“The dying Other from the gloom she drew,
Supported on his shorten’d arm he leans,
Prone agonizing; with incumbent fate,
Heavy declines his head; yet dark beneath
The suffering feature sullen vengeance lowers,
Shame, indignation, unaccomplish’d rage,
And still the cheated eye expects his fall.”
THOMSON.
The fatal morning dawned refulgently over the metropolis of the world,
but the eyes of the Hebrew captives shrank from before its beams,
loathing the light, and vainly wishing for its decline. A hundred days
of festivity had been decreed by the emperor to the Roman people, in
which the children of Israel were to be torn in pieces by wild beasts,
or compelled to slay each other,[18] to gratify the barbarous tastes of
those who held them in chains. Adonijah and his opponent were included
in the latter combats, as persons to whom no mercy would be shown. Both
were still in the flower of youth, in the glory of their strength, who
were thus brought forth to die.
The feelings of a warrior were not so entirely sunk in slavery as to
permit Adonijah to assume the sword and buckler without experiencing a
momentary elevation of soul. It was not till he found himself within the
circle of the vast amphitheatre, and encountered the hostile glances of
many thousand eyes, that he remembered that this was no battle-field,
but the arena on which he was to be “butchered for a Roman spectacle.”
Even in this bitter moment he confronted the spectators with unshrinking
firmness, till among that living mass he distinguished the infant
Lucius, and felt the tender emotions of his heart towards the child
suffuse his eyes.
Titus sat in state to view the spectacle with the lovely Jewish queen by
his side. She, endowed with Mariamne’s talents and fatal beauty, yet
wanting her nobility of mind and virtue, was become the absolute ruler
of him whose mighty arm had enslaved her people,—that people whose
miseries were then exhibiting before her eyes. Julius Claudius was
seated near the lovers, apparently enjoying familiar converse with them
both. His little son, gaily attired as Cupid, listlessly reclined his
fair young head against his father’s knee. Art had supplied to his pale
cheek the roses that pining for Adonijah had banished, but the glaring
hue ill accorded with the fair delicate cheek, whose pallid tints it
could not overcome. All this was marked by the Hebrew with painful
interest, even in the present awful hour, for the child was the only
thing left upon earth that he could love. The craving feeling for
sympathy that exists in every human bosom, however cold and unpromising
its exterior may be, led him to salute the infant Lucius by name.
The boy raised his languid head and, recognising his unhappy friend,
uttered a joyful cry, and, stretching forth his arms towards him,
returned his greeting with delight, inviting him to join him by his
lively and animated gestures.
Half-unmanned, the gladiator turned away his tearful eyes from the child
to his opponent. The face of his countryman was averted from him, and
for a moment he expected to behold the familiar features of a friend.
They faced each other, and the hostile names of Adonijah and Ithamar
were mutually uttered on one side in the tone of defiance, on the other
with amazement.
Adonijah indeed, in recognising the war-wasted countenance of Ithamar,
scarcely remembered that they had once been foes. Years of bondage and
exile had nearly obliterated all traces of former hatred from his
breast. No rival, but an old companion in arms appeared to stand before
him—one who had fought for the same sacred cause, and was united with
him in the same sad brotherhood of sorrow. He lowered the point of his
weapon, saying as he did so, “Ithamar, in me you behold no hostile
opponent; my hatred has perished with my country: I know no enemies but
Romans.” He stretched forth his hand in token of amity, and anxiously
awaited the answer of his foe.
Ithamar’s haggard features betrayed surprise, but expressed no generous
feeling. Sullenly he repulsed the friendly pledge and assumed a posture
of defence.
“Hear me, Ithamar, hear me, my countryman,” continued Adonijah; “I have
sworn by the holy name of Jehovah not to raise a hostile weapon against
the bosom of an Israelite. I only wait thy bidding to throw away these
arms and tread them in the dust. Let an oath of peace be between us; let
the unbelieving Gentiles cast us to beasts less savage than themselves,
rather than force us to slay each other for their sport. Hearken, my
brother, to my words, and hallow with me the commandments of the Lord in
the sight of this heathen people.”
Ithamar broke into a laugh so wild and horrid that it sounded rather
like the yell of a demon than the expression of mirth. He cast upon his
adversary a withering look, and all the hoarded malice of vanished years
of rivalry spake in that glance of hatred and disdain. Without waiting
for the usual signal, he rushed upon Adonijah, who was wounded before he
had time to put himself in a posture of defence.
Enraged at this perfidious conduct, Adonijah forgot his vow, and,
animated at once by the desire of revenge and the instinctive feeling of
self-preservation, gave blow for blow and wound for wound.
Never were two combatants better matched in size or strength or skill,
and the gratified spectators cheered and applauded every stroke, betting
largely upon the heads of both, as caprice or interest suggested.
Julius Claudius, aware of the incipient malady lurking in the frame of
his slave, ventured great sums upon Ithamar, who he supposed possessed
more judgment to direct his courage than Adonijah. In this he was
mistaken, for the pressure of calamity, that had overwhelmed the
sensitive nature of Adonijah for a time, was far less nearly allied to
madness than the fanatic zeal of Ithamar.
Blind with rage, the Sadducee rushed upon his enemy, determined to crush
him with one last decisive blow. Adonijah reeled beneath its deadly
force, but collecting with a mighty effort his failing powers, plunged
his sword into the bosom of Ithamar, who fell dead at his feet, yielding
up his breath without a cry or struggle.
A long loud plaudit from sixty thousand spectators greeted the victor,
who heeded it not, but bending sadly over his victim remembered his
broken vow. A moment he contemplated the sullen features of Ithamar,
another instant and the amphitheatre with its circling thousands swam
before his sight; the next he slowly sank in that attitude immortalized
by sculpture; then his dark locks swept the bloody floor of the arena
and rested on the lifeless bosom of his fallen foe.
A second shout, more loud, more lengthened than that which lately hailed
his victory, greeted now his fall. It thrilled through every nerve of
Adonijah’s frame, and yet he seemed only to hear Julius Claudius’ single
voice. He opened his heavy eyes, and turned upon his worthless master a
look that told him that his soul was still unsubdued, for feebly raising
his hand he appeared to defy him to the last. That indignant gesture
exhausted the fallen gladiator’s remaining strength; but the latest
sound he heard was the wailing cry of the infant Lucius, then sight and
sense forsook him, and he lay unconscious, yet still breathing, before
that vast and eager multitude.
The spectators were divided in their feelings; but Titus, who in the
intrepid gladiator had recognised the captive of Jotapata, was inclined
to grant him mercy. This clement feeling was opposed by Julius Claudius,
who declared “that, having disturbed the triumph, he ought to die,” in
which opinion he was seconded by all those who had ventured too much
upon the vanquished Ithamar.
Berenice espoused the side of the fallen victor, and, incensed at the
positive manner in which Julius Claudius dared to oppose her wishes,
determined to make him feel her power. She pleaded warmly in behalf of
Adonijah, and with Titus she could not plead in vain. He gave the signal
of mercy, commanding the attendants of the circus to see the gladiator’s
wounds looked to, and to let nothing be wanting to promote his cure.
Not content with having gained her point, the fair Jewess exerted her
influence to lessen Julius Claudius in the eyes of her lover, of whose
regard she was jealous; and the proud Roman patrician had the
mortification of discovering that a word or hint from this fascinating
foreigner could shake the affection of his early friend.
Like most other Romans of the period, Julius despised strangers, and
this he had suffered Berenice to perceive, and the beautiful Jewess was
not of a temper to look over an affront. Unfeminine as she was, this
princess possessed the womanly failing at least of seeking to humble
those who contemned her power. She exerted her brilliant wit to make the
effeminate Roman appear ridiculous, and succeeded so well that Titus,
who like the Persian king of old smiled when his fair enslaver smiled,
and frowned when she frowned, laughed outright at her sallies. Stung to
the quick by this contemptuous treatment, Julius, no longer in the
humour to play the courtier, made an unguarded rejoinder which drew
tears from the eyes of the royal beauty, and looks of angry displeasure
from her princely lover. Julius, deeply wounded, took his little son by
the hand, and withdrew from the amphitheatre full of the mortifying
reflection that a tear or smile from this highly gifted though guilty
foreigner was more to Titus than the intimate companionship of years.
Julius Claudius had displayed the utmost political adroitness during the
fearful contests that had made Italy a war-field and a grave. He had
shown an acute judgment in abandoning the prince whom fortune was about
to desert. He forsook Galba’s adopted son Piso at a critical point of
time. With Otho he remained till that emperor left Rome, for he had
foreseen that the Prætorian army would not be able to compete with the
German legions. The splendid but erratic course of one of his dissipated
friends, Antonius Primus, a young Roman knight, whose participation in
forging a will had caused his banishment, but to whom Galba gave a
legion, had made Julius forsake the failing cause of Vitellius, though
he had been one of his chief favourites. He had declared for Vespasian
in time to save himself from confiscation, and when Licinius Mucianus,
the friend of Titus, took upon himself the direction of public affairs,
and Antonius Primus fell into disgrace, he abandoned him, and attached
himself to the man who had reaped the blood-stained laurels of the
general whose arm had placed Vespasian on the throne of Rome.
From Vespasian himself Julius Claudius had expected no marks of favour,
but Titus had received his old friend with open arms; yet his star had
declined before that of a woman whose years nearly doubled those of her
youthful lover. But the charms of Berenice, like those of Cleopatra,
defied the power of time, for her intellectual powers enabled her to
retain her beauty beyond the usual period assigned for the possession of
a gift so precious, rare, and fleeting. Her fascinating manners veiled
her disposition, which once, and once only, had betrayed the softness of
the woman and the feelings of a patriot. She had formerly stood a
barefooted suppliant for her own people before the tribunal of a
merciless Roman procurator,[19] and had pleaded for the Jews, and vainly
pleaded, for the man was avaricious, and the tears and abasement of a
beautiful woman had offered no counter-charm to the greater influence of
gold and the gratification of a barbarous revenge. History has recorded
to her honour this solitary instance of compassion shown by the guilty
sister of Agrippa.
She had persecuted her sister Drusilla, who was supposed to be the most
beautiful woman in the world; but, though that unfortunate princess had
been forgetful of the obligation of her first marriage vow, her fidelity
to Felix, and the self-devotion that induced her to die with him, proved
at least that she possessed a depth of tenderness of which Berenice was
incapable.
Julius Claudius saw that he had exposed himself to the malice of an
artful and revengeful woman, when the irritation of gambling and
drunkenness had passed away, and he returned to his house, mortified,
disappointed, and miserably anxious. But a heavier trial awaited Julius
Claudius than the mere loss of Titus’ favour;—an arrow keener than
ridicule or mere worldly disappointment struck him to the very heart.
All his affections that were not centered upon self, rested upon his
child. The beauty, the talents, the lovely disposition of Lucius had
endeared him to the heart of the dissipated parent, who was proud that
such a scion should be destined to carry the name of the Claudii down to
posterity. Destined to prolong thy name and lineage, Julius Claudius? Oh
no! a fairer inheritance is given to the young heir of thy honours, even
one “that fadeth not away.” That very night his hopeful young son was
smitten with sore disease; in vain art was exhausted to stay its direful
progress, in vain Julius promised half his wealth to save his child; now
invoking deities whom he had despised, now seeking from the Chaldean
sorcerer for some charm to cure a malady that defied the skill of the
physician. The child, burning with fever and raving in delirium, turned
away from his unhappy father as if he had forgotten him, while he called
continually upon the name of Adonijah till his accents grew faint.
Fainter and fainter, and yet more laboured, the suffering infant drew
his fleeting breath, and Julius had no other child, and he loved the boy
so much. He could not stay to see the end; but rushing from the chamber
of death went forth he knew not whither—longing to die, but shrinking
back in terror from plunging into an unknown futurity.
While the frantic father fled forth into the night, an aged freedwoman,
an ancient servant of the house, entered the forsaken chamber, knelt by
the couch of the dying boy, and holding his hand in hers, prayed
fervently for him.
It was Fulvia the deaconess, who, perceiving that the soul was in the
act of departing, took water and administered the rite of baptism to the
expiring scion of her patron’s lofty stem. He opened his eyes, seemed to
recognise her familiar features, and smiled as he expired.
-----
[18] See Appendix, Note XI.
[19] Gessius Florus.