CHAPTER III
The market for the sale of the Olynthians now stretched before us. As far as one could see, and forming in a straight line six large parallel ways, platforms of planks were erected upon tressels at a height of about a yard from the ground. The population of an entire city was there exposed before the population of another city: the one as merchandise, the other as purchaser. Twenty-five thousand men, women and children, their hands bound behind the back, the ankles shackled with loose cords, waited, for the most part standing—waited the unknown master who was yet to come, purchase, and lead them to some, to them, unknown place on Grecian soil. One soldier guarded forty; servants in crowds circulated with the bread and water needed for the sustenance of such a host of slaves. A great and murmurous noise perpetually ascended to the sky. It was like the sound of a great feast.
Parrhasius penetrated into the principal “street” of slaves, where were exposed for sale young men and young girls who appeared for one reason or another to be of the sort that would command a high price. To my great astonishment I did not catch in their eyes any great expression of sadness. They seemed merely curious. Human sadness and misery, for youth that is, has its certain measure, and they saw their sorrows were about to pass or be moderated by the care of a master. From the time of the ruin of their homes these beautiful beings had experienced to the full all that could give days and nights of despair. The young men no doubt had regained hope of their future escape: the young girls perhaps dreamed of a love that might partly release them. By bravado or by sheer ignorance of the fate in store they all showed a certain good humour. The crowd pressed around them, examining and uncertain before making a purchase. Few could have decided quickly in the midst of such a vast choice. Often they handled the slaves. Hands tested the muscles of a leg, the delicacy of a skin, the firmness of a breast. Then the intending purchasers passed on hoping to find better bargains.
Parrhasius halted an instant before a girl whose tall white form was a harmony of lines.
“Behold,” he said, “this is a beautiful child.”
A seller at once came forward and cried—
“She is the most beautiful one offered for sale, my lord. See how straight she is and white. Sixteen years old yesterday.”
“Eighteen years,” rectified the young girl.
“You lie, by Zeus! She is but sixteen years, my lord; do not credit her when she says otherwise. Look at her black locks lifted up by this comb. When she uncoils her hair it falls to the knees. Look at her long white fingers, untouched by any labour. She is the daughter of a senator.”
“Speak not of my father,” said the girl gravely.
“She is beautiful as a water-nymph, supple as a sword, and a virgin—as at her birth.”
The man disrobed her with cynical hands, but Parrhasius struck the earth with his stick, and muttered—
“Virgin, you say? I care not whether she be a virgin or not, but merely whether she be beautiful enough. Take away her shackles, that she may robe herself properly. I will purchase her. What is her name?”
“Artemidora,” said she.
“Ah, good. Then know, Artemidora, that you are for the future in the suite of Parrhasius.”
She opened her great eyes wide, hesitated charmingly, and then said—
“You are the Parrhasius who....”
“Yes, I am Parrhasius,” came the reply.
Then, handing her to the care of his guard, he again walked on. Presently he deigned to explain to me—
“Bound to the Caucausus that young girl would look charming! Nevertheless, she will not be my Prometheus. She will serve me as model for certain little erotic pictures with which I ease my toils during hours of leisure—pictures that are not, however, the least noble part of my lifework.”
We walked on. The crowd had greatly increased. The sun became more terrible in the midst of that vast plain, without a shadow, and in the midst of a great and mixed concourse of people.
Artemidora was dressed in a white tunic, girdle, and veil. She often turned to look at us, and it seemed to me that when properly robed she seemed to be another person. Her face acquired another expression, and she seemed anxious to glean from one of us which was to be the man she was fated to surrender to. Already we had been through half the principal street when Parrhasius stopped, and said—
“No. That for which I seek is not here. The youth of the body and the beauty of the face are not found together. I have more chance, I think, of finding my man among slaves of the second class.”
Scarcely had we gone three more paces when he extended his hand, and cried out, “Behold him!”
I drew near and gazed with curiosity. The man whom he pointed to was about fifty years of age. Of a fine, tall figure and excellent proportions, he had a large face; the arch of the brows was powerful and muscular, the nose and ears were correctly modelled, hair grey, but beard brown and brindled. The strong muscles of the neck formed a sort of pedestal to his fine head, and gave it a pose of authority.
Parrhasius questioned him. “What do you call yourself?”
“Outis.”
“I do not ask you for anything, my brave man, but the name that you received from your father.”
“For a month past I have called myself Outis. If I have ever borne another, older name it does not please me to tell you.”
“Why not?”
“It does not please me to tell you why, Son of a Dog.”
Parrhasius became maddened with anger. The seller of the slaves, alarmed, advanced with suppliant arms.
“Do not listen to him, my lord. He speaks as one who has lost his senses. It is pure malice on his part, for he has more brain-power than I have. He is a physician. For science and cleverness he had not his equal in all Olynthus. I say what all the world would repeat, for he was celebrated even in Macedon. People have told me that during thirty years he has cured more Olynthians than we were able to kill when we took their city. This will be a precious slave when he is chained and has felt the rod. He plays the insolent, but he will change his tone, as all the others will or have done. Then, if you lead him away with you, Death will not come to you till your hundredth winter! Give me thirty drachmas, and this Nicostratus will be your thing for ever.”
“Nicostratus,” repeated Parrhasius to me; “as a poet I know one of that name. My indifference is total towards the science of medicine.”
Turning towards the seller he ordered—
“Remove his clothes.”
Nicostratus let this be done, powerless and yet disdainful. Parrhasius continued to command that the captive take up first one position and then another. At last the bargain was struck. Parrhasius then said, “Superb!”
But I did not reply, for I felt almost envious.
Fifty years have passed—the space of a human life. I have seen hundreds and hundreds of models, but never one worthy to be compared with that Nicostratus the Olynthian. He was the Statue of the Man in all his grandeur at the full age of force and power. I never had him as a model for anything of mine; the unfortunate being only posed once, and you shall learn how.