SPARTACUS AND JOVIUS.
Enter Spartacus, L.,[6] Jovius, R.
Spartacus. Speak, Roman! wherefore does thy master send
Thy gray hairs to the “cut throat’s” camp?
Jovius. Brave rebel—
Spart. Why, that’s a better name than rogue or bondman;
But in this camp I am called General.
Jov. Brave General,—for, though a rogue and bondman,
As you have said, I’ll still allow you General,
As he that beats a consul surely is.
Spart. Say two—two consuls; and to that e’en add
A proconsul, three prætors, and some generals.
Jov. Why, this is no more than true. Are you a Thracian?
Spart. Ay.
Jov. There is something in the air of Thrace
Breeds valor up as rank as grass. ’Tis pity.
You are a barbarian.
Spart. Wherefore?
Jov. Had you been born
A Roman, you had won by this a triumph.
Spart. I thank the gods I am barbarian;
For I can better teach the grace-begot
And heaven-supported masters of the earth
How a mere dweller of a desert rock
Can bow their crowned heads to his chariot-wheels,
Their regal necks to be his stepping-blocks.
But come, what is thy message?
Jov. Julia, niece
Of the prætor, is thy captive.
Spart. Ay.
Jov. For whom
Is offered in exchange thy wife, Senona,
And thy young boy.
Spart. Tell thou the prætor, Roman,
The Thracian’s wife is ransomed.
Jov. How is that?
Spart. Ransomed, and by the steel, from out the camp
Of slaughtered Gellius! (Pointing off.) Behold them, Roman!
Jov. (Looking as Spart. points.) This is sorcery!
But name a ransom for the general’s niece.
Spart. Have I not now the prætor on the hip?
He would, in his extremity, have made
My wife his buckler of defence; perhaps
Have doomed her to the scourge! But this is Roman.
Now the barbarian is instructed. Look!
I hold the prætor by the heart; and he
Shall feel how tightly grip barbarian fingers.
Jov. Men do not war on women. Name her ransom.
Spart. Men do not war on women! Look you:
One day I climbed up to the ridgy top
Of the cloud-piercing Hæmus, where, among
The eagles and the thunders, from that height,
I looked upon the world, as far as where,
Wrestling with storms, the gloomy Euxine chafed
On his recoiling shores; and where dim Adria
In her blue bosom quenched the fiery sphere.
Between those surges lay a land, might once
Have matched Elysium; but Rome had made it
A Tartarus. In my green youth I looked
From the same frosty peak where now I stood,
And then beheld the glory of those lands,
Where Peace was tinkling on the shepherd’s bell
And singing with the reapers.
Since that glad day, Rome’s conquerors had passed
With withering armies there, and all was changed.
Peace had departed; howling War was there,
Cheered on by Roman hunters. Then, methought
E’en as I looked upon the altered scene,
Groans echoed through the valleys, through which ran
Rivers of blood, like smoking Phlegethons;
Fires flashed from burning villages, and Famine
Shrieked in the empty cornfields! Women and children,
Robbed of their sires and husbands, left to starve—
These were the dwellers of the land! Say’st thou
Rome wars not, then, on women?
Jov. This is not to the matter.
Spart. Now, by Jove,
It is! These things do Romans. But the earth
Is sick of conquerors. There is not a man,
Not Roman, but is Rome’s extremest foe:
And such am I; sworn from that hour I saw
Those sights of horror, while the gods support me,
To wreak on Rome such havoc as Rome wreaks,
Carnage and devastation, woe and ruin.
Why should I ransom, when I swear to slay?
Begone! This is my answer!
Bird.
[6] L. signifies left; R., right, and C., centre of stage
THE RESOLVE OF REGULUS.—Sargent.
(Regulus, a Roman consul, having been defeated in battle and taken prisoner by the Carthaginians, was detained in captivity five years, and then sent on an embassy to Rome to solicit peace, under a promise that he would return to Carthage if the proposals were rejected. These, it was thought, he would urge in order to obtain his own liberty; but he urged contrary and patriotic measures on his countrymen; and then, having carried his point, resisted the persuasions of his friends to remain in Rome, and returned to Carthage, where a martyr’s death awaited him. Some writers say that he was thrust into a cask covered over on the inside with iron spikes, and thus rolled down hill. The following scene presents Regulus just as he has made known to his friends in Rome his resolution to return to Carthage.)
Enter Regulus, followed by Sertorius.
Sertorius. Stay, Roman, in pity!—if not for thy life,
For the sake of thy country, thy children, thy wife.
Sent, not to urge war, but to lead Rome to peace,
Thy captors of Carthage vouchsafed thee release.
Thou return’st to encounter their anger, their rage;—
No mercy expect for thy fame or thy age!
Regulus. To my captors one pledge, and one only, I gave:
To return, though it were to walk into my grave!
No hope I extended, no promise I made,
Rome’s Senate and people from war to dissuade.
If the vengeance of Carthage be stored for me now,
I have reaped no dishonor, have broken no vow.
Sert. They released thee, but dreamed not that thou wouldst fulfil
A part that would leave thee a prisoner still;
They hoped thy own danger would lead thee to sway
The councils of Rome a far different way;
Would induce thee to urge the conditions they crave,
If only thy freedom, thy life-blood, to save.
Thought shudders, the torment and woe to depict
Thy merciless foes have the heart to inflict!
Remain with us, Regulus! do not go back!
No hope sheds its ray on thy death-pointing track!
Keep faith with the faithless? The gods will forgive
The balking of such. O, live, Regulus, live!
Reg. With the consciousness fixed in the core of my heart,
That I had been playing the perjurer’s part?
With the stain ever glaring, the thought ever nigh,
That I owe the base breath I inhale to a lie?
O, never! Let Carthage infract every oath,
Be false to her word and humanity both,
Yet never will I in her infamy share,
Or turn for a refuge to guilt from despair!
Sert. O, think of the kindred and friends who await
To fall on thy neck, and withhold thee from fate;
O, think of the widow, the orphans to be,
And let thy compassion plead softly with me.
Reg. O, my friend, thou canst soften, but canst not subdue;
To the faith of my soul I must ever be true.
If my honor I cheapen, my conscience discrown,
All the graces of life to the dust are brought down;
All creation to me is a chaos once more—
No heaven to hope for, no God to adore!
And the love that I feel for wife, children, and friend,
Has lost all its beauty, and thwarted its end.
Sert. Let thy country determine.
Reg. My country? Her will,
Were I free to obey, would be paramount still.
I go to my doom for my country alone;
My life is my country’s; my honor, my own!
Sert. O, Regulus! think of the pangs in reserve!
Reg. What menace should make me from probity swerve?
Sert. Refinements of pain will these miscreants find
To daunt and disable the loftiest mind.
Reg. And ’tis to a Roman thy fears are addressed!
Sert. Forgive me. I know thy unterrified breast.
Reg. Thou know’st me but human—as weak to sustain
As thyself, or another, the searchings of pain.
This flesh may recoil, and the anguish they wreak
Chase the strength from my knees, and the hue from my cheek;
But the body alone they can vanquish and kill;
The spirit immortal shall smile at them still.
Then let them make ready their engines of dread,
Their spike-bristling cask, and their torturing bed;
Still Regulus, heaving no recreant breath,
Shall greet as a friend the deliverer, Death!
Their cunning in torture and taunt shall defy,
And hold it in joy for his country to die.