Darkness and Dawn; Or, Scenes in the Days of Nero. An Historic Tale

by F. W. Farrar

He had several adventures, and such principles of righteousness as were left to him were severely tried. Some of the young slaves whom he encountered took him to the theatres, and in the pantomimic displays and Atellan fables a cynical shamelessness reigned supreme. To witness the acting of a Paris or an Aliturus was to witness consummate human skill and beauty pandering to the lowest instincts of humanity. Yet Onesimus could not keep away from these scenes, though Stachys and Nereus and Junia and others of the Christian slaves of Pudens did their best, when the chance offered, to save him from the vortex of such perilous dissipation.

Still more brutalising, still more destructive of every element of pureness and kindness were the gladiatorial games. Of these he had no experience. In the provinces they were comparatively rare, and Philemon had forbidden his slaves ever to be present in the amphitheatre when they were exhibited. Onesimus, who had nothing cruel in his nature, had so far preserved a sort of respect for the wishes of Philemon, that he determined not to witness a gladiatorial show. When the great day came, all the slaves were talking of the prowess of Gallina and Syrus, two famous gladiators, and of the magnificent number of lions and tigers which were to be exhibited.

He could not help being interested in a topic which seemed so absorbing, but he still meant to keep away. Some of his comrades, however, thought that scruples which might suit a Cicero and a Seneca were quite out of place in a Phrygian foot-boy, and seized him in the street and said, ‘We are going to take you to the amphitheatre by force.’

‘It is of no use to take me,’ said Onesimus, repeating a sentiment which he had heard from Philemon. ‘I am not going to see fine fellows—fine Dacians and Britons—hack one another to pieces to please a multitude of whom the majority deserve life much less than the gladiators themselves.’

‘Di magni, salaputium disertum!’ exclaimed Lygdus, one of the gay and festal company who belonged to Cæsar’s household. ‘I heard Epictetus say something of the kind, and we all know that the poor little fellow is only a small echo of Musonius. But you, Onesimus, cannot pretend to be a philosopher, and instead of talking seditious nonsense against the majesty of the Roman people, go you shall.’

‘Well then, you will have to drag me there by force,’ said Onesimus.

‘Never mind; go you shall,’ said Lygdus; and, seizing him by the neck and arms, they hurried him along with them into the top seats set apart for slaves and the proletariat.

When once there, Onesimus had not the wisdom to behave as young Alypius did three centuries later, and to close his eyes. On the contrary, he caught fire, almost from the first moment, with the wild excitement, and returned home paganised in every fibre of his being by the horrid voluptuous maddening scene which he had witnessed—in which he had taken part. All that was sweet and pure and tender in the lessons which he had learnt in the house of Philemon seemed to have been swept away for the time in that crimson tide of blood, in that demoniac spectacle of strong men sacrificed as on a Moloch-altar for the amusement of the idle populace. The more splendid the agility of the nets-man, the more brawny the muscles of the Samnite, the more dazzling the sweep of the mirmillo’s steel, the more vivid was the excitement of watching the glazing eye and ebbing life. It was thrilling to see the supreme moments and most unfathomed mysteries of existence turned into the spectacle of a holiday; and even to help in deciding by the movement of a thumb whether some blue-eyed German from the Teutobergian forests should live or die. What wonder was it that waves of emotion swept over the assembled multitude as the gusts of a summer tempest sweep over the waving corn? What wonder that the hearts of thousands, as though they were the heart of one man, throbbed together in fierce sympathy, and became like a wild Æolian harp, of which the strings were beaten into murmurs or shrieks or sobs by some intermittent hurricane? In the concentrated passion of those hours, when every pulse leapt and tingled with excitement, the youth seemed to live through years in moments; his whole being palpitated with a delicious horror, which annihilated all the ordinary interests of life. Here, for the mere dissipation of time, the most consummate tragedies were enacted as part of a scenic display. The spasms of anguish and the heroism of endurance were but the passing incidents of a gymnastic show.

When Onesimus returned to his cell that night he was a changed being. For a long time he could not sleep, and when he did sleep the tumult of the arena still rolled through his troubled dreams. His fellow-slaves, long familiar with such games, were amused to hear him start up from his pallet with shouts of Habet! Occide! Verbera! and all the wild cries of the amphitheatre, and from these bloodshot dreams he would awake panting as from a nightmare, while the chant of the gladiators, Ave, Cæsar! Morituri te salutamus, still woke its solemn echoes in his ears.

All life looked stale and dull to the Phrygian slave when the glow of an Italian morning entering his cell aroused him to the duties of the day. Slaves, even in a humble home like that of Pudens, were so numerous as to make those duties inconceivably light. For the greater part of the day his time was his own, for all he had to do was to wait on Pudens when he went out, carrying anything which his master might require. But henceforth his thoughts were day-dreams, and, when not engaged in work, he found nothing to do but to join in the gossip of his fellow-slaves. Their talk turned usually on three subjects—their masters, and all the low society slanders of the city; the delights of the taverns; the merits of rival gladiators and charioteers, whose names were on every lip. Such conversation led of course to incessant betting, and many a slave lost the whole amount of his savings again and again by backing the merits of a Pacideianus or a Spicillus; or by running up too long scores at the cook-shop (popina) to which his fellow-slaves resorted; or by trying to win the affections of some favourite female flute-player from Syria or Spain.