Zenobia; or, the Fall of Palmyra by William Ware (latest ebook reader TXT) 📖

shield, and entering the opening, but not with a perfect direction, it passed not through, but hung there by the head.

'Princess,' said Zabdas, springing from his repose with more than wonted energy, 'that lance was chosen, as I saw, by a Roman. Try once more with one that I shall choose, and see what the issue will be.'

'Truly,' said Julia, 'I am ready to seize any plea under which to redeem my fame. But first give me yourself a lesson, will you not?'

The Egyptian was not deaf to the invitation, and once more essaying the feat, and with his whole soul bent to the work, the lance, quicker than sight, darted from his hand, and following in the wake of Fausta's, lighted farther than hers--being driven with more force--upon the lawn.

The princess now, with more of confidence in her air, again balanced and threw the lance which Zabdas had chosen--this time with success; for, passing through the shield, it fell side by side with Fausta's.

'Fortune still unites us,' said Julia; 'if for a time she leaves me a little in the rear, yet she soon repents of the wrong, and brings me up.' Saying which, she placed herself at Fausta's side.

'But come, our worthy cousin,' said the Queen, now turning and addressing Antiochus, who stood with folded arms, dully surveying the scene, 'will you not try a lance?'

'Tis hardly worth our while,' said he, 'for the gods seem to have delivered all the honor and power of the East into the hands of women.'

'Yet it may not be past redemption,' said Julia, 'and who more likely than Hercules to achieve so great a work? Pray begin.'

That mass of a man, hardly knowing whether the princess were jesting or in earnest--for to the usual cloud that rested upon his intellect, there was now added the stupidity arising from free indulgence at the tables--slowly moved toward the lances, and selecting the longest and heaviest, took his station at the proper place. Raising then his arm, which was like a weaver's beam, and throwing his enormous body into attitudes which showed that no child's play was going on, he let drive the lance, which, shooting with more force than exactness of aim, struck upon the outer rim of the shield, and then glancing sideways was near spearing a poor slave, whose pleasure it was, with others, to stand in the neighborhood of the butt, to pick up and return the weapons thrown, or withdraw them from the shield, where they might have fastened themselves.

Involuntary laughter broke forth upon this unwonted performance of the lance; upon which it was easy to see, by the mounting color of Antiochus, that his passions were inflamed. Especially--did we afterward suppose--was he enraged at the exclamation of one of the slaves near the shield, who was heard to say to his fellow: 'Now is the reign of women at an end.' Seizing, however, on the instant, another lance, he was known to exclaim, by a few who stood near him, but who did not take the meaning of his words: 'With a better mark, there may be a better aim.' Then resuming his position, he made at first, by a long and steady aim, as if he were going, with certainty now, to hit the shield; but, changing suddenly the direction of his lance, he launched it with fatal aim, and a giant's force, at the slave who had uttered those words. It went through him, as he had been but a sheet of papyrus, and then sung along the plain. The poor wretch gave one convulsive leap into the air, and dropped dead.

'Zenobia!' exclaimed Julia.

'Great Queen!' said Fausta.

'Shameful!'--'dastardly!'--'cowardly!'--broke from one and another of the company.

'That's the mark I never miss,' observed Antiochus; and at the same time regaled his nose from a box of perfume.

'Tis his own chattel,' said the Queen; 'he may do with it as he lists. He has trenched upon no law of the realm, but only upon those of breeding and humanity. Our presence, and that of this company, might, we think, have claimed a more gentle observance.'

'Dogs!' fiercely shouted Antiochus--who, as the Queen said these words, her eyes fastened indignantly upon him, had slunk sulkily to his seat--'dogs,' said he, aiming suddenly to brave the matter, 'off with yonder carrion!--it offends the Queen.'

'Would our cousin,' said Zenobia, 'win the hearts of Palmyra, this surely is a mistaken way. Come, let us to the palace. This spot is tainted. But that it may be sweetened as far as may be, slaves!' she cried, 'bring to the gates the chariot, and other remaining chattels of Antiochus!'

Antiochus, at these words, pale with the apprehensions of a cowardly spirit, rose and strode toward the palace, from which, in a few moments, he was seen on his way to the city.

'You may judge me needlessly harsh, Piso,' said the Queen, as we now sauntered toward the palace, 'but truly the condition of the slave is such, that seeing the laws protect him not, we must do something to enlist in his behalf the spirit of humanity. The breach of courtesy, however, was itself not to be forgiven.'

'It was a merciful fate of the slave,' said I, 'compared with what our Roman slaves suffer. To be lashed to death, or crucified, or burned, or flayed alive, or torn by dogs, or thrown as food for fishes, is something worse than this quick exit of the thrall of Antiochus. You of these softer climes are in your natures milder than we, and are more moved by scenes like this. What would you think, Queen, to see not one, but scores or hundreds of these miserable beings, upon bare suspicion of attempts against their master's life, condemned, by their absolute irresponsible possessors, to death in all its most revolting forms? Nay, even our Roman women, of highest rank, and gentlest nurture, stand by while their slaves are scourged, or themselves apply the lash. If under this torture they die, it is thought of but as of the death of vermin. War has made with us this sort of property of so cheap possession, that to destroy it is often a useful measure of economy. By a Roman, nothing is less regarded than life. And in truth, I see not how it can be otherwise.'

'But surely,' said Julia, 'you do not mean to defend this condition of life. It is not like the sentiments I have heard you express,'

'I defend it only thus,' I replied: 'so long as we have wars--and when will they cease?--there must be captives; and what can these be but slaves? To return them to their own country, were to war to no purpose. To colonize them were to strip war of its horrors. To make them freemen of our own soil, were to fill the land with foes and traitors. Then if there must be slaves, there must be masters and owners. And the absolute master of other human beings, responsible to no one, can be no other than a tyrant. If he has, as he must have, the power to punish at will, he will exercise it, and that cruelly. If he has the power to kill, as he must have, then will he kill and kill cruelly when his nature prompts. And this his nature will prompt, or if not his nature absolutely, yet his educated nature. Our children grow up within the sight and sound of all the horrors and sufferings of this state of things. They use their slaves--with which, almost in infancy, they are provided--according to their pleasure--as dogs, as horses; they lash, they scourge them, long before they have the strength to kill. What wonder if the boy, who, when a boy, used a slave as his beast of burden, or his footstool, when he grows to be a man, should use him as a mark to be shot at? The youth of Antiochus was reared in Rome. I presume to say that his earliest play-things were slaves, and the children of slaves. I am not surprised at his act. And such acts are too common in Rome for this to disturb me much. The education of Antiochus was continued and completed, I may venture also to say, at the circus. I think the result very natural. It cannot be very different, where slavery and the sports of the amphitheatre exist.'

'I perceive your meaning,' said Julia; 'Antiochus you affirm to be the natural product of the customs and institutions which now prevail. It is certainly so, and must continue so, until some new element shall be introduced into society, that shall ultimately reform its practices, by first exalting the sentiments and the character of the individual. Such an element do I detect----'

'In Christianity,' said Fausta; 'this is your panacea. May it prove all you desire; yet methinks it gives small promise, seeing it has already been at work more than two hundred years, and has accomplished no more.'

'A close observer,' replied Julia, 'sees much of the effect of Christianity beside that which appears upon the surface. If I err not greatly, a few years more will reveal what this religion has been doing these two centuries and more. Revolutions which are acted out in a day, have often been years or centuries in preparation. An eye that will see, may see the final issue, a long time foreshadowed in the tendencies and character of a preceding age.'

The princess uttered this with earnestness. I have reflected upon it. And if you, my Curtius, will look around upon the state of the empire, you will find many things to startle you. But of this another time.

Assembled in the evening in the court of the elephant, we were made to forget whatever had proved disagreeable during the day, while we listened to the 'Frogs,' read by Julia and Longinus.

The following day was appointed for the chase, and early in the morning I was waked by the braying of trumpets, and the baying of dogs. I found the Queen already mounted and equipped for the sport, surrounded by Zabdas, Longinus, and a few of the nobles of Palmyra. We were soon joined by Julia and Fausta. In order to insure our sport, a tiger, made fierce by being for some days deprived of food, had the preceding evening been let loose from the royal collection into the neighboring forests. These forests, abounding in game, commence immediately, as it were, in the rear of the palace. They present a boundless continuity of crag, mountain, and wooded plain, offering every variety of ground to those who seek the pleasures of the chase. The sun had not been long above the horizon when we sallied forth from the palace gates, and from the smooth and shaven fields of the royal demesne, plunged at once into the

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It was a moment of inexpressible horror. At the same instant, our eyes caught the form of the famished tiger, just in the act to spring from the crag upon the unconscious Queen. But before we had time to alarm Zenobia--which would indeed have been useless--a shaft from an unerring arm arrested the monster midair, whose body then tumbled heavily at the feet of Zenobia's Arab. The horse, rearing with affright, had nearly dashed the Queen against the opposite rocks, but keeping her seat, she soon, by her powerful arm and complete horsemanship, reduced him to his obedience, though trembling like a terrified child through every part of his body. A thrust from my hunting spear quickly despatched the dying beast. We now gathered around the Queen.

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Hardly were we arrived at the lawn in front of the palace, when a cloud of dust was observed to rise in the direction of the road to Palmyra, as if caused by a body of horse in rapid movement. 'What may this mean?' said Zenobia: 'orders were strict, that our brief retirement should not be disturbed. This indicates an errand of some urgency.'

'Some embassy from abroad, perhaps,' said Julia, 'that cannot brook delay. It may be from your great brother at Rome.'

While we, in a sportive humor, indulged in various conjectures, an official of the palace announced the approach of a Roman herald, 'who craved permission to address the Queen of Palmyra.' He was ordered to advance.

In a few moments, upon a horse covered with dust and foam, appeared the Roman herald. Without one moment's hesitancy, he