“Nevertheless his blows fall thick and fast, like a hailstorm, and Lutorius shifts his ground every time the young one makes the attack,” argued honest Rufus, who had not a grain of either fear or jealousy in his disposition; and who considered his profession as a mere trade by which he could obtain a livelihood for wife and children in the meantime, and a remote chance of independence with a vineyard of his own beyond the Apennines, should he escape a violent death in the amphitheatre at last.
“He thrusts too often overhand,” observed Manlius, “and his guard is always open for the wrist.”
“He is a strong fencer, but he has no style,” added Euchenor; and the boxer looked around him with the air of a man who closes a controversy by an unanswerable argument.
Hirpinus was boiling over with indignation; but his eloquence was by no means in proportion to his corporeal gifts, and he could not readily find words to express his dissent and his disdain. Banter, too, and a coarse, good-humoured sort of wrangling, was the usual form by which difference of opinion found expression in the training-school. Quarrelling, amongst men whose very trade it was to fight to the death, seemed simply absurd; and to come to blows except in public and for money, a mere childish waste of time. Indeed, with all their contempt for death, and their extraordinary courage when pitted against each other to amuse the populace, these gladiators, perhaps from the very nature of their profession, seem to have been unsuited for any sustained efforts of energy and endurance. When banded together under the eagles, they were often so undisciplined in camp, as by no means to be relied on before an enemy. Perhaps there was something of bravado in the flourish with which they entered the circus, and hailed Cæsar with their greetings from those about to die![10] Moreover, they had to fight in a corner, and with the impossibility of escape. Courage is of many different kinds. Men are brave from various motives—from ambition, from emulation, from the habit of confronting danger; some from a naturally chivalrous disposition, backed by strong physical nerves. The last alone are to be trusted in an emergency; and a really courageous man faces an unexpected and unaccustomed peril, if not with [pg 123]confidence, at least with an unflinching determination to do his best.
Hirpinus turned upon Euchenor, for whom he had no great liking at any time.
“You talk of your science,” said he, “and your Greek skill, against which even our Roman thews and sinews are of no avail. Dare you stand up to this barbarian with the cestus on? Only to exchange half a dozen friendly buffets, you know, in sheer sport.”
But Euchenor excused himself with great disdain. Like many another successful professor, he owed no inconsiderable share of his fame to his own assumption of superiority, and the judgment with which, when practicable, he matched himself against inferior performers. Champions who exist on their reputation, such as it is, are not to peril it lightly against the first tyro that comes, who has everything to gain and nothing to lose by an encounter with the celebrity; whereas the celebrity derives no additional laurels from a triumph, and a defeat tends to take the very bread out of his mouth. Euchenor said as much; but Hirpinus was not satisfied, till the subtle Greek, who had learned the terms of the match in which Esca was engaged, observed carelessly, that all the time the Briton had to spare should be devoted to practice in the part he was about to play before the Emperor. The suggestion took effect upon Hirpinus at once. He sprang across the school to where the master had resumed his walk. The old gladiator positively turned pale while he entreated Hippias to instruct his pupil in all the scientific devices by which those deadly meshes could be foiled.
“Nothing but art can save him,” said he, in imploring accents, which seemed almost ludicrous from one of his Herculean exterior. “Courage and strength, ay, and the activity of a wild-cat, are all paralysed when that accursed twine is round your limbs. I know it! I have felt it! I was down under the net myself once. If a man is to die, he should die like a man, not like a thrush caught in a springe. He must learn, Hippias, he must practise day by day, and hour by hour; he must study every movement of the caster. Pit him against Manlius, he is the best netsman in the Family. If he learns to foil him, he will take the conceit out of Placidus readily enough. I tell you I shall not be easy till I see him with his foot on the gay tribune’s breast!”
“Patience, man,” replied Hippias, “thou fearest but one thing in the world, and that is a fathom of twine. Thinkest thou all others are scared at the same bugbear? Mind thine [pg 124]own training,—thou art yet too lusty by half to go into the circus,—and leave this young barbarian to me.”
The master kept up his influence amongst these lawless pupils, partly by a reserved demeanour and a silent tongue, partly by never suffering his authority to be disputed for a moment. To have said as much as he now did was tantamount to a confession of interest in the Briton’s success; and Hirpinus resumed his own labours with a lightened heart, whilst Esca, in all the delightful flush of youth and health, and muscular strength developing itself by scientific practice, plied his antagonist with redoubled vigour, and enjoyed his pastime to the utmost.