A Victor of Salamis
“My Lord, as always,” was his parting compliment, “has shown himself
exceeding wise.”
Thus the Oriental went. In what a mood Democrates passed the remaining day
needs only scant wits to guess. Clearer, clearer in his ears was ringing
Æschylus’s song of the Furies. He could not silence it.
“With scourge and with ban
We prostrate the man
Who with smooth-woven wile
And a fair-facèd smile
Hath planted a snare for his friend!
Though fleet, we shall find him;
Though strong, we shall bind him,
Who planted a snare for his friend!”
He had intended to be loyal to Hellas,—to strive valiantly for her
freedom,—and now! Was the Nemesis coming upon him, not in one great clap,
but stealthily, finger by finger, cubit by cubit, until his soul’s price
was to be utterly paid? Was this the beginning of the recompense for the
night scene at Colonus?
The next morning he made a formal visit to the shrine of the Furies in the
hill of Areopagus. “An old vow, too long deferred in payment, taken when
he joined in his first contest on the Bema,” he explained to friends, when
he visited this uncanny spot.
Few were the Athenians who would pass that cleft in the Areopagus where
the “Avengers” had their grim sanctuary without a quick motion of the
hands to avert the evil eye. Thieves and others of evil conscience would
make a wide circuit rather than pass this abode of Alecto, Megæra, and
Tisiphone, pitiless pursuers of the guilty. The terrible sisters hounded a
man through life, and after death to the judgment bar of Minos. With
reason, therefore, the guilty dreaded them.
Democrates had brought the proper sacrifices—two black rams, which were
duly slaughtered upon the little altar before the shrine and sprinkled
with sweetened water. The priestess, a gray hag herself, asked her visitor
if he would enter the cavern and proffer his petition to the mighty
goddesses. Leaving his friends outside, the orator passed through the door
which the priestess seemed to open in the side of the cave. He saw only a
jagged, unhewn cranny, barely tall enough for a man to stand upright and
reaching far into the sculptured rock. No image: only a few rough votive
tablets set up by a grateful suppliant for some mercy from the awful
goddesses.
“If you would pray here, _kyrie_,” said the hag, “it is needful that I go
forth and close the door. The holy Furies love the dark, for is not their
home in Tartarus?”
She went forth. As the light vanished, Democrates seemed buried in the
rock. Out of the blackness spectres were springing against him. From a
cleft he heard a flapping, a bat, an imprisoned bird, or Alecto’s direful
wings. He held his hands downward, for he had to address infernal
goddesses, and prayed in haste.
“O ye sisters, terrible yet gracious, give ear. If by my offerings I have
found favour, lift from my heart this crushing load. Deliver me from the
fear of the blood guilty. Are ye not divine? Do not the immortals know all
things? Ye know, then, how I was tempted, how sore was the compulsion, and
how life and love were sweet. Then spare me. Give me back unhaunted
slumber. Deliver me from Lycon. Give my soul peace,—and in reward, I swear
it by the Styx, by Zeus’s own oath, I will build in your honour a temple
by your sacred field at Colonus, where men shall gather to reverence you
forever.”
But here he ceased. In the darkness moved something white. Again a
flapping. He was sure the white thing was Glaucon’s face. Glaucon had
perished at sea. He had never been buried, so his ghost was wandering over
the world, seeking vainly for rest. It all came to Democrates in an
instant. His knees smote together; his teeth chattered. He sprang back
upon the door and forced it open, but never saw the dove that fluttered
forth with him.
“A hideous place!” he cried to his waiting friends. “A man must have a
stronger heart than mine to love to tarry after his prayer is finished.”
Only a few days later Hellas was startled to hear that Tempē had been
evacuated without a blow, and the pass left open to Xerxes. It was said
Democrates, in his ever commendable activity, had discovered at the last
moment the mountain wall was not as defensible as hoped, and any
resistance would have been disastrous. Therefore, whilst the retreat was
bewailed, everybody praised the foresight of the orator. Everybody—one
should say, except two, Bias and Phormio. They had many conferences
together, especially after the coming and going of Hiram.
“There is a larger tunny in the sea than yet has entered the meshes,”
confessed the fishmonger, sorely puzzled, after much vain talk.
But Hermione was caring for none of these things. Her hands were busy with
the swaddling clothes. Her thoughts only for that wicker cradle which
swung betwixt the pillars, where Hermippus’s house looked toward Salamis.
CHAPTER XIX
THE COMMANDMENT OF XERXES
It is easy to praise the blessings of peace. Still easier to paint the
horrors of war,—and yet war will remain for all time the greatest game at
which human wits can play. For in it every form of courage, physical and
moral, and every talent are called into being. If war at once develops the
bestial, it also develops as promptly the heroic. Alone of human
activities it demands a brute’s strength, an iron will, a serpent’s
intellect, a lion’s courage—all in one. And of him who has these things in
justest measure, history writes, “He conquered.” It was because Mardonius
seemed to possess all these, to foresee everything, to surmount
everything, that Glaucon despaired for the fate of Hellas, even more than
when he beheld the crushing armaments of the Persian.
Yet for long it seemed as if the host would march even to Athens without
battle, without invoking Mardonius’s skill. The king crossed Thrace and
Macedonia, meeting only trembling hospitality from the cities along his
route. At Doriscus he had held a review of his army, and smiled when the
fawning scribes told how one million seven hundred thousand foot and
eighty thousand horse followed his banners.(8) Every fugitive and spy from
southern Hellas told how the hearts of the stanchest patriots were
sinking, how everywhere save in Athens and Sparta loud voices urged the
sending of “earth and water,”—tokens of submission to the irresistible
king. At the pass of Tempē covering Thessaly, Glaucon, who knew the hopes
of Themistocles, had been certain the Hellenes would make a stand. Rumour
had it that ten thousand Greek infantry were indeed there, and ready for
battle. But the outlaw’s expectations were utterly shattered. To the
disgust of the Persian lords, who dearly loved brisk fighting, it was soon
told how the cowardly Hellenes had fled by ship, leaving the rich plains
of Thessaly bare to the invader.
Thus was blasted Glaucon’s last hope. Hellas was doomed. He almost looked
to see Themistocles coming as ambassador to bring the homage of Athens.
Since his old life seemed closed to the outlaw, he allowed Mardonius to
have his will with him,—to teach him to act, speak, think, as an Oriental.
He even bowed himself low before the king, an act rewarded by being
commanded one evening to play at dice with majesty itself. Xerxes was
actually gracious enough to let his new subject win from him three
handsome Syrian slave-boys.
“You Hellenes are becoming wise,” announced the monarch one day, when the
Locrian envoys came with their earth and water. “If you can learn to speak
the truth, you will equal even the virtues of the Aryans.”
“Your Majesty has not found me a liar,” rejoined the Athenian, warmly.
“You gather our virtues apace. I must consider how I can reward you by
promotion.”
“The king is overwhelmingly generous. Already I fear many of his servants
mutter that I am promoted beyond all desert.”
“Mutter? mutter against you?” The king’s eyes flashed ominously. “By
Mazda, it is against me, then, who advanced you! Hearken, Otanes,”—he
addressed the general of the Persian footmen, who stood near by,—“who are
the disobedient slaves who question my advancement of Prexaspes?”
The general—he had been the loudest grumbler—bowed and kissed the carpet.
“None, your Eternity; on the contrary, there is not one Aryan in the host
who does not rejoice the king has found so noble an object for his godlike
bounty.”
“You hear, Prexaspes,” said Xerxes, mollified. “I am glad, for the man who
questions my wisdom touching your advancement must be impaled. To-morrow
is my birthday, you will not fail to sit with the other great lords at the
banquet.”
“The king overpowers me with his goodness.”
“Do not fail to deserve it. Mardonius is always praising you. Consider
also how much better it is to depend on a gracious king than on the
clamour of the fickle mob that rules in your helpless cities!”
* * * * * * *
The next morning was the royal birthday. The army, pitched in the fertile
plain by Thessalian Larissa, feasted on the abundance at hand. The king
distributed huge largesses of money. All day long he sat in his
palace-like tent, receiving congratulations from even the lowest of his
followers, and bound in turn not to reject any reasonable petition. The
Magi sacrificed blooded stallions and rare spices to Mithra the “Lord of
Wide Pastures,” to Vohu-Manu the “Holy Councillor,” and all their other
angels, desiring them to bless the arms of the king.
The “Perfect Banquet” of the birthday came in the evening. It hardly
differed from the feast at Sardis. The royal pavilion had its poles plated
with silver, the tapestries were green and purple, the couches were spread
with gorgeous coverlets. Only the drinking was more moderate, the
ceremonial less rigid. The fortunate guests devoured dainties reserved for
the special use of royalty: the flour of the bread was from Assos, the
wine from Helbon, the water to dilute the wine had come in silver flasks
from the Choaspes by Susa. The king even distributed the special unguent
of lion’s fat and palm wine which no subject, unpermitted, could use and
shun the death penalty.
Then at the end certain of the fairest of the women came and danced
unveiled before the king—this one night when they might show forth their
beauty. And last of all danced Roxana. She danced alone; a diaphanous
drapery of pink Egyptian cotton blew around her as an evening cloud. From
her black hair shone the diamond coronet. To the sensuous swing of the
music she wound in and out before the king and his admiring lords,
advancing, retreating, rising, swaying, a paragon of agility and grace,
feet, body, hands, weaving their charm together. When at the end she fell
on her knees before the king, demanding whether she had done well, the
applause shook the pavilion. The king looked down on her, smiling.
“Rise, sister of Mardonius. All Eran rejoices in you to-night. And on this
evening whose request can I fail to grant? Whose can I grant more gladly
than yours? Speak; you shall have it, though it be for half my kingdoms.”
The dancer arose, but hung down her flashing coronal. Her blush was
enchanting. She stood silent, while the good-humoured king smiled down on
her, till Artazostra came from her seat by Mardonius and whispered in her
ear. Every neck in the crowded pavilion was craned as Artazostra spoke to
Xerxes.
“May it please my royal brother, this is the word of Roxana. ‘I love my
brother Mardonius; nevertheless, contrary to the Persian custom, he keeps
me now to my nineteenth year unwedded. If now I have found favour in the
sight of the king, let him command Mardonius to give me to some noble
youth who shall do me honour by the valiant deeds and the true service he
shall render unto my Lord.’ ”