BY MRS. LIZZIE W. CHAMPNEY.
In the days of the Emperor Caracalla the Colosseum had ceased to be used for terrible conflicts between man and beast. But the young student Valentinian could not forget that eighty thousand spectators at a time had looked down from its seats, only a few years before, to see Christian martyrs given to the lions to be torn in pieces.
And Valentinian was a Christian. The persecutions had ceased. No more cruel Emperor than Caracalla had ever occupied the throne of Rome; but his cruelty found its victims in his own family and among his political enemies, and the Christians were overlooked and forgotten. Even Caracalla may have been sick of the blood spilled in assassinations, executions, and battle; and so, as a mere change of scene, ordered that the sports at the Colosseum should be of a bloodless character. At any rate, chariot races were now the vogue, the population of Rome were now all "horsy" men, and betting was the popular way of gaining or losing their fortunes.
The Emperor, as reigning over and above all like the air, chose white to mark his horses; the steeds of the soldiers were designated by red badges and trappings—red, the appropriate color of Mars, of blood and flame; the sailors of course chose blue; and the landed proprietors, farmers, citizens, etc., grouped under green. When the enthusiasm extended thus to all classes, it was impossible that Valentinian should not feel it too. He was a soldier's son, and though he felt that it would be a crime even to enter the building in which the martyrs had been murdered, he could not repress a throb of exultation when the scarlet-spangled horses were led out with shoutings as victors in the race.
Valentinian loved a fine horse, and, boy though he was, he owned one that had long been the envy and admiration of the different racing fraternities of Rome. Those who knew the animal's history did not wonder that Valentinian and his mother, the stately lady Placidia, had refused a noble's ransom for the magnificent creature. It was the beginning of the warm season, and Placidia had removed to her summer villa in shady Præneste. Valentinian still remained in Rome to prosecute his studies, but in the cool of the evening the youth would frequently drive out to see his mother, and the horse on every such visit was certain of being decorated with garlands by the fair hand of its mistress. On one of these occasions Rufinus accompanied his friend. Valentinian knew that the visit was not prompted by any fondness for his mother, for the lady Placidia did not regard Rufinus as a sufficiently refined companion for her son, and the dislike was mutual. He gave Rufinus credit for a feeling of good-fellowship toward himself, and for an appreciation of a moonlight ride to Rome. But Rufinus had a deeper motive on this occasion; he had determined to persuade Valentinian to join in the races, and he thought wisely that the long, solitary ride would give him a good opportunity for persuasion. He began skillfully by praising his friend's horse, and then spoke with some surprise of the affection that Placidia lavished upon it.
Valentinian replied that Carus deserved all the love and distinction that he received, for he was indeed a hero; and then he told how as a war-horse he had followed the Roman standards with honor throughout all the late disastrous campaign in Britain, and though he had fled with the legions from the battle on the river Carun, where Fingal and his Caledonian troops sang their exultant chant of victory in the ears of the cowardly Caracalla, it was not his fault, for he was only a horse. When Carus had felt his master, Valentinian's father, fall wounded upon his neck, the feeble hands entwined in his mane, and the warm life-blood bathing his glossy side, the faithful animal, who until then had rushed on inflamed with all the fury of conflict, joined the general retreat, and paced swiftly but carefully from the battle-field. The Captain of the Legion, whose stiffening fingers were tangled in Carus's mane, did not hear the loud boast of the Britons, and when Carus knelt at the door of his tent, and other soldiers of the great "King of the World" (as Ossian calls the Roman Emperor) lifted the rider from the steed, the Roman heart had poured out all its blood on British soil; the brave Centurion was dead.
At the death of his father, the Emperor Severus, Caracalla gave up the war in Britain, and, impatient to assume his new dignities, hurried back to Rome. The war-horse Carus was brought back too, and entered the imperial city marching riderless at the head of its dead master's troop. As the army approached the gates of Rome, the broad imperial highway became more and more crowded. The return of the army was known, and the citizens of Rome, small and great, swarmed out in vehicles, on horses, or on foot, soldiers and slaves, the aristocracy and the beggars, old families of Rome and foreigners.
Painfully the army forced its way through the surging crowd, attending Caracalla, who so little deserved this enthusiastic welcome, to the porch of the imperial palace "the house of Cæsar." Then the cohorts, with the exception of the imperial body-guard, returned to the great Prætorium camp outside, the city walls. One knight, a member of the Equites that the master of Carus had so lately commanded, led the Centurion's horse to the aristocratic street of the Carinæ, which ran along the slope of the Esquiline Hill, until he reached a house whose portal was decorated with laurel, and where, from the swarms of entering guests, pastry-cooks, and musicians, one might judge a feast was in progress. As the knight paused at the door, a boy bounded into the street, and sprang upon the back of the war-horse, lavishing upon the noble creature the most eager caresses. At the same moment a stately Roman matron appeared at the door, and greeted the knight, while a glad eager light shone in her eyes.
"Welcome, my good Galerius," said the lady. "Where is my husband? Is he detained at the palace with the young Emperor?"
"Nay, madam," replied the knight, gravely, "thy husband was happy in knowing no Emperor but Severus."