Perpetua. A Tale of Nimes in A.D. 213

Throughout the south of Gaul the worship of Augustus had become predominant, and had displaced most of the ancestral cults. The temples dedicated to Augustus exceeded in richness all others, and were crowded when the rest were deserted.

Jupiter was only not forgotten because he had borrowed some of the attributes of the Gallic solar deity, and he flourished the golden wheel in one hand and brandished the lightnings in the other. Juno had lent her name to a whole series of familiar spirits of the mountains and of the household, closely allied to the Proxumes, a set of domestic Brownies or Kobolds, who were chiefly adored and propitiated by the women, and who had no other temple than the hearth. At Tarasconum, the Phœnician goddess Britomartis reigned supreme, and her worship was stimulated by a grand annual procession and dramatic representation of her conquest over a dragon. At Nemausus the corresponding god of war was called Mars Britovius. But the Volcæ Arecomici were a peaceably-disposed people, and paid little devotion to the god of battles. The cult of the founder Nemausus did not flag, but that of Augustus was in the ascendant. All the freedmen were united in one great sodality under his invocation, and this guild represented an important political factor in the land. It had its religious officers, its flamines and seviri, attended by lictors, and the latter had charge of all the altars at the crossroads, and sat next to the civic functionaries in the courts, at banquets, in the theater. Rich citizens bequeathed large sums to the town and to the sodalities to be expended in public feasts, in largesses, and in gladiatorial shows. The charge of these bequests, as also their distribution, was in the hands of the flamines and seviri. The priesthood was, therefore, provided with the most powerful of all means for gaining and moving the multitude, which desired nothing better than bread and games.

“Have that door shut!” called the magistrate. “It bangs in this evil wind, and I cannot even hear what my excellent friend Lucius Smerius is saying in my ear; how then can I catch what is said in court?” Then, turning to the pontiff, he said: “I detest this weather. Last year, about this time, I was struck with an evil blast, and lost all sense of smell and taste for nine months. I had pains in my loins and an ache in all my bones. I doubt if even the jests of Baubo could have made me laugh; I was in lower dumps than even Ceres. Even now, when seated far too long in this marble chair, I get an ache across my back that assures me I am no longer young. But I could endure that if my sense of taste had been fully restored. I do not relish good wine as of old, and that is piteous, and I really at times think of suicide.”

“It was the work of enchantment,” said the pontiff. “These Christians, in their orgies, stick pins into images to produce pains in those the figures represent.”

“How do you know this? Have you been initiated into their mysteries?”

“I – ! The Immortals preserve me therefrom.”

“Then, by Pluto, you speak what you have heard of the gossips – old wives’ babble. I will tell you what my opinion is, Smerius. If you were to thrust your nose into the mysteries of the Bona Dea you would find – what? No more than did Clodius – nothing at all. My wife, she attends them, and comes home with her noddle full of all the tittle-tattle of Nemausus. It is so with the Christian orgies. I would not give a snap of the fingers for all the secrets confided to the initiated – neither in Eleusis nor in the Serapium, nor among the Christians.”

“These men are not like others; they are unsociable, brutish, arrogant.”

“Unsociable I allow. Brutish! The word is inapt; for, on the contrary, I find them very simple, soft-headed, pulp-hearted folk. They abstain from all that is boisterous and cruel. Arrogant they may be. There I am at one with you. ‘Live and let live’ is my maxim. We have a score of gods, home made and foreign, and they all rub and tumble together without squabbling. Of late we have had Madame Isis over from Egypt, and the White Ladies,11 and the Proxumes, Victoria Augusta, Venus, and Minerva, make room for her without even a frown on their divine faces. And imperial Rome sanctions all these devotions. Why, did not the god Augustus build a temple here to Nemausus and pay him divine honors, though he had never heard him named before? Now this Christian sect is exclusive. It will suffer no gods to stand beside Him whom they adore. He must reign alone. That I call illiberal, narrow-minded, against the spirit of the age and the principle of Roman policy. That is the reason why I dislike these Christians.”

“Here come the prisoners. My good friend, do not be too easy with them. It will not do. The temper of the people is up. The sodality of Augustus swear that they will not decree you a statue, and will oppose your nomination to the knighthood. They have joined hands with the Cultores Nemausi, and insist that proper retribution be administered to the transgressors, and that the girl be surrendered.”

“It shall be done; it shall be so,” said the Quatuorvir. Then, raising his hand to his mouth, and speaking behind it – not that in the roar of the wind such a precaution was necessary – he said to the pontiff: “My dear man, a magistrate has other matters to consider than pleasing the clubs. There is the prince over all, and he is on the way to Narbonese Gaul. It is whispered that he is favorably disposed towards this Nazarene sect.”

“The Augustus would not desire to have the laws set at naught, and the sodalities are rich enough to pay to get access to him and make their complaint.”

“Well, well, well! I cannot please all. I have to steer my course among shoals and rocks. Keep the question of Christianity in the background and charge on other grounds. That is my line. I will do my best to please all parties. We must have sport for the games. The rabble desire to have some one punished for spoiling their pet image. But, by the Twins, could not the poor god hold his own head on his shoulders? If he had been worth an as, he would have done so. But there, I nettle you. You shall be satisfied along with the rest. Bring up the prisoners: Quincta, widow of Aulus Harpinius Læto, first of all.”

The mother of Perpetua was led forward in a condition of terror that rendered her almost unconscious, and unable to sustain herself.

“Quincta,” said the magistrate, “have no fear for yourself. I have no desire to deal sharply with you; if you will inform us where is your daughter, you shall be dismissed forthwith.”

“I do not know – ” The poor woman could say no more.

“Give her a seat,” ordered Petronius. Then to the prisoner: “Compose yourself. No doubt that, as a mother, you desire to screen your daughter, supposing that her life is menaced. No such thing, madame. I have spoken with the priestess, and with my good friend here, Lucius Smerius, chief pontiff, Augustal flamen, and public haruspex.” He bowed to the priest at his side. “I am assured that the god, when he spoke, made no demand for a sacrifice. That is commuted. All he desires is that the young virgin should pass into his service, and be numbered among his priestesses.”

“She will not consent,” gasped Quincta.

“I hardly need to point out the honor and advantage offered her. The priestesses enjoy great favor with the people, have seats of honor at the theater, take a high position in all public ceremonies, and are maintained by rich endowments.”

“She will never consent,” repeated the mother.

“Of that we shall judge for ourselves. Where is the girl?”

“I do not know.”

“How so?”

“She has been carried away from me; I know not whither.”

“When the old ewe baas the lamb will bleat,” said the Quatuorvir. “We shall find the means to make you produce her. Lady Quincta, my duty compels me to send you back to prison. You shall be allowed two days’ respite. Unless, by the end of that time, you are able and willing to give us the requisite information, you will be put to the question, and I doubt not that a turn of the rack will refresh your memory and relax your tongue.”

“I cannot tell what I do not know.”

“Remove the woman.”

The magistrate leaned back, and turning his head to the pontiff, said: “Did not your worthy father, Spurius, die of a surfeit of octopus? I had a supper off the legs last night, and they made me sleep badly; they are no better than marine leather.” Then to the vigiles: “Bring forward Falerius Marcianus.”

The deacon was conducted before the magistrate. He was pale, and his lips ashen and compressed. His dark eyes turned in every direction. He was looking for kinsmen and patron.

“You are charged, Falerius, with having broken the image of the god whom Nemausus delights to honor, and who is the reputed founder of the city. You conveyed his head to the house of Baudillas, and several witnesses have deposed that you made boast that you had committed the sacrilegious act of defacing the statue. What answer make you to this?”

Marcianus replied in a low voice.

“Speak up,” said the magistrate; “I cannot hear thee, the wind blusters and bellows so loud.” Aside to the pontiff Smerius he added: “And ever since that evil blast you wot of, I have suffered from a singing in my ears.”

“I did it,” said the deacon. Again he looked about him, but saw none to support him.

“Then,” said the magistrate, “we shall at once conclude this matter. The outrage is too gross to be condoned or lightly punished. Even thy friends and kinsfolk have not appeared to speak for thee. Thy family has been one of dignity and authority in Nemausus. There have been members who have been clothed with the Quatuorvirate de aerario and have been accorded the use of a horse at public charge. Several have been decurions wearing the white toga and the purple stripe. This aggravates the impiety of your act. I sentence Cneius Falerius Marcianus, son of Marius Audolatius, of the Voltinian tribe, to be thrown to the beasts in the approaching show, and that his goods be confiscated, and that out of his property restitution be made, by which a new statue to the god Nemausus be provided, to be set up in the place of that injured by the same Cneius Falerius Marcianus.”

The deacon made an attempt to speak. He seemed overwhelmed with astonishment and dismay at the sentence, so utterly unexpected in its severity. He gesticulated and cried out, but the Quatuorvir was cold and weary. He had pronounced a sentence that would startle all the town, and he thought he had done enough.

“Remove him at once,” said he.

Then Petronius turned to the pontiff and said: “Now, my Smerius, what say you to this? Will not this content you and all the noisy rag-tag at your back?”

Next he commanded the rest of the prisoners to be brought forward together. This was a mixed number of poor persons, some women, some old men, boys, slaves and freedmen; none belonged to the upper class or even to that of the manufacturers and tradesmen.

“You are all dismissed,” said the magistrate. “The imprisonment you have undergone will serve as a warning to you not to associate with image-breakers, not to enter into sodalities which have not received the sanction of Cæsar, and which are not compatible with the well-being and quiet of the city and are an element of disturbance in the empire. Let us hear no more of this pestilent nonsense. Go – worship what god ye will – only not Christos.”

Then the lictors gathered around the Quatuorvir and the pontiff, who also rose, and extended his hand to assist the magistrate, who made wry faces as rheumatic twinges nipped his back.

“Come with me, Smerius,” said the Quatuorvir, “I have done the best for you that lay in my power. I hate unnecessary harshness. But this fellow, Falerius Marcianus, has deserved the worst. If the old woman be put on the rack and squeak out, and Marcianus be devoured by beasts, the people will have their amusement, and none can say that I have acted with excessive rigor – and, my dear man – not a word has been said about Christianity. The cases have been tried on other counts, do you see?” he winked. “Will you breakfast with me? There are mullets from the Satera, stewed in white wine – confound those octopi! – I feel them still.”

CHAPTER XXI

A MANUMISSION

“Blanda, what shall I do?”

Æmilius had withdrawn immediately after the interview in the citron-house, and Perpetua was left a prey to even greater distress of mind than before.

Accustomed to lean on her mother, she was now without support. She drew towards the female slave, who had a patient, gentle face, marked with suffering.

“Blanda, what shall I do?”

“Mistress, how can I advise? If you had been graciously pleased to take counsel of my master, he would have instructed you.”

“Alack! what I desire is to find my mother. If, as I suppose, she is in concealment in Nemausus, he will be unable to discover her. No clue will be put into his hand. He will be regarded with suspicion. He will search; I do not doubt his good will, but he will not find. Those who know where my mother is will look on him with suspicion. O Blanda, is there none in this house who believes, whom I could send to some of the Church?”

“Lady,” answered the slave, “there be no Christians here. There is a Jew, but he entertains a deadly hate of such as profess to belong to this sect. To the rest one religion is as indifferent as another. Some swear by the White Ladies, some by Serapis, and there is one who talks much of Mithras, but who this god is I know not.”

“If I am to obtain information it must be through some one who is to be trusted.”

“Lady,” said the woman-slave, “the master has given strict orders that none shall speak of you as having found a shelter here. Yet when slaves get together, by the Juno of the oaks, I believe men chatter and are greater magpies than we women; their tongues run away with them, especially when they taste wine. If one of the family were sent on this commission into the town, ten sesterces to an as, he would tell that you are here, and would return as owlish and ignorant as when he went forth. Men’s minds are cudgels, not awls. If thou desirest to find out a thing, trust a woman, not a man.”

“I cannot rest till I have news.”

“There has been a great search made after Christians, and doubtless she is, as thou sayest, in concealment, surely among friends. Have patience.”

“But, Blanda, she is in an agony of mind as to what has become of me.”

The slave-woman considered for awhile, and then said:

“There is a man who might help; he certainly can be relied on. He is of the strange sect I know, and he would do anything for me, and would betray no secrets.”

“Who is that?”

“His name is Pedo, and he is the slave to Baudillas Macer, son of Carisius Adgonna, who has a house in the lower town.”

“O Blanda!” exclaimed Perpetua, “it was from the house of Baudillas that I was enticed away.” Then, after some hesitation, she added: “That house, I believe, was invaded by the mob; but I think my mother had first escaped.”

“Lady, I have heard that Baudillas has been taken before the magistrate, and has been cast into the robur, because that in his house was found the head of the god; and it was supposed that he was guilty of the sacrilege, either directly or indirectly. He that harbors a thief is guilty as the thief. I heard that yesterday. No news has since been received. I mistrust my power of reaching the town, of standing against the gale. Moreover, as the master has been imprisoned, it is not likely that the slave will be in the empty house. Yet, if thou wilt tarry till the gale be somewhat abated and the rain cease to fall in such a rush, I will do my utmost to assist thee. I will go to the town myself, and communicate with Pedo, if I can find him. He will trust me, poor fellow!”

“I cannot require thee to go forth in this furious wind,” said Perpetua.

“And, lady, thou must answer to my master for me. Say that I went at thine express commands; otherwise I shall be badly beaten.”

“Is thy master so harsh?”

“Oh, I am a slave. Who thinks of a slave any more than of an ass or a lapdog? It was through a severe scourging with the cat that I was brought to know Pedo.”

“Tell me, how was that?”

“Does my lady care for matters that affect her slave?”

“Nay, good Blanda, we Christians know no difference between bond and free. All are the children of one God, who made man. Our master, though Lord of all, made Himself of no reputation, but took on Him the form of a servant; and was made subject for us.”

“That is just how Pedo talks. We slaves have our notions of freedom and equality, and there is much tall talk in the servants’ hall on the rights of man. But I never heard of a master or mistress holding such opinions.”

“Nevertheless this doctrine is a principle of our religion. Listen to this; the words are those of one of our great teachers: ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.’ ”

“Was he a slave who said that?”

“No; he was a Roman citizen.”

“That I cannot understand. Yet perhaps he spoke it at an election time, or when he was an advocate in the forum. It was a sentiment; very fine, smartly put, but not to be practiced.”

“There, Blanda, you are wrong. We Christians do act upon this principle, and it forms a bond of union between us.”

“Well, I understand it not. I have heard the slaves declaim among themselves, saying that they were as good as, nay, better than, their masters; but they never whispered such a thought where were their masters’ ears, or they would have been soundly whipped. In the forum, when lawyers harangue, they say fine things of this sort; and when candidates are standing for election, either as a sevir or as a quatuorvir, all sorts of fine words fly about, and magnificent promises are made, but they are intended only to tickle ears and secure votes. None believe in them save the vastly ignorant and the very fools.”

“Come, tell me about thyself and Pedo.”

“Ah, lady, that was many years ago. I was then in the household of Helvia Secundilla, wife of Calvius Naso. On one occasion, because I had not brought her May-dew wherewith to bathe her face to remove sun-spots, she had me cruelly beaten. There were knucklebones knotted in the cat wherewith I was beaten. Thirty-nine lashes I received. I could not collect May-dew, for the sky was overcast and the herb was dry. But she regarded not my excuse. Tullia, my fellow-slave, was more sly. She filled a flask at a spring and pretended that she had gathered it off the grass, and that her fraud might not be detected, she egged her mistress on against me. I was chastised till my back was raw.”

“Poor Blanda!”

“Aye, my back was one bleeding wound, and yet I was compelled to put on my garment and go forth again after May-dew. It was then that I encountered Pedo. I was in such pain that I walked sobbing, and my tears fell on the arid grass. He came to me, moved by compassion, and spoke kindly, and my heart opened, and I told him all. Then he gave me a flask filled with a water in which elder flowers had been steeped, and bade me wash my back therewith.”

“And it healed thee?”

“It soothed the fever of my blood and the anguish of my wounds. They closed, and in a few days were cicatriced. But Pedo had been fellow-slave with a Jewish physician, and from him had learned the use of simples. My mistress found no advantage from the spring-water brought her as May-dew. Then I offered her some of the decoction given me by Pedo, and that had a marvelous effect on her freckles. Afterwards her treatment of me was kinder, and it was Tullia who received the whippings.”

“And did you see more of Pedo?”

Blanda colored.

“Mistress, that was the beginning of our acquaintance. He was with a good master, Baudillas Macer, who, he said, would manumit him at any time. But, alas! what would that avail me? I remained in bondage. Ah, lady, Pedo regarded me with tenderness, and, indeed, I could have been happy with none other but him.”

“He is old and lame.”

“Ah, lady, I think the way he moves on his lame hip quite beautiful. I do not admire legs when one is of the same length as another – it gives a stiff uniformity not to my taste.”

“And he is old?”

“Ripe, lady – full ripe as a fig in August. Sour fruit are unpleasant to eat. Young men are prigs and think too much of themselves.”

“How long ago was it that this acquaintance began?”

“Five and twenty years. I trusted, when my master, Calvius Naso – he was so called because he really had a long nose, and my mistress was wont to tweak it – but there! I wander. I did think that he would have given me my freedom. In his illness I attended to him daily, nightly. I did not sleep, I was ever on the watch for him. As to my mistress, she was at her looking-glass, and using depilatory fluid on some hairs upon her chin, expecting shortly to be a widow. She did not concern herself about the master. He died, but left money only for the erection of a statue in the forum. Me he utterly forgot. Then my mistress sold me to the father of my present master. When he died also he manumitted eight slaves, but they were all men. His monument stands beside the road to Tolosa, with eight Phrygian caps sculptured on it, to represent the manumissions; but me – he forgot.”

“Then, for all these five and twenty years you have cared for Pedo and desired to be united to him!”

“Yes, I longed for it greatly for twenty years, and so did he, poor fellow; but, after that, hope died. I have now no hope, no joy in life, no expectation of aught. Presently will come death, and death ends all.”

“No, Blanda; that is not what we hold. We look for eternal life.”

“For masters, not for slaves.”

“For slaves as well as masters, and then God will wipe away all tears from our eyes.”

“Alack, mistress. The power to hope is gone from me. In a wet season, when there is little sun, then the fruit mildews on the tree and drops off. When we were young we put forth the young fruit of hopes; but there has been no sun. They fall off, and the tree can bear no more.”

“Blanda, if ever I have the power – ”

“Oh, mistress, with my master you can do anything.”

“Blanda, I do not know that I can ask him for this – thy freedom. But, if the opportunity offers, I certainly will not forget thee.”

A slave appeared at the door and signed to Blanda, who, with an obeisance, asked leave to depart. The leave was given, and she left the room.

Presently she returned in great excitement, followed by Baudillas and Pedo, both drenched with rain and battered by the gale.

Perpetua uttered an exclamation of delight, and rushed to the deacon with extended arms.

“I pray, I pray, give me some news of my mother.”

But he drew back likewise surprised, and replied with another question:

“The Lady Perpetua! And how come you to be here?”

“That I will tell later,” answered the girl. “Now inform me as to my mother.”

“Alas!” replied Baudillas, wiping the rain from his face, “the news is sad. She has been taken before Petronius, and has been consigned to prison.”

“My mother is in prison!”

The deacon desired to say no more, but he was awkward at disguising his unwillingness to speak the whole truth. The eager eyes of the girl read the hesitation in his face.

“I beseech you,” she urged, “conceal nothing from me.”

“I have told you, she is in jail.”

“On what charge? Who has informed against her?”

“I was not in the court when she was tried. I know very little. I was near the town, waiting about, and I got scraps of information from some of our people, and from Pedo, who went into the city.”

“Then you do know. Answer me truly. Tell me all.”

“I – I was in prison myself, but escaped through the aid of Pedo. I tarried in an old kiln. He advised that I should come on here, where he had friends. Dost thou know that Marcianus has been sentenced? He will win that glorious crown which I have lost. I – I, unworthy, I fled, when it might have been mine. Yet, God forgive me! I am not ungrateful to Pedo. Marcianus said I was a coward, and unfit for the Kingdom of God; that I should be excluded because I had turned back. God forgive me!”

Suddenly Perpetua laid hold of Baudillas by both arms, and so gripped him that the water oozed between her fingers and dropped on the floor.