BOOK THE SECOND
Chapter I
A FLASH HOUSE IN POMPEII, AND THE GENTLEMEN OF THE CLASSIC RING.
TO one of those parts of Pompeii, which were tenanted not by the lords of
pleasure, but by its minions and its victims; the haunt of gladiators and
prize-fighters; of the vicious and the penniless; of the savage and the
obscene; the Alsatia of an ancient city--we are now transported.
It was a large room, that opened at once on the confined and crowded lane.
Before the threshold was a group of men, whose iron and well-strung muscles,
whose short and Herculean necks, whose hardy and reckless countenances,
indicated the champions of the arena. On a shelf, without the shop, were
ranged jars of wine and oil; and right over this was inserted in the wall a
coarse painting, which exhibited gladiators drinking--so ancient and so
venerable is the custom of signs! Within the room were placed several small
tables, arranged somewhat in the modern fashion of 'boxes', and round these
were seated several knots of men, some drinking, some playing at dice, some
at that more skilful game called 'duodecim scriptae', which certain of the
blundering learned have mistaken for chess, though it rather, perhaps,
resembled backgammon of the two, and was usually, though not always, played
by the assistance of dice. The hour was in the early forenoon, and nothing
better, perhaps, than that unseasonable time itself denoted the habitual
indolence of these tavern loungers.
Yet, despite the situation of the house and the character of its inmates, it
indicated none of that sordid squalor which would have characterized a
similar haunt in a modern city. The gay disposition of all the Pompeians,
who sought, at least, to gratify the sense even where they neglected the
mind, was typified by the gaudy colors which decorated the walls, and the
shapes, fantastic but not inelegant, in which the lamps, the drinking-cups,
the commonest household utensils, were wrought.
'By Pollux!' said one of the gladiators, as he leaned against the wall of
the threshold, 'the wine thou sellest us, old Silenus'--and as he spoke he
slapped a portly personage on the back--'is enough to thin the best blood in
one's veins.'
The man thus caressingly saluted, and whose bared arms, white apron, and
keys and napkin tucked carelessly within his girdle, indicated him to be the
host of the tavern, was already passed into the autumn of his years; but his
form was still so robust and athletic, that he might have shamed even the
sinewy shapes beside him, save that the muscles had seeded, as it were, into
flesh, that the cheeks were swelled and bloated, and the increasing stomach
threw into shade the vast and massive chest which rose above it.
'None of thy scurrilous blusterings with me,' growled the gigantic landlord,
in the gentle semi-roar of an insulted tiger; 'my wine is good enough for a
carcass which shall so soon soak the dust of the spoliarium.'
'Croakest thou thus, old raven!' returned the gladiator, laughing
scornfully; 'thou shalt live to hang thyself with despite when thou seest me
win the palm crown; and when I get the purse at the amphitheatre, as I
certainly shall, my first vow to Hercules shall be to forswear thee and thy
vile potations evermore.'
'Hear to him--hear to this modest Pyrgopolinices! He has certainly served
under Bombochides Cluninstaridysarchides,' cried the host. 'Sporus, Niger,
Tetraides, he declares he shall win the purse from you. Why, by the gods!
each of your muscles is strong enough to stifle all his body, or I know
nothing of the arena!'
'Ha!' said the gladiator, coloring with rising fury, 'our lanista would tell
a different story.'
'What story could he tell against me, vain Lydon?' said Tetraides, frowning.
'Or me, who have conquered in fifteen fights?' said the gigantic Niger,
stalking up to the gladiator.
'Or me?' grunted Sporus, with eyes of fire.
'Tush!' said Lydon, folding his arms, and regarding his rivals with a
reckless air of defiance. 'The time of trial will soon come; keep your
valor till then.'
'Ay, do,' said the surly host; 'and if I press down my thumb to save you,
may the Fates cut my thread!'
'Your rope, you mean,' said Lydon, sneeringly: 'here is a sesterce to buy
one.'
The Titan wine-vender seized the hand extended to him, and griped it in so
stern a vice that the blood spirted from the fingers' ends over the garments
of the bystanders.
They set up a savage laugh.
'I will teach thee, young braggart, to play the Macedonian with me! I am no
puny Persian, I warrant thee! What, man! have I not fought twenty years in
the ring, and never lowered my arms once? And have I not received the rod
from the editor's own hand as a sign of victory, and as a grace to
retirement on my laurels? And am I now to be lectured by a boy?' So saying,
he flung the hand from him in scorn.
Without changing a muscle, but with the same smiling face with which he had
previously taunted mine host, did the gladiator brave the painful grasp he
had undergone. But no sooner was his hand released, than, crouching for one
moment as a wild cat crouches, you might see his hair bristle on his head
and beard, and with a fierce and shrill yell he sprang on the throat of the
giant, with an impetus that threw him, vast and sturdy as he was, from his
balance--and down, with the crash of a falling rock, he fell--while over him
fell also his ferocious foe.
Our host, perhaps, had had no need of the rope so kindly recommended to him
by Lydon, had he remained three minutes longer in that position. But,
summoned to his assistance by the noise of his fall, a woman, who had
hitherto kept in an inner apartment, rushed to the scene of battle. This
new ally was in herself a match for the gladiator; she was tall, lean, and
with arms that could give other than soft embraces. In fact, the gentle
helpmate of Burbo the wine-seller had, like himself, fought in the
lists--nay under the emperor's eye. And Burbo himself--Burbo, the
unconquered in the field, according to report, now and then yielded the palm
to his soft Stratonice. This sweet creature no sooner saw the imminent
peril that awaited her worse half, than without other weapons than those
with which Nature had provided her, she darted upon the incumbent gladiator,
and, clasping him round the waist with her long and snakelike arms, lifted
him by a sudden wrench from the body of her husband, leaving only his hands
still clinging to the throat of his foe. So have we seen a dog snatched by
the hind legs from the strife with a fallen rival in the arms of some
envious groom; so have we seen one half of him high in air--passive and
offenceless--while the other half, head, teeth, eyes, claws, seemed buried
and engulfed in the mangled and prostrate enemy. Meanwhile, the gladiators,
lapped, and pampered, and glutted upon blood, crowded delightedly round the
combatants--their nostrils distended--their lips grinning--their eyes
gloatingly fixed on the bloody throat of the one and the indented talons of
the other.
'Habet! (he has got it!) habet!' cried they, with a sort of yell, rubbing
their nervous hands.
'Non habeo, ye liars; I have not got it!' shouted the host, as with a mighty
effort he wrenched himself from those deadly hands, and rose to his feet,
breathless, panting, lacerated, bloody; and fronting, with reeling eyes, the
glaring look and grinning teeth of his baffled foe, now struggling (but
struggling with disdain) in the gripe of the sturdy amazon.
'Fair play!' cried the gladiators: 'one to one'; and, crowding round Lydon
and the woman, they separated our pleasing host from his courteous guest.
But Lydon, feeling ashamed at his present position, and endeavoring in vain
to shake off the grasp of the virago, slipped his hand into his girdle, and
drew forth a short knife. So menacing was his look, so brightly gleamed the
blade, that Stratonice, who was used only to that fashion of battle which we
moderns call the pugilistic, started back in alarm.
'O gods!' cried she, 'the ruffian!--he has concealed weapons! Is that fair?
Is that like a gentleman and a gladiator? No, indeed, I scorn such
fellows.' With that she contemptuously turned her back on the gladiator, and
hastened to examine the condition of her husband.
But he, as much inured to the constitutional exercises as an English
bull-dog is to a contest with a more gentle antagonist, had already
recovered himself. The purple hues receded from the crimson surface of his
cheek, the veins of the forehead retired into their wonted size. He shook
himself with a complacent grunt, satisfied that he was still alive, and then
looking at his foe from head to foot with an air of more approbation than he
had ever bestowed upon him before:
'By Castor!' said he, 'thou art a stronger fellow than I took thee for! I
see thou art a man of merit and virtue; give me thy hand, my hero!'
'Jolly old Burbo!' cried the gladiators, applauding, 'staunch to the
backbone. Give him thy hand, Lydon.'
'Oh, to be sure,' said the gladiator: 'but now I have tasted his blood, I
long to lap the whole.'
'By Hercules!' returned the host, quite unmoved, 'that is the true gladiator
feeling. Pollux! to think what good training may make a man; why, a beast
could not be fiercer!'
'A beast! O dullard! we beat the beasts hollow!' cried Tetraides.
'Well, well said Stratonice, who was now employed in smoothing her hair and
adjusting her dress, 'if ye are all good friends again, I recommend you to
be quiet and orderly; for some young noblemen, your patrons and backers,
have sent to say they will come here to pay you a visit: they wish to see
you more at their ease than at the schools, before they make up their bets
on the great fight at the amphitheatre. So they always come to my house for
that purpose: they know we only receive the best gladiators in Pompeii--our
society is very select--praised be the gods!'
'Yes,' continued Burbo, drinking off a bowl, or rather a pail of wine, 'a
man who has won my laurels can only encourage the brave. Lydon, drink, my
boy; may you have an honorable old age like mine!'
'Come here,' said Stratonice, drawing her husband to her affectionately by
the ears, in that caress which Tibullus has so prettily described--'Come
here!'
'Not so hard, she-wolf! thou art worse than the gladiator,' murmured the
huge jaws of Burbo.
'Hist!' said she, whispering him; 'Calenus has just stole in, disguised, by
the back way. I hope he has brought the sesterces.'
'Ho! ho! I will join him, said Burbo; 'meanwhile, I say, keep a sharp eye on
the cups--attend to the score. Let them not cheat thee, wife; they are
heroes, to be sure, but then they are arrant rogues: Cacus was nothing to
them.'
'Never fear me, fool!' was the conjugal reply; and Burbo, satisfied with the
dear assurance, strode through the apartment, and sought the penetralia of
his house.
'So those soft patrons are coming to look at our muscles,' said Niger. 'Who
sent to previse thee of it, my mistress?'
'Lepidus. He brings with him Clodius, the surest better in Pompeii, and the
young Greek, Glaucus.'
'A wager on a wager,' cried Tetraides; 'Clodius bets on me, for twenty
sesterces! What say you, Lydon?'
'He bets on me!' said Lydon.
'No, on me!' grunted Sporus.
'Dolts! do you think he would prefer any of you to Niger?' said the
athletic, thus modestly naming himself.
'Well, well,' said Stratonice, as she pierced a huge amphora for her guests,
who had now seated themselves before one of the tables, 'great men and
brave, as ye all think yourselves, which of you will fight the Numidian lion
in case no malefactor should be found to deprive you of the option?'
'I who have escaped your arms, stout Stratonice,' said Lydon, 'might safely,
I think, encounter the lion.'
'But tell me,' said Tetraides, 'where is that pretty young slave of
yours--the blind girl, with bright eyes? I have not seen her a long time.'
'Oh! she is too delicate for you, my son of Neptune,' said the hostess, 'and
too nice even for us, I think. We send her into the town to sell flowers
and sing to the ladies: she makes us more money so than she would by waiting
on you. Besides, she has often other employments which lie under the rose.'
'Other employments!' said Niger; 'why, she is too young for them.'
'Silence, beast!' said Stratonice; 'you think there is no play but the
Corinthian. If Nydia were twice the age she is at present, she would be
equally fit for Vesta--poor girl!'
'But, hark ye, Stratonice,' said Lydon; 'how didst thou come by so gentle
and delicate a slave? She were more meet for the handmaid of some rich
matron of Rome than for thee.'
'That is true,' returned Stratonice; 'and some day or other I shall make my
fortune by selling her. How came I by Nydia, thou askest.'
'Ay!'
'Why, thou seest, my slave Staphyla--thou rememberest Staphyla, Niger?'
'Ay, a large-handed wench, with a face like a comic mask. How should I
forget her, by Pluto, whose handmaid she doubtless is at this moment!'
'Tush, brute!--Well, Staphyla died one day, and a great loss she was to me,
and I went into the market to buy me another slave. But, by the gods! they
were all grown so dear since I had bought poor Staphyla, and money was so
scarce, that I was about to leave the place in despair, when a merchant
plucked me by the robe. "Mistress," said he, "dost thou want a slave cheap
I have a child to sell--a bargain. She is but little, and almost an infant,
it is true; but she is quick and quiet, docile and clever, sings well, and
is of good blood, I assure you." "Of what country?" said I. "Thessalian."
Now I knew the Thessalians were acute and gentle; so I said I would see the
girl. I found her just as you see her now, scarcely smaller and scarcely
younger in appearance. She looked patient and resigned enough, with her
hands crossed on her bosom, and her eyes downcast. I asked the merchant his
price: it was moderate, and I bought her at once. The merchant brought her
to my house, and disappeared in an instant. Well, my friends, guess my
astonishment when I found she was blind! Ha! ha! a clever fellow that
merchant! I ran at once to the magistrates, but the rogue was already gone
from Pompeii. So I was forced to go home in a very ill humor, I assure you;
and the poor girl felt the effects of it too. But it was not her fault that
she was blind, for she had been so from her birth. By degrees, we got
reconciled to our purchase. True, she had not the strength of Staphyla, and
was of very little use in the house, but she could soon find her way about
the town, as well as if she had the eyes of Argus; and when one morning she
brought us home a handful of sesterces, which she said she had got from
selling some flowers she had gathered in our poor little garden, we thought
the gods had sent her to us. So from that time we let her go out as she
likes, filling her basket with flowers, which she wreathes into garlands
after the Thessalian fashion, which pleases the gallants; and the great
people seem to take a fancy to her, for they always pay her more than they
do any other flower-girl, and she brings all of it home to us, which is more
than any other slave would do. So I work for myself, but I shall soon
afford from her earnings to buy me a second Staphyla; doubtless, the
Thessalian kidnapper had stolen the blind girl from gentle parents. Besides
her skill in the garlands, she sings and plays on the cithara, which also
brings money, and lately--but that is a secret.'
'That is a secret! What!' cried Lydon, 'art thou turned sphinx?'
'Sphinx, no!--why sphinx?'
'Cease thy gabble, good mistress, and bring us our meat--I am hungry,' said
Sporus, impatiently.
'And I, too,' echoed the grim Niger, whetting his knife on the palm of his
hand.
The amazon stalked away to the kitchen, and soon returned with a tray laden
with large pieces of meat half-raw: for so, as now, did the heroes of the
prize-fight imagine they best sustained their hardihood and ferocity: they
drew round the table with the eyes of famished wolves--the meat vanished,
the wine flowed. So leave we those important personages of classic life to
follow the steps of Burbo.
