Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz (ebook reader macos TXT) 📕

When Vinicius had finished and yielded himself in turn to the

epilatores, a lector came in with a bronze tube at his breast and rolls

of paper in the tube.

“Dost wish to listen?” asked Petronius.

“If it is thy creation, gladly!” answered the young tribune; “if not, I

prefer conversation. Poets seize people at present on every street

corner.”

“Of course they do. Thou wilt not pass any basilica, bath, library, or

book-shop without seeing a poet gesticulating like a monkey. Agrippa, on

coming here from the East, mistook them for madmen. And it is just such

a time now. Cæsar writes verses; hence all follow in his steps. Only

it is not permitted to write better verses than Cæsar, and for that

reason I fear a little for Lucan. But I write prose, with which,

however, I do not honor myself or others. What the lector has to read

are codicilli of that poor Fabricius Veiento.”

“Why ‘poor’?”

“Because it has been communicated to him that he must dwell in Odyssa

and not return to his domestic hearth till he receives a new command.

That Odyssey will be easier for him than for Ulysses, since his wife is

no Penelope. I need not tell thee, for that matter, that he acted

stupidly. But here no one takes things otherwise than superficially.

His is rather a wretched and dull little book, which people have begun

to read passionately only when the author is banished. Now one hears on

every side, ‘Scandala! scandala!’ and it may be that Veiento invented

some things; but I, who know the city, know our patres and our women,

assure thee that it is all paler than reality. Meanwhile every man is

searching in the book,—for himself with alarm, for his acquaintances

with delight. At the book-shop of Avirnus a hundred copyists are

writing at dictation, and its success is assured.”

“Are not thy affairs in it?”

“They are; but the author is mistaken, for I am at once worse and less

flat than he represents me. Seest thou we have lost long since the

feeling of what is worthy or unworthy,—and to me even it seems that in

real truth there is no difference between them, though Seneca, Musonius,

and Trasca pretend that they see it. To me it is all one! By Hercules,

I say what I think! I have preserved loftiness, however, because I know

what is deformed and what is beautiful; but our poet, Bronzebeard, for

example, the charioteer, the singer, the actor, does not understand

this.”

“I am sorry, however, for Fabricius! He is a good companion.”

“Vanity ruined the man. Every one suspected him, no one knew certainly;

but he could not contain himself, and told the secret on all sides in

confidence. Hast heard the history of Rufinus?”

“No.”

“Then come to the frigidarium to cool; there I will tell thee.”

They passed to the frigidarium, in the middle of which played a fountain

of bright rose-color, emitting the odor of violets. There they sat in

niches which were covered with velvet, and began to cool themselves.

Silence reigned for a time. Vinicius looked awhile thoughtfully at a

bronze faun which, bending over the arm of a nymph, was seeking her lips

eagerly with his lips.

“He is right,” said the young man. “That is what is best in life.”

“More or less! But besides this thou lovest war, for which I have no

liking, since under tents one’s finger-nails break and cease to be rosy.

For that matter, every man has his preferences. Bronzebeard loves song,

especially his own; and old Scaurus his Corinthian vase, which stands

near his bed at night, and which he kisses when he cannot sleep. He has

kissed the edge off already. Tell me, dost thou not write verses?”

“No; I have never composed a single hexameter.”

“And dost thou not play on the lute and sing?”

“No.”

“And dost thou drive a chariot?”

“I tried once in Antioch, but unsuccessfully.”

“Then I am at rest concerning thee. And to what party in the hippodrome

dost thou belong?”

“To the Greens.”

“Now I am perfectly at rest, especially since thou hast a large property

indeed, though thou art not so rich as Pallas or Seneca. For seest thou,

with us at present it is well to write verses, to sing to a lute, to

declaim, and to compete in the Circus; but better, and especially safer,

not to write verses, not to play, not to sing, and not to compete in the

Circus. Best of all, is it to know how to admire when Bronzebeard

admires. Thou art a comely young man; hence Poppæa may fall in love

with thee. This is thy only peril. But no, she is too experienced; she

cares for something else. She has had enough of love with her two

husbands; with the third she has other views. Dost thou know that that

stupid Otho loves her yet to distraction? He walks on the cliffs of

Spain, and sighs; he has so lost his former habits, and so ceased to

care for his person, that three hours each day suffice him to dress his

hair. Who could have expected this of Otho?”

“I understand him,” answered Vinicius; “but in his place I should have

done something else.”

“What, namely?”

“I should have enrolled faithful legions of mountaineers of that

country. They are good soldiers,—those Iberians.”

“Vinicius! Vinicius! I almost wish to tell thee that thou wouldst not

have been capable of that. And knowest why? Such things are done, but

they are not mentioned even conditionally. As to me, in his place, I

should have laughed at Poppæa, laughed at Bronzebeard, and formed for

myself legions, not of Iberian men, however, but Iberian women. And

what is more, I should have written epigrams which I should not have

read to any one,—not like that poor Rufinus.”

“Thou wert to tell me his history.”

“I will tell it in the unctorium.”

But in the unctorium the attention of Vinicius was turned to other

objects; namely, to wonderful slave women who were waiting for the

bathers. Two of them, Africans, resembling noble statues of ebony,

began to anoint their bodies with delicate perfumes from Arabia; others,

Phrygians, skilled in hairdressing, held in their hands, which were

bending and flexible as serpents, combs and mirrors of polished steel;

two Grecian maidens from Kos, who were simply like deities, waited as

vestiplicæ, till the moment should come to put statuesque folds in the

togas of the lords.

“By the cloud-scattering Zeus!” said Marcus Vinicius, “what a choice

thou hast!”

“I prefer choice to numbers,” answered Petronius. “My whole ‘familia’

[household servants] in Rome does not exceed four hundred, and I judge

that for personal attendance only upstarts need a greater number of

people.”

“More beautiful bodies even Bronzebeard does not possess,” said

Vinicius, distending his nostrils.

“Thou art my relative,” answered Petronius, with a certain friendly

indifference, “and I am neither so misanthropic as Barsus nor such a

pedant as Aulus Plautius.”

When Vinicius heard this last name, he forgot the maidens from Kos for a

moment, and, raising his head vivaciously, inquired,—“Whence did Aulus

Plautius come to thy mind? Dost thou know that after I had disjointed

my arm outside the city, I passed a number of days in his house? It

happened that Plautius came up at the moment when the accident happened,

and, seeing that I was suffering greatly, he took me to his house; there

a slave of his, the physician Merion, restored me to health. I wished

to speak with thee touching this very matter.”

“Why? Is it because thou hast fallen in love with Pomponia perchance?

In that case I pity thee; she is not young, and she is virtuous! I

cannot imagine a worse combination. Brr!”

“Not with Pomponia—eheu!” answered Vinicius.

“With whom, then?”

“If I knew myself with whom? But I do not know to a certainty her name

even,—Lygia or Callina? They call her Lygia in the house, for she

comes of the Lygian nation; but she has her own barbarian name, Callina.

It is a wonderful house,—that of those Plautiuses. There are many

people in it; but it is quiet there as in the groves of Subiacum. For a

number of days I did not know that a divinity dwelt in the house. Once

about daybreak I saw her bathing in the garden fountain; and I swear to

thee by that foam from which Aphrodite rose, that the rays of the dawn

passed right through her body. I thought that when the sun rose she

would vanish before me in the light, as the twilight of morning does.

Since then, I have seen her twice; and since then, too, I know not what

rest is, I know not what other desires are, I have no wish to know what

the city can give me. I want neither women, nor gold, nor Corinthian

bronze, nor amber, nor pearls, nor wine, nor feasts; I want only Lygia.

I am yearning for her, in sincerity I tell thee, Petronius, as that

Dream who is imaged on the Mosaic of thy tepidarium yearned for

Paisythea,—whole days and night do I yearn.”

“If she is a slave, then purchase her.”

“She is not a slave.”

“What is she? A freed woman of Plautius?”

“Never having been a slave, she could not be a freed woman.”

“Who is she?”

“I know not,—a king’s daughter, or something of that sort.”

“Thou dost rouse my curiosity, Vinicius.”

“But if thou wish to listen, I will satisfy thy curiosity straightway.

Her story is not a long one. Thou art acquainted, perhaps personally,

with Vannius, king of the Suevi, who, expelled from his country, spent a

long time here in Rome, and became even famous for his skilful play with

dice, and his good driving of chariots. Drusus put him on the throne

again. Vannius, who was really a strong man, ruled well at first, and

warred with success; afterward, however, he began to skin not only his

neighbors, but his own Suevi, too much. Thereupon Vangio and Sido, two

sister’s sons of his, and the sons of Vibilius, king of the Hermunduri,

determined to force him to Rome again—to try his luck there at dice.”

“I remember; that is of recent Claudian times.”

“Yes! War broke out. Vannius summoned to his aid the Yazygi; his dear

nephews called in the Lygians, who, hearing of the riches of Vannius,

and enticed by the hope of booty, came in such numbers that Cæsar

himself, Claudius, began to fear for the safety of the boundary.

Claudius did not wish to interfere in a war among barbarians, but he

wrote to Atelius Hister, who commanded the legions of the Danube, to

turn a watchful eye on the course of the war, and not permit them to

disturb our peace. Hister required, then, of the Lygians a promise not

to cross the boundary; to this they not only agreed, but gave hostages,

among whom were the wife and daughter of their leader. It is known to

thee that barbarians take their wives and children to war with them. My

Lygia is the daughter of that leader.”

“Whence dost thou know all this?”

“Aulus Plautius told it himself. The Lygians did not cross the

boundary, indeed; but barbarians come and go like a tempest. So did the

Lygians vanish with their wild-ox horns on their heads. They killed

Vannius’s Suevi and Yazygi; but their own king fell. They disappeared

with their booty then, and the