Half ignorant, they turned an easy wheel
That set sharp racks at work to pinch and peel.
I
In the heyday of the Emperor Aurelian’s greatness, when his strong
right arm propped Rome up, and hewed Palmyra down, when he surrounded
his capital with walls fifty miles in circuit, and led Tetricus and
Zenobia in triumph through its streets, and distributed elephants among
the senators, and laid Etruria out in vineyards, and contemplated in
leisure moments the suppression of Christianity as a subordinate detail
of administration, a mere ripple on the broad ocean of his policy—at
this period Bahram the First, King of Persia, naturally became
disquieted in his mind.
“This upstart soldier of fortune,” reflected he, “has an unseemly habit
of overcoming and leading captive legitimate princes; thus prejudicing
Divine right in the eyes of the vulgar. The skin of his predecessor
Valerian, curried and stuffed with straw, hangs to this hour in the
temple at Ctesiphon, a pleasing spectacle to the immortal gods. How
would my own skin appear in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus? This
must not be. I will send an embassy to him, and impress him with my
greatness. But how?”
He accordingly convoked his counsellors; the viziers, the warriors, the
magi, the philosophers; and addressed them thus:
“The king deigns to consult ye touching a difficult matter. I would
flatter the pride of Rome, without lowering the pride of Persia. I
would propitiate Aurelian, and at the same time humble him. How shall
this be accomplished?”
The viziers, the warriors, and the magi answered not a word. Unbroken
silence reigned in the assembly, until the turn came to the sage
Marcobad, who, prostrating himself, said, “O king, live for ever! In
ancient times, as hath been delivered by our ancestors, Persians were
instructed in three accomplishments—to ride, to draw the bow, and to
speak the truth. Persia still rides and shoots; truth-speaking (praised
be Ormuzd!) she hath discontinued as unbefitting an enlightened nation.
Thou needest not, therefore, scruple to circumvent Aurelian. Offer him
that which thou knowest will not be found in his treasury, seeing that
it is unique in thine own; giving him, at the same time, to understand
that it is the ordinary produce of thy dominions. So, while rejoicing
at the gift, shall he be abashed at his inferiority. I refer to the
purple robe of her majesty the queen, the like of which is not to be
found in the whole earth, neither do any know where the dye that tinges
it is produced, save that it proceeds from the uttermost parts of
India.”
“I approve thy advice,” replied Bahram, “and in return will save thy
life by banishing thee from my dominions. When my august consort shall
learn that thou hast been the means of depriving her of her robe, she
will undoubtedly request that thou mayest be flayed, and thou knowest
that I can deny her nothing. I therefore counsel thee to depart with
all possible swiftness. Repair to the regions where the purple is
produced, and if thou returnest with an adequate supply, I undertake
that my royal sceptre shall be graciously extended to thee.”
The philosopher forsook the royal presence with celerity, and his
office of chief examiner of court spikenard was bestowed upon another;
as also his house and his garden, his gold and his silver, his wives
and his concubines, his camels and his asses, which were numerous.
While the solitary adventurer wended his way eastward, a gorgeous
embassy travelled westward in the direction of Rome.
Arrived in the presence of Aurelian, and at the conclusion of his
complimentary harangue, the chief envoy produced a cedar casket, from
which he drew a purple robe of such surpassing refulgence, that, in the
words of the historian who has recorded the transaction, the purple of
the emperor and of the matrons appeared ashy grey in comparison. It was
accompanied by a letter thus conceived:
“Bahram to Aurelian: health! Receive such purple as we have in Persia.”
“Persia, forsooth!” exclaimed Sorianus, a young philosopher versed in
natural science, “this purple never was in Persia, except as a rarity.
Oh, the mendacity and vanity of these Orientals!”
The ambassador was beginning an angry reply, when Aurelian quelled the
dispute with a look, and with some awkwardness delivered himself of a
brief oration in acknowledgment of the gift. He took no more notice of
the matter until nightfall, when he sent for Sorianus, and inquired
where the purple actually was produced.
“In the uttermost parts of India,” returned the philosopher.
“Well,” rejoined Aurelian, summing up the matter with his accustomed
rapidity and clearness of head, “either thou or the Persian king has
lied to me, it is plain, and, by the favour of the Gods, it is
immaterial which, seeing that my ground for going to war with him is
equally good in either case. If he has sought to deceive me, I am right
in punishing him; if he possesses what I lack, I am justified in taking
it away. It would, however, be convenient to know which of these
grounds to inscribe in my manifesto; moreover, I am not ready for
hostilities at present; having first to extirpate the Blemmyes, Carpi,
and other barbarian vermin. I will therefore despatch thee to India to
ascertain by personal examination the truth about the purple. Do not
return without it, or I shall cut off thy head. My treasury will charge
itself with the administration of thy property during thy absence. The
robe shall meanwhile be deposited in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.
May he have it and thee in his holy keeping!”
Thus, in that age of darkness, were two most eminent philosophers
reduced to beggary, and constrained to wander in remote and
insalubrious regions; the one for advising a king, the other for
instructing an emperor. But the matter did not rest here. For Aurelian,
having continued the visible deity of half the world for one hundred
and fifty days after the departure of Sorianus, was slain by his own
generals. To him succeeded Tacitus, who sank oppressed by the weight of
rule; to him Probus, who perished in a military tumult; to him Carus,
who was killed by lightning; to him Carinus, who was assassinated by
one whom he had wronged; to him Diocletian, who, having maintained
himself for twenty years, wisely forbore to tempt Nemesis further, and
retired to plant cabbages at Salona. All these sovereigns, differing
from each other in every other respect, agreed in a common desire to
possess the purple dye, and when the philosopher returned not,
successively despatched new emissaries in quest of it. Strange was the
diversity of fate which befell these envoys. Some fell into the jaws of
lions, some were crushed by monstrous serpents, some trampled by
elephants at the command of native princes, some perished of hunger,
and some of thirst; some, encountering smooth-browed and dark-tressed
girls wreathing their hair with the champak blossom or bathing by
moonlight in lotus-mantled tanks, forsook their quest, and led
thenceforth idyllic lives in groves of banian and of palm. Some became
enamoured of the principles of the Gymnosophists, some couched
themselves for uneasy slumber upon beds of spikes, weening to wake in
the twenty-second heaven. All which romantic variety of fortune was the
work of a diminutive insect that crawled or clung heedless of the
purple it was weaving into the many-coloured web of human life.