The Gladiators. A Tale of Rome and Judæa

by G. J. Whyte-Melville

He tried his best to soothe and comfort her—his best such as it was, for the good old man knew but little of a woman’s heart—its wild hopes, its indefinite aims, its wayward feelings, and its inexplicable tendency to self-torture. He thought in his simplicity the real grievance was that which she avowed, and he strove to remove it in his own kind hopeful way.

“My child,” said he, “the evils that are raging in Italy, the horrors that we hear of every day, cannot but make Eleazar’s position more important and less hazardous, as they increase the difficulties of the imperial councils. It is, indeed, no child’s play to bridle such a nation as ours with one hand, and to grasp at the imperial diadem with the other. It takes a bold heart to draw the sword against Judah, and a long arm to buffet Cæsar across the seas. Vespasian will have little leisure to persecute our race; and the Emperor, sore beset as he is, will surely lend a favourable ear to my brother’s proposals for peace. Even now the legions are declaring, far and wide, against Vitellius; and civil war, the most dreadful of all scourges, is desolating the provinces and entering Italy herself. It was but yesterday that news reached Rome of the revolt of the whole fleet at Ravenna—and ere this Cremona has perhaps fallen into the power of Antonius, that soldier-orator, with the iron arm and the silver tongue. Well we know, for we have been told by One whose words shall never be forgotten, that a house divided against itself cannot stand; and is this a time, think you, my child, for the worn-out sensualist who wears the purple here, to make conditions with such a man as your father? It is all in God’s hand, as I never cease to insist; yet I cannot but feel that a better day must at last be dawning upon Judæa, that her enemies will be confounded, her armies victorious, and her chiefs—but what have we to do with the sword?” he broke off abruptly, while his kindling eye and animated gestures bore witness to the ardent spirit that would flash out here and there even now. “Our weapon is the Cross, our warfare is not of this world, our triumph is in our humility, and when most we are brought low, then are we most exalted. Oh, that the time were come, as come it surely will, when Cæsar [pg 131]shall be content to take only that which is Cæsar’s, and men shall be gathered under one banner, and in one brotherhood, from all corners of the world!”

It was no exaggerated account Calchas thus gave of the dilemma in which the empire was placed at this juncture. Vespasian, with great political talents, with coolness, patience, and audacity, was playing a game against which the besotted brains of Vitellius were powerless to compete. The former, adored by the army, who saw in him a successful general, an intrepid soldier, and a man of simple virtuous habits, contrasting nobly with the luxurious gluttony and sensuality of his rival, lost none of his influence by the moderation he displayed, and the modesty, real or affected, with which he declined the purple. Not afraid to wait till advantage ripened into opportunity, he could seize it when the time came with a bold and tenacious grasp, could turn it deftly to his own profit and guide those circumstances of which he seemed to be the mere puppet, with a master-hand. Though at a distance from the scene of warfare, and to all appearance little more than an unwilling observer of the disturbances carried on in his name, he directed as it were from behind a curtain the operations of his generals, and pulled the strings that set in motion his numerous partisans with a clear head, a delicate touch, and that tenacity of purpose which is the essential element of success. Vitellius, on the other hand, whose natural abilities had been weakened, nay destroyed, by an unceasing course of sensual gratification, wavered in council and hesitated in action; now determined to abdicate the diadem and retire into obscurity; anon persuaded to fight for dominion to the death; and ever paralysing the energies of his warmest partisans by the distrust he entertained for honest advisers, and the reliance he placed on the counsels of those traitors who surrounded him.

The empire was, perhaps, at this period in a more disheartening position than even under the ferocious sway of Nero. Monster as the latter was, he at least held the reins with a firm hand; and tyranny, however oppressive, is doubtless one degree better than anarchy and confusion. Now, the mighty fabric, of which Romulus laid the first stone and Augustus completed the pinnacle—the work of seven centuries, to which every generation had added its labours and its enterprise, till it embraced the confines of the known world—was beginning perceptibly to sink and crumble from its own enormous size and weight. The legions (and it must never be forgotten that the dominion of Rome was essentially [pg 132]that of the sword) were now recruited from natives of her distant colonies. The Syrian and the Ethiop guarded the eagles as well as the tall turbulent sons of Germany, and the ever-changing, ever-faithless Gaul. Armies thus gathered under one standard from such various climates could have but little in common save a certain professional ferocity, and an ardent liking for plunder, no less than pay. Mercenaries have in all ages been easily bought by the one and seduced by the other. Each legion gradually came to consider itself a separate and independent power, to be sold to the highest bidder. Perhaps the fairest vision of all was a march upon Rome, and a ten hours’ sack of the city they were sworn to defend. A great and good man, backed by the glory of name, race, and illustrious actions, could alone have ruled such discordant elements, and united these conflicting interests for the common good; but fate ordained that the weak, worn-out, besotted Vitellius should be seated on the throne of the Cæsars, and that the cool, unflinching, and far-seeing Vespasian should be watching with sleepless eye and ready hand to snatch the diadem from his bewildered predecessor, and place it firmly on his own head.

While the destinies of the world were thus trembling in the balance, while her own nation was fighting for its very existence, and the storm gathering all around, obviously to burst in its greatest fury on the Imperial City, the care that weighed heaviest at Mariamne’s heart was that she had that day noticed a barbarian slave walk into the training-school of a Roman gladiator.

“Is it true, then,” asked the girl, “that civil war is indeed raging here, as we have seen it at home? That we shall have an enemy ere long at the very gates of the city?”

“Too true, my child,” replied Calchas; “and the Roman people seem, as usual, to make light of the emergency, to eat, drink, buy, sell, and feast their eyes on bloodshed in the circus, as though their idolatrous temple, where Janus overlooks the usurers and money-changers of the city, were shut up once for all, never to be opened again.”

She turned pale and shuddered at the mention of the circus.

“Are they making no preparations?” she asked timidly. “Did I not hear my father say they were collecting the gladiators, and—and—some of the nobles had enrolled their German and British slaves, and were arming them against an attack?”

“It may be so,” answered Calchas; “but a slave can [pg 133]scarcely be expected to fight very stoutly for a cause which only serves to rivet his chains. As for the gladiators, those tigers in human form, it were surely better for them to perish in open warfare, than to tear one another to pieces in the arena, like the very beasts against which I have seen them pitted. Yet these, too, have souls to be saved.”