulders, one dark and stooping
slightly with age, the other tall and young and fair, with a sweet light
in the grey eyes which met those of Damaris. Behind them came a fair,
athletic young man, holding a powerful deer-hound in leash.
Damaris and Lucia looked significantly at each other. They would have
followed the strangers, but their horses had suddenly changed their pace,
and were galloping towards the hills, rocking the heavy carriage (or
highly-decorated wagon) from side to side. The mother and daughter had
not a doubt that, as in a momentary flash of lightning, they had seen the
group described in Marius’ letter. As they drove on they met a troop of
the slaves of the Imperial household.
Meantime in the opposite direction the little company they had met
entered the gate of the city, and were passed by the same troop of the
Imperial household.
The officer who was at the head of the band of slaves seemed struck by
the four travellers, so contrasted in types of face and figure, and yet
so evidently belonging to each other. Especially he fixed his eyes on the
fair face of Ethne, the athletic form of Baithene, and the dog of the
much-prized Irish breed. After he had passed them he turned back, and
asked Eleazar where he lived, and if the dog was to be purchased, and
said he might look in some day and inquire about it.
Something in the officer’s look and bearing made Ethne look down and draw
closer to Miriam, and Baithene look up defiantly and throw his arm around
the dog, whilst the dog pricked up his ears, and gave a suspicious low
growl.
When they reached Eleazar’s lodging at the top of a tall house on the
further side of the Tiber, where many of his countrymen congregated, and
had separated into their different rooms for the night, Ethne said to her
brother—
“Have you the tablet the Roman soldier at Troyes gave us for his mother
and father, who live in a palace on one of these hills?”
“Surely,” he said; “why do you ask?”
“I can scarcely say why,” she answered, with a shiver. “But this great
Rome seems to me lonelier than the sea, and stranger than our first step
into a strange land, and more like a den of lions than besieged Orleans
or the camp of the Huns. The people look at us so strangely, as if we
were foreign animals, or pieces of merchandise for sale.”
“And _we are_!” moaned Baithene.
“Let us say the paternoster and Patrick’s hymn,” she rejoined, “and try
and go to sleep.” But they slept little.
Nor did Miriam and Eleazar sleep much better.
“Dost thou know that man with the sinister face,” she said, “who spoke to
thee about the dog to-day?”
“No,” he replied, “save that he is of the Imperial household, and must
not be offended.”
“He must be _escaped_,” she replied decidedly. “It is not the dog only
that he wants, and he looks a son of Belial. The Imperial household is
said to be a sink of iniquity; we must never sell these children into
that.”
He was silent; heart and conscience were with her, but he murmured
sullenly—
“I told thee these Gentile strangers were no merchandise for us.”
“The God of the fatherless sent them to us,” she replied; “and our own
child is fatherless and motherless; and if we suffer God’s orphans to be
ruined, how are we to ask Him to care for our own?”
“We are no princes now,” he answered, “to have young men and maidens in
our service, and beasts of the chase. What would you do?”
“They have a tablet from that young Roman officer,” she said. “A letter
to his family in a palace on the Aventine.”
“What of that?” he grumbled.
“I will go to-morrow,” she said, “with the maiden, to see the lady on the
Aventine, the young Roman noble’s mother, and tell her all. Perchance she
will have compassion on these Christian captives, and help them and us.”
“Thou wilt do what seemeth thee best,” he rejoined, in a tone of
oppressed acquiescence. “If we are ruined, we are ruined; and the
All-Merciful have mercy on thee and our lost child.”
Miriam, having gained her point, was too wise to prolong the debate and
imperil the victory, which was, she well knew, the victory of his own
conscience, by the most brilliant or devout retort.
So the next morning early she gently tapped at the door of the rooms
where the young captives were, and said—
“Put on thy raiment quietly, my daughter, and bring the tablet the young
Roman gave thee, and come with me, and let thy brother and the dog follow
close behind.”
In the dusk of the morning they crossed the Tiber, and gliding along
the silent quays at the foot of the Aventine, climbed from their level
between the walls of the vineyard and palace gardens till they reached
the gate of the house of Fabricius.
Eleazar came after them, and stood near them at the gate, in the shadow,
a little apart. One or two slaves were stirring, and seemed at first
determined not to heed them, but in a few minutes the steward of the
household appeared, and demanded what they wanted at that unseasonable
hour.
“We want thee to bear this epistle instantly to thy lady,” said Miriam;
“it is from her son. He gave it us at the city of Troyes, far away in
Gaul, to bring hither to her.”
The steward looked doubtfully at the group, but nevertheless accepted the
tablet, went quickly into the house, and in a few minutes returned with
his young mistress. Lucia’s smile reassured them.
“Does the matter press?” she asked.
“It presses sore,” was Miriam’s reply. “A few hours’ delay may prove the
ruin of two innocent lives.”
Lucia went instantly to her mother’s room.
“Mother,” she said, “it is the people we met yesterday, the people who
nursed Marius, with a letter from him.”
Together they glanced at the few words in the letter from Marius,
commending the fugitives to the care of his father and mother. In a few
minutes Damaris and Lucia received the strangers in the atrium. Miriam
asked to see Damaris apart, and few words of explanation were needed
between them.
“My husband purchased these captives on the coast of Gaul,” she said.
“They are noble. They were taken by pirates. They are Christians. They
are good. Lady, save them from becoming slaves in the household of the
Emperor. One of his people has seen them, and is coming, I fear, to
purchase them to-day.”
“It must not be,” said Damaris. “What would you have us do?”
“Ransom them, purchase them, lady; make them your own. They belong to
your Christ!”
“You are not Christian?” Damaris asked courteously.
“My family are of the tribe of Judah—of the family of your Christ.
Christians robbed us of all, of our only child. But I believe your Christ
was good.”
Damaris looked into the dark, sad, Oriental eyes and read much there.
After a moment’s pause she took Miriam’s hand.
“You have pity on these captives,” she said tenderly, “as your great
prophets commanded you; you know the heart of a captive. You have pity on
this maiden for the sake of your own dead maiden child.”
“Our daughter is not dead,” exclaimed Miriam, with a tremulous voice.
“But she is a captive, perhaps a slave, we know not where. We search for
her year after year. We pray for her night and day. There is One Who
lives and hears.”
“One Who sees and loves!” responded Damaris; “Who sees thee caring for
these His children, and I believe brings them through thee to me. I will
do all I can.”
She went straight to her husband, who was in consultation with his
steward, in his room of business. After dismissing the attendant, she
said,
“Fabricius, these captives, the friends of Marius, who helped to save his
life, are here. We shall have to ransom them at once.”
“My lady is imperious,” he replied, smiling, “and must of course be
obeyed. But where are the revenues? The taxes and imposts for these wars
are ruinous. Only just now the forester from our farms on the Sabine
hills has been telling me the slaves will not work. They are probably
meditating another flight to the barbarians, as in the days of Alaric,
and everything is going to ruin.
“We must sell some of our land,” she said.
“No one will buy,” he replied. “They say Attila the Hun will soon return
to avenge his defeat and ravage the country.”
“I will part with my jewels,” she said.
He made a deprecatory gesture, and said—
“I was but pointing out to thee we were not Olympians to command the
clouds, nor, alas! of those who found the tribute-money miraculously
stored in the mouths of fishes. What thou commandest must certainly be
done. But what can then be done with the captives we shall have to see.”
They returned together to the atrium, and Fabricius, addressing Baithene,
said gravely—
“My son writes that thou art a prince in thine own land. I fear we have
too many princes here already to have much room for more.”
“I am no prince now,” said Baithene, raising his frank, fearless eyes to
Fabricius, “at least I have no kingdom and no subjects; and what we call
a kingdom in our country would perhaps seem but a wilderness to thee.”
There was no complaining in his tone, simply the acknowledgment of an
unpleasant fact; and no defiance in his look, only a kind of princely
sense that nothing could rob him of his birthright, or change what he was
in himself, or prevent his conquering circumstances by making the best of
them.
The old Roman patrician was touched, he felt he had met an equal; but all
he said was—
“Thy dog, at all events, seems a prince of dogs.”
And Bran acknowledged the compliment by an acquiescent wag of his tail.
Then turning to Miriam, Fabricius said—“I would see thy husband.”
“I will fetch him at once,” she replied. And without another word she
went and brought in Eleazar, who was still keeping guard outside the gate.
Fabricius took the old man to his private room, and as a matter of course
there was some bargaining between them. The Roman noble pleaded with much
truth the badness of the times; the Jewish merchant pleaded with much
plausibility the poverty of his race, and his own especial losses on this
purchase. But the arrangement was soon concluded; and Eleazar and Miriam
returned alone to the tall houses beyond the Tiber, leaving Ethne,
Baithene, and the dog in the palace on the Aventine.
As Miriam went, she bowed with an Oriental gesture, and kissed the hand
of Damaris.
“Your Christ is good,” she murmured with a quivering voice, “and so are
some of His Christians.”
“Our Christ is yours!” said Damaris, in a low voice.
Miriam made no reply for a moment, and then with passionate intensity she
said—
“Pray to your God and ours, that if your Christ is ours we may know it in
time, I and my husband, and our captive child whom we have lost.”
[Illustration]
[Illustration]