Books: Quo Vadis A Narrative of the Time of Nero

H >> Henryk Sienkiewicz >> Quo Vadis A Narrative of the Time of Nero

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"Thou hart ever been kind to me," answered Vinicius, with
vivacity; "but now I shall give command to rear thy statue among
my lares, -- just such a beauty as this one, -- and I will place
offerings before it."

Then he turned toward the statues which ornamented one entire
wall of the perfumed chamber, and pointing to the one which
represented Petronius as Hermes with a staff in his hand, he added,
-- "By the light of Helios! if the 'godlike' Alexander resembled
thee, I do not wonder at Helen."

And in that exclamation there was as much sincerity as flattery; for
Pc.tronius, though older and less athletic, was more beautiful than
even Vinicius. The women of Rome admired not only his pliant
mind and his taste, which gained for him the title Arbiter
cleganti~e, but also his body. This admiration was evident even on
the faces of those maidens from Kos who were arranging the folds
of his toga; and one of whom, whose name was Eunice, loving him
in secret, looked him in the eyes with submission and rapture. But
he did not even notice this; and, smiling at Vinicius, he quoted in
answer an expression of Seneca about woman, -- Animal impud
ens, etc. And then, placing an arm on the shoulders of his nephew,
he conducted him to the triclinium.

In the unctorium the two Grecian maidens, the Phrygians, and the
two Ethiopians began to put away the vessels with perfumes. But
at that moment, and beyond the curtain of the frigidarium,
appeared the heads of the halneatores, and a low "Psst!" was heard.
At that call one of the Grecians, the Phrygians, and the Ethiopians
sprang up quickly, and vanished in a twinkle behind the curtain. In
the baths began a moment of license which the inspector did not
prevent, for he took frequent part in such frolics himself. Petronius
suspected that they took place; but, as a prudent man, and one who
did not like to punish, he looked at them through his fingers.

In the unctorium only Eunice remained. She listened for a short
time to the voices and laughter which retreated in the direction of
the laconicum. At last she took the stool inlaid with amber and
ivory, on which Petronius had been sitting a short time before, and
put it carefully at his statue. The unctorium was full of sunlight
and the hues which came from the manycolored marbles with
which the wall was faced. Eunice stood on the stool, and, finding
herself at the level of the statue, cast her arms suddenly around its
neck; then, throwing back her golden hair, and pressing her rosy
body to the white marble, she pressed her lips with ecstasy to the
cold lips of Petronius.

1 Nero's name was originally I. Domitius Ahenobarbus.

Chapter II

Avrza a refreshment, which was called the morning meal and to
which the two friends sat down at an hour when common mortals
were abeady long past their midday prandium, Petronius proposed
a light doze. According to him, it was too early for visits yet.
"There are, it is true," said he, "people who begin to visit their
acquaintances about sunrise, thinking that custom an old Roman
one, but I look on this as barbarous. The afternoon hours are most
proper, -- not earlier, however, than that one when the sun passes
to the side of Jove's temple on the Capitol and begins to look
slantwise on the Forum. In autumn it is still hot, and people arc
glad to sleep after eating. At the same time it is pleasant to hear
the noise of the fountain in the atrium, and, after the obligatory
thousand steps, to doze in the red light which filters in through the
purple half-drawn velarium."

Vinicius recognized the justice of these words; and the two men
began to walk, speaking in a careless manner of what was to be
heard on the Palatine and in the city, and philosophizing a little
upon life. Petronius withdrew then to the cubiculum, but did not
sleep long. In half an hour he came out, and, having given
command to bring verbena, he inhaled the perfume and rubbed his
hands and temples with it.

"Thou wilt not believe," said he, "how it enlivens and freshens one.
Now I am ready."

The litter was waiting long since; hence they took their places, and
Petronius gave command to bear them to the Vicus Patricius, to
the house of Aulus. Petronius's "insula" lay on the southern slope
of the Palatine, near the so-called Carinse; their nearest way,
therefore, was below the Forum; but since Petronius wished to step
in on the way to see the jeweller Idomeneus, he gave the direction
to carry them along the Vicus Apollinis and the Forum in the
direction of the Vicus Sceleratus, on the corner of which were
many tabernae of every kind.

Gigantic Africans bore the litter and moved on, preceded by slaves
called pedisequii. Petronius, after some time, raised to his nostrils
in silence his palm odorous with verbena, and seemed to be
meditating on something.

"It occurs to me," said he after a while, "that if thy forest goddess
is not a slave she might leave the house of Plautius, and transfer
herself to thine. Thou wouldst surround her with love and cover
her with wealth, as I do my adored Chrysothemis, of whom,
speaking between us, I have quite as nearly enough as she has of
me."

Marcus shook his head.

"No?" inquired Petronius. "In the worst event, the case would be
left with Caesar, and thou mayst be certain that, thanks even to my
influence, our Bronzebeard would be on thy side."

"Thou knowest not Lygia," replied Vinicius.

"Then permit me to ask if thou know her otherwise than by sight?
Mast spoken with her? hast confessed thy love to her?"

"I saw her first at the fountain; since then I have met her twice.
Remember that during my stay in the house of Aulus, I dwelt in a
separate villa, intended for guests, and, having a disjointed arm, I
could not sit at the common table. Only on the eve of the day for
which I announced my departure did I meet Lygia at supper, but I
could not say a word to her. I had to listen to Aulus and his
account of victories gained by him in Britain, and then of the fall
of small states in Italy, which Licinius Stolo strove to prevent. In
general I do not know whether Aulus will be able to speak of aught
else, and do not think that we shall escape this history unless it be
thy wish to hear about the effeminacy of these days. They have
pheasants in their preserves, but they do not eat them, setting out
from the principle that every pheasant eaten brings nearer the end
of Roman power. I met her a second time at the garden cistern,
with a freshly plucked reed in her hand, the top of which she
dipped in the water and sprinkled the irises growing around. Look
at my knees. By the shield of Hercules, I tell thee that they did not
tremble when clouds of Parthians advanced on our maniples with
howls, but they trembled before the cistern. And, confused as a
youth who still wears a bulla on his neck, I merely begged pity
with my eyes, not being able to utter a word for a long time."

Petronius looked at him, as if with a certain envy. "Happy man,"
said he, "though the world and life were the worst possible, one
thing in them will remain eternally good, -- youth!"

After a while he inquired: "And hast thou not spoken to her?"

"When I had recovered somewhat, I told her that I was returning
from Asia, that I had disjointed my arm near the city, and had
suffered severely, but at the moment of leaving that hospitable
house I saw that suffering in it was more to be wished for than
delight in another place, that sickness there was better than health
somewhere else. Confused too on her part, she listened to my
words with bent head while drawing something with the reed on
the saffron-colored sand. Afterward she raised her eyes, then
looked down at the marks drawn already; once more she looked at
me, as if to ask about something, and then fled on a sudden like a
hamadryad before a dull faun."

"She must have beautiful eyes."

"As the sea -- and I was drowned in them, as in the sea. Believe me
that the archipelago is less blue. After a while a little son of
Plautius ran up with a question. But I did not understand what he
wanted."

"O Athene!" exclaimed Petronius, "remove from the eyes of this
youth the bandage with which Eros has bound them; if not, he will
break his head against the columns of Venus's temple.

"O thou spring bud on the tree of life," said he, turning to Vinicius,
"thou first green shoot of the vine! Instead of taking thee to the
Plautiuses, I ought to give command to bear thee to the house of
Gelocius, where there is a school for youths unacquainted with
life."

"What dost thou wish in particular?"

"But what did she write on the sand? Was it not the name of Amor,
or a heart pierced with his dart, or something of such sort, that one
might know from it that the satyrs had whispered to the ear of that
nymph various secrets of life? How couldst thou help looking on
those marks?"

"It is longer since I have put on the toga than seems to thee," said
Vinicius, "and before little Aulus ran up, I looked carefully at
those marks, for I know that frequently maidens in Greece and in
Rome draw on the sand a confession which their lips will not utter.
But guess what she drew!"

"If it is other than I supposed, I shall not guess."

"A fish."

"What dost thou say?"

"I say, a fish. What did that mean, -- that cold blood is flowing in
her veins? So far I do not know; but thou, who hast called me a
spring bud on the tree of life, wilt be able to understand the sign
certainly."

"Carissime! ask such a thing of Pliny. He knows fish. If old
Apicius were alive, he could tell thee something, for in the course
of his life he ate more fish than could find place at one time in the
bay of Naples."

Further conversation was interrupted, since they were borne into
crowded streets where the noise of people hindered them.

From the Vicus Apollinis they turned to the Boarium, and then
entered the Forum Rornanurn, where on clear days, before sunset,
crowds of idle people assembled to stroll among the columns, to
tell and hear news, to see noted people borne past in litters, and
finally to look in at the jewellery-shops, the book-shops, the arches
where coin was changed, shops for silk, bronze, and all other
articles with which the buildings covering that part of the market
placed opposite the Capitol were filled.

One-half of the Forum, immediately under the rock of the Capitol,
was buried already in shade; but the columns of the temples,
placed higher, seemed golden in the sunshine and the blue. Those
lying lower cast lengthened shadows on marble slabs. The place
was so filled with columns everywhere that the eye was lost in
them as in a forest.

Those buildings and columns seemed huddled together. They
towered some above others, they stretched toward the right and the
left, they climbed toward the height, and they clung to the wall of
the Capitol, or some of them clung to others, like greater and
smaller, thicker and thinner, white or gold colored tree-trunks, now
blooming under architraves, flowers of the acanthus, now
surrounded with Ionic corners, now finished with a simple Done
quadrangle. Above that forest gleamed colored triglyphs; from
tympans stood forth the sculptured forms of gods; from the
Summits winged golden quadrig~ seemed ready to fly away
through space into the blue dome, fixed serenely above that
crowded place of temples. Through the middle of the market and
along the edges of it flowed a river of people; crowds passed under
the arches of the basilica of Julius C~zsar; crowds were sitting on
the steps of Castor and Pollux, or walking around the temple of
Vesta, resembling on that great marble background many-colored
swarms of butterflies or beetles. Down immense steps, from the
side of the temple on the Capitol dedicated to Jupiter Optimus
Maximus, came new waves; at the rostra people listened to chance
orators; in one place and another rose the shouts of hawkers selling
fruit, wine, or water mixed with fig_juice; of tricksters; of venders
of marvellous medicines; of soothsayers; of discoverers of hidden
treasures; of interpreters of dreams. Here and there, in the tumult
of conversations and cries, were mingled sounds of the Egyptian
sistra, of tile sambuk‚, or of Grecian flutes. Here and there the
sick, the pious, or the afflicted were bearing offerings to the
temples. In the midst of the people, on the stone flags, gathered
flocks of doves, eager for the grain given them, and like movable
many-colored and dark spots, now rising for a moment with a loud
sound of wings, now dropping down again to places left vacant by
people. From time to time the crowds opened before litters in
which were visible the affected faces of women, or the heads of
senators and knights, with features, as it were, rigid and exhausted
from living. The many-tongued population repeated aloud their
names, with the addition of some term of praise or ridicule.
Among the unordered groups pushed from time to time, advancing
with measured tread, parties of soldiers, or watchers, preserving
order on the streets. Around about, the Greek language was heard
as often as Latin.

Vinicius, who had not been in the city for a long time, looked with
a certain curiosity on that swarm of people and on that Forum
Romanum, which both dominated the sea of the world and was
flooded by it, so that Petronius, who divined the thoughts of his
companion, called it "the nest of the Quirites -- without the
Quiites." In truth, the local element was well-nigh lost in that
crowd, composed of all races and nations. There appeared
Ethiopians, gigantic light-haired people from the distant north,
Britons, Gauls, Germans, sloping-eyed dwellers of Lericum;
people from the Euphrates and from the Indus, with beards dyed
brick color; Syrians from the banks of the Orontes, with black and
mild eyes; dwellers in the deserts of Arabia, dried up as a bone;
Jews, with their flat breasts; Egyptians, with the eternal,
indifferent smile on their faces; Numidians and Africans; Greeks
from Hellas, who equally with the Romans commanjied the city,
but commanded through science, art, wisdom, and deceit; Greeks
from the islands, from Asia Minor, from Egypt, from Italy, from
Narbonic Gaul. In the throng of slaves, with pierced ears, were not
lacking also freemen, -- an idle population, which Caesar amused,
supported, even clothed, -- and free visitors, whom the ease of life
and the prospects of fortune enticed to the gigantic city; there was
no lack of venal persons. There were priests of Serapis, with palm
branches in their hands; priests of Isis, to whose altar more
offerings were brought than to the temple of the Capitoline Jove;
priests of Cybele, bearing in their hands golden ears of rice; and
priests of nomad divinities; and dancers of the East with bright
head-dresses, and dealers in amulets, and snake-tamers, and
Chaldean seers; and, finally, people without any occupation
whatever, who applied for grain every week at the storehouses on
the Tiber, who fought for lottery-tickets to the Circus, who spent
their nights in rickety houses of districts beyond the Tiber, and
sunny and warm days under covered porticos, and in foul
eating-houses of the Subura, on the Milvian bridge, or before the
"insuhr" of the great, where from time to time remnants from the
tables of slaves were thrown out to them.

Petronius was well known to those crowds. Vinicius's ears were
struck continually by "Hic est!" (Here he is). They loved him for
his munificence; and his peculiar popularity increased from the
time when they learned that he had spoken before Caesar in
opposition to the sentence of death issued against the whole
"familia," that is, against all the slaves of the prefect Pedanius
Secundus, without distinction of sex or age, because one of them
had killed that monster in a moment of despair. Petronius repeated
in public, it is true, that it was all one to him, and that he had
spoken to Caesar only privately, as the arbiter elegantiarum whose
aesthetic taste was offended by a barbarous slaughter befitting
Scythians and not Romans. Nevertheless, people who were
indignant because of the slaughter loved Petronius from that
moment forth. But he did not care for their love. He remembered
that that crowd of people had loved also Britannicus, poisoned by
Nero; and Agrippina, killed at his command; and Octavia,
smothered in hot steam at the Pandataria, after her veins had been
opened previously; and Rubelius Plautus, who had been banished;
and Thrasea, to whom any morning might bring a death sentence.
The love of the mob might be considered rather of ill omen; and
the sceptical Pctronius was superstitious also. He had a twofold
contempt for the multitude, -- as an aristocrat and an aesthetic
person. Men with the odor of roast beans, which they carried in
their bosoms, and who besides were eternally hoarse and sweating
from playing mora on the street-corners and peristyles, did not in
his eyes deserve the term "human." Hence he gave no answer
whatever to the applause, or the kisses sent from lips here and
there to him. He was relating to Marcus the case of Pedanius,
reviling meanwhile the fickleness of that rabble which, next
morning after the terrible butchery, applauded Nero on his way to
the temple of Jupiter Stator. But he gave conimand to halt before
the book-shop of Avirnus, and, descending from tile litter,
purchased an ornamented manuscript, which he gave to Vinicius.

"Here is a gift for thee," said he.

"Thanks!" answered Vinicius. Then, looking at the title, he
inquired, "'Satyricon'? Is this something new? Whose is it?"

"Mine. But I do not wish to go in the road of Rufinus, whose
history I was to tell thee, nor of Fabricius Veiento; hence no one
knows of this, and do thou mention it to no man."

"Thou hast said that thou art no writer of verses," said Vinicius,
looking at the middle of tile manuscript; "but here I see prose
thickly interwoven with them."

"When thou art reading, turn attention to Trimalchion's feast. As to
verses, they have disgusted me, since Nero is writing an epic.
Vitelius, when he wishes to relieve himself, uses ivory fingers to
thrust down his throat; others serve themselves with flamingo
feathers steeped in olive oil or in a decoction of wild thyme. I read
Nero's poetry, and the result is immediate. Straight-way I am able
to praise it, if not with a clear conscience, at least with a clear
stomach."

When he had said this, he stopped the litter again before the shop
of Idomeneus the goldsmith, and, having settled the affair of the
gems, gave command to bear the litter directly to Aulus's mansion.

"On the road I will tell thee the story of Rufinus," said he, "as
proof of what vanity in an author may be."

But before he had begun, they turned in to the Vicus Patricius, and
soon found themselves before the dwelling of Aulus. A young and
sturdy "janitor" opened the door leading to the ostium, over which
a magpie confined in a cage greeted them noisily with the word,
"Salve!"

On the way from the second antechamber, called the ostium, to the
atrium itself, Vinicius said, -- "Flast noticed diat tile doorkeepers
are without chains!" "This is a wonderful house," answered
Petronius, in an undertone. "Of course it is known to thee that
Pomponia Griecina is suspected of entertaining that Eastern
superstition which consists in honoring a certain Chrestos. It seems
that Crispinilla rendered her this service, -- she who cannot forgive
Pomponia because one husband has sufficed her for a lifetime. A
one-man Woman! To-day, in Rome, it is easier to get a half-plate
of fresh mushrooms from Noricum than to find such. They tried
her before a domestic court --"

"To thy judgment this is a wonderful house. Later on I will tell
thee what I heard and saw in it."

Meanwhile they had entered the atrium. The slave appointed to it,
called atricnsis, sent a nomenclator to announce the guests; and
Petronius, who, imagining that eternal sadness reigned in this
severe house, had never been in it, looked around with
astonishment, and as it were with a feeling of disappointment, for
the atrium produced rather an impression of cheerfulness. A sheaf
of bright light falling from above through a large opening broke
into a thousand sparks on a fountain in a quadrangular little basin,
called the impluvium, which was in the middle to receive rain
falling through the opening during bad weather; this was
surrounded by anemones and lilies. In that house a special love for
lilies was evident, for there were whole clumps of them, both
white and red; and, finally, sapphire irises, whose delicate leaves
were as if silvered from the spray of the fountain. Among the
moist mosses, in which lily-pots were hidden, and among the
bunches of lilies were little bronze statues representing children
and water-birds. In one corner a bronze fawn, as if wishing to
drink, was inclining its greenish head, grizzled, too, by dampness.
The floor of the atrium was of mosaic; the walls, faced partly with
red marble and partly with wood, on which were painted fish,
birds, and griffins, attracted the eye by the play of colors. From the
door to the side chamber they were ornamented with tortoise-shell
or even ivory; at the walls between the doors were statues of
Aulus's ancestors. Everywhere calm plenty was evident, remote
from excess, but noble and self-trusting.

Petronius, who lived with incomparably greater show and
elegance, could find nothing which offended his taste; and had just
turned to Vinicius with that remark, when a slave, the velarius,
pushed aside the curtain separating the atrium from the tablinum,
and in the depth of the building appeared Aulus Plautius
approaching hurriedly.

He was a man nearing the evening of life, with a head whitened by
hoar frost, but fresh, with an energetic face, a trifle too short, but
still somewhat eagle-like. This time there was expressed on it a
certain astonishment, and even alarm, because of the unexpected
arrival of Nero's friend, companion, and suggester.

Petronius was too much a man of the world and too quick not to
notice this; hence, after the first greetings, he announced with all
the eloquence and ease at his command that he had come to give
thanks for the care which his sister's son had found in that house,
and that gratitude alone was the cause of the visit, to which,
moreover, he was emboldened by his old acquaintance with Aulus.

Aulus assured him that he was a welcome guest; and as to
gratitude, he declared that he had that feeling himself, though
surely Petronius did not divine the cause of it.

In fact, Petronius did not divine it. In vain did he raise his hazel
eyes, endeavoring to remember the least service rendered to Aulus
or to any one. He recalled none, unless it might be that which he
intended to show Vinicius. Some such thing, it is true, might have
happened involuntarily, but only involuntarily.

"I have great love and esteem for Vespasian, whose life thou didst
save," said Aulus, "when he had the misfortune to doze while
listening to Nero's verses."

"He was fortunate," replied Petronius, "for he did not hear them;
but I will not deny that the matter might have ended with
misfortune. Bronzebeard wished absolutely to send a centurion to
him with the friendly advice to open his veins."

"But thou, Petronius, laughed him out of it."

"That is true, or rather it is not true. I told Nero that if Orpheus put
wild beasts to sleep with song, his triumph was equal, since he had
put Vespasian to sleep. Ahenobarbus may be blamed on condition
that to a small criticism a great flattery be added. Our gracious
Augusta, Poppae, understands this to perfection."

"Alas! such are the times," answered Aulus. "I lack two front teeth,
knocked out by a stone from the hand of a Briton, I speak with a
hiss; still my happiest days were passed in Britain."

"Because they were days of victory," added Vinicius.

But Petronius, alarmed lest the old general might begin a narrative
of his former wars, changed the conversation.

"See," said he, "in the neighborhood of Prirneste country people
found a dead wolf whelp with two heads; and during a storm about
that time lightning struck off an angle of the temple of Luna, -- a
thing unparalleled, because of the late autumn. A certain Cotta,
too, who had told this, added, while telling it, that the priests of
that temple prophesied the fall of the city or, at least, the ruin of a
great house, -- ruin to be averted only by uncommon sacrifices."

Aulus, when he had heard the narrative, expressed the opinion that
such signs should not be neglected; that the gods might be angered
by an over-measure of wickedness. In this there was nothing
wonderful; arid in such an event expiatory sacrifices were
perfectly in order.

"Thy house, Plautius, is not too large," answered Petronius,
"though a great man lives in it. Mine is indeed too large for such a
wretched owner, though equally small. But if it is a question of the
ruin of something as great, for example, as the doinus transitoria,
would it be worth while for us to bring offerings to avert that
ruin?"