A Thorny Path — Complete by Georg Ebers (howl and other poems txt) 📖

the lips; but heads are less easy to hide, and I shall be content with them. Tell that to your Alexandrian wits! Macrinus will inform you of all else. You may go.”

During this speech the lion, excited by his master’s furious gestures, had risen on his feet and showed his terrible teeth to the delegates. At this their courage sank. Some laid their hands on their bent knees, as if to shield them; others had gradually sidled to the door before Caesar had uttered the last word. Then, in spite of the efforts of the governor and the alabarch to detain them, in the hope of pacifying the potentate, as soon as they heard the word “go,” they hurried out; and, for better or for worse, the few bolder spirits had to follow.

As soon as the door was closed upon them, Caesar’s features lost their cruel look. He patted the lion with soothing words of praise, and exclaimed, contemptuously:

“These are the descendants of the Macedonians, with whom the greatest of heroes conquered the world! Who was that fat old fellow who shrank into himself so miserably, and made for the door while I was yet speaking?”

“Kimon, the chief of the night-watch and guardian of the peace of the city,” replied the high-priest of Alexander, who as a Roman had kept his place by the throne; and Theocritus put in:

“The people must sleep badly under the ward of such a coward. Let him follow the prefect, noble Caesar.”

“Send him his dismissal at once,” said Caracalla; “but see that his successor is a man.”

He then turned to the high-priest, and politely requested him to assist Theocritus in choosing a new head for the town-guard, and Timotheus and the favorite quitted the room together.

Philostratus took ingenious advantage of the incident, by at once informing the emperor that it had come to his knowledge that this coward, so worthily dismissed from office, had, on the merest suspicion, cast into prison a painter who was undoubtedly one of the first of living artists, and with him his guiltless relations.

“I will not have it!” Caesar broke out. “Nothing but blood will do any good here, and petty aggravations will only stir their bile and increase their insolence. Is the painter of whom you speak an Alexandrian?—I pine for the open air, but the wind blows the rain against the windows.”

“In the field,” the philosopher remarked, “you have faced the weather heroically enough. Here, in the city, enjoy what is placed before you. Only yesterday I still believed that the art of Apelles was utterly degenerate. But since then I have changed my opinion, for I have seen a portrait which would be an ornament to the Pinakothek in your baths. The northern windows are closed, or, in this land of inundations, and in such weather as this, we might find ourselves afloat even under cover of a roof; so it is too dark here to judge of a painting, but your dressing-room is more favorably situated, and the large window there will serve our purpose. May I be allowed the pleasure of showing you there the work of the imprisoned artist?”

Caesar nodded, and led the way, accompanied by his lion and followed by the philosopher, who desired an attendant to bring in the picture.

In this room it was much lighter than in the audience-chamber, and while Caracalla awaited, with Philostratus, the arrival of the painting, his Indian body-slave, a gift from the Parthian king, silently and skillfully dressed his thin hair. The sovereign sighed deeply, and pressed his hand to his brow as though in pain. The philosopher ventured to approach him, and there was warm sympathy in his tone as he asked:

“What ails you, Bassianus? Just now you bore all the appearance of a healthy, nay, and of a terrible man!”

“It is better again already,” replied the sovereign. “And yet—!”

He groaned again, and then confessed that only yesterday he had in the same way been tortured with pain.

“The attack came on in the morning, as you know,” he went on, “and when it was past I went down into the court of sacrifice; my feet would scarcely carry me. Curiosity—and they were waiting for me; and some great sign might be shown! Besides, some excitement helps me through this torment. But there was nothing—nothing! Heart, lungs, liver, all in their right place.—And then, Galenus—What I like is bad for me, what I loathe is wholesome. And again and again the same foolish question, ‘Do you wish to escape an early death?’ And all with an air as though Death were a slave at his command—He can, no doubt, do more than others, and has preserved his own life I know not how long. Well, and it is his duty to prolong mine.

“I am Caesar. I had a right to insist on his remaining here. I did so; for he knows my malady, and describes it as if he felt it himself. I ordered him—nay, I entreated him. But he adhered to his own way. He went—he is gone!”

“But he may be of use to you, even at a distance,” Philostratus said.

“Did he do anything for my father, or for me in Rome, where he saw me every day?” retorted Caesar. “He can mitigate and relieve the suffering, but that is all; and of all the others, is there one fit to hand him a cup of water? Perhaps he would be willing to cure me, but he can not; for I tell you, Philostratus, the gods will not have it so. You know what sacrifices I have offered, what gifts I have brought. I have prayed, I have abased myself before them, but none will hear. One or another of the gods, indeed, appears to me not infrequently as Apollo did last night. But is it because he favors me? First, he laid his hand on my shoulder, as my father used to do; but his was so heavy, that the weight pressed me down till I fell on my knees, crushed. This is no good sign, you think? I see it in your face. I do not myself think so. And how loudly I have called on him, of all the gods! The whole empire, they say, men and women alike, besought the immortals unbidden for the welfare of Titus. I, too, am their lord; but”—and he laughed bitterly—“who has ever raised a hand in prayer for me of his own impulse? My own mother always named my brother first. He has paid for it,—But the rest!”

“They fear rather than love you,” replied the philosopher. “He to whom Phoebus Apollo appears may always expect some good to follow. And yesterday—a happy omen, too—I overheard by chance a young Greek girl, who believed herself unobserved, who of her own prompting fervently entreated Asklepios to heal you. Nay, she collected all the coins in her little purse, and had a goat and a cock sacrificed in your behalf.”

“And you expect me to believe that!” said Caracalla, with a scornful laugh.

But Philostratus eagerly replied:

“It is the pure truth. I went to the little temple because it was said that Apollonius had left some documents there. Every word from his pen is, as you know, of value to me in writing his history. The little library was screened off from the cella by a curtain, and while I was hunting through the manuscripts I heard a woman’s voice.”