Ben-Hur: A tale of the Christ
wings, into horrible battle had, for the time, nothing to do with his
thoughts. The things thus in hope were unmixed with doubts—they WERE.
Hence his joy so full, so perfect, there was no room in his heart for
revenge. Messala, Gratus, Rome, and all the bitter, passionate memories
connected with them, were as dead plagues—miasms of the earth above
which he floated, far and safe, listening to singing stars.
The deeper darkness before the dawn was upon the waters, and all things
going well with the Astroea, when a man, descending from the deck,
walked swiftly to the platform where the tribune slept, and awoke him.
Arrius arose, put on his helmet, sword, and shield, and went to the
commander of the marines.
“The pirates are close by. Up and ready!” he said, and passed to the
stairs, calm, confident, insomuch that one might have thought, “Happy
fellow! Apicius has set a feast for him.”
CHAPTER V
Every soul aboard, even the ship, awoke. Officers went to their
quarters. The marines took arms, and were led out, looking in all
respects like legionaries. Sheaves of arrows and armfuls of javelins
were carried on deck. By the central stairs the oil-tanks and
fire-balls were set ready for use. Additional lanterns were lighted.
Buckets were filled with water. The rowers in relief assembled under
guard in front of the chief. As Providence would have it, Ben-Hur was
one of the latter. Overhead he heard the muffled noises of the final
preparations—of the sailors furling sail, spreading the nettings,
unslinging the machines, and hanging the armor of bull-hide over the
side. Presently quiet settled about the galley again; quiet full of
vague dread and expectation, which, interpreted, means READY.
At a signal passed down from the deck, and communicated to the hortator
by a petty officer stationed on the stairs, all at once the oars
stopped.
What did it mean?
Of the hundred and twenty slaves chained to the benches, not one but
asked himself the question. They were without incentive. Patriotism,
love of honor, sense of duty, brought them no inspiration. They felt
the thrill common to men rushed helpless and blind into danger. It may
be supposed the dullest of them, poising his oar, thought of all that
might happen, yet could promise himself nothing; for victory would but
rivet his chains the firmer, while the chances of the ship were his;
sinking or on fire, he was doomed to her fate.
Of the situation without they might not ask. And who were the enemy?
And what if they were friends, brethren, countrymen? The reader,
carrying the suggestion forward, will see the necessity which governed
the Roman when, in such emergencies, he locked the hapless wretches to
their seats.
There was little time, however, for such thought with them. A sound
like the rowing of galleys astern attracted Ben-Hur, and the Astroea
rocked as if in the midst of countering waves. The idea of a fleet at
hand broke upon him—a fleet in manoeuvre—forming probably for attack.
His blood started with the fancy.
Another signal came down from the deck. The oars dipped, and the galley
started imperceptibly. No sound from without, none from within, yet
each man in the cabin instinctively poised himself for a shock; the
very ship seemed to catch the sense, and hold its breath, and go
crouched tiger-like.
In such a situation time is inappreciable; so that Ben-Hur could form
no judgment of distance gone. At last there was a sound of trumpets on
deck, full, clear, long blown. The chief beat the sounding-board until
it rang; the rowers reached forward full length, and, deepening the dip
of their oars, pulled suddenly with all their united force. The galley,
quivering in every timber, answered with a leap. Other trumpets joined
in the clamor—all from the rear, none forward—from the latter quarter
only a rising sound of voices in tumult heard briefly. There was a
mighty blow; the rowers in front of the chief’s platform reeled, some
of them fell; the ship bounded back, recovered, and rushed on more
irresistibly than before. Shrill and high arose the shrieks of men in
terror; over the blare of trumpets, and the grind and crash of the
collision, they arose; then under his feet, under the keel, pounding,
rumbling, breaking to pieces, drowning, Ben-Hur felt something
overridden. The men about him looked at each other afraid. A shout of
triumph from the deck—the beak of the Roman had won! But who were they
whom the sea had drunk? Of what tongue, from what land were they?
No pause, no stay! Forward rushed the Astroea; and, as it went, some
sailors ran down, and plunging the cotton balls into the oil-tanks,
tossed them dripping to comrades at the head of the stairs: fire was to
be added to other horrors of the combat.
Directly the galley heeled over so far that the oarsmen on the
uppermost side with difficulty kept their benches. Again the hearty
Roman cheer, and with it despairing shrieks. An opposing vessel, caught
by the grappling-hooks of the great crane swinging from the prow, was
being lifted into the air that it might be dropped and sunk.
The shouting increased on the right hand and on the left; before,
behind, swelled an indescribable clamor. Occasionally there was a
crash, followed by sudden peals of fright, telling of other ships
ridden down, and their crews drowned in the vortexes.
Nor was the fight all on one side. Now and then a Roman in armor was
borne down the hatchway, and laid bleeding, sometimes dying, on the
floor.
Sometimes, also, puffs of smoke, blended with steam, and foul with the
scent of roasting human flesh, poured into the cabin, turning the
dimming light into yellow murk. Gasping for breath the while, Ben-Hur
knew they were passing through the cloud of a ship on fire, and burning
up with the rowers chained to the benches.
The Astroea all this time was in motion. Suddenly she stopped. The oars
forward were dashed from the hands of the rowers, and the rowers from
their benches. On deck, then, a furious trampling, and on the sides a
grinding of ships afoul of each other. For the first time the beating
of the gavel was lost in the uproar. Men sank on the floor in fear or
looked about seeking a hiding-place. In the midst of the panic a body
plunged or was pitched headlong down the hatchway, falling near
Ben-Hur. He beheld the half-naked carcass, a mass of hair blackening
the face, and under it a shield of bull-hide and wicker-work—a
barbarian from the white-skinned nations of the North whom death had
robbed of plunder and revenge. How came he there? An iron hand had
snatched him from the opposing deck—no, the Astroea had been boarded!
The Romans were fighting on their own deck? A chill smote the young
Jew: Arrius was hard pressed—he might be defending his own life. If he
should be slain! God of Abraham forefend! The hopes and dreams so
lately come, were they only hopes and dreams? Mother and
sister—house—home—Holy Land—was he not to see them, after all? The
tumult thundered above him; he looked around; in the cabin all was
confusion—the rowers on the benches paralyzed; men running blindly
hither and thither; only the chief on his seat imperturbable, vainly
beating the sounding-board, and waiting the orders of the tribune—in
the red murk illustrating the matchless discipline which had won the
world.
The example had a good effect upon Ben-Hur. He controlled himself
enough to think. Honor and duty bound the Roman to the platform; but
what had he to do with such motives then? The bench was a thing to run
from; while, if he were to die a slave, who would be the better of the
sacrifice? With him living was duty, if not honor. His life belonged to
his people. They arose before him never more real: he saw them, their
arms outstretched; he heard them imploring him. And he would go to
them. He started—stopped. Alas! a Roman judgment held him in doom.
While it endured, escape would be profitless. In the wide, wide earth
there was no place in which he would be safe from the imperial demand;
upon the land none, nor upon the sea. Whereas he required freedom
according to the forms of law, so only could he abide in Judea and
execute the filial purpose to which he would devote himself: in other
land he would not live. Dear God! How he had waited and watched and
prayed for such a release! And how it had been delayed! But at last he
had seen it in the promise of the tribune. What else the great man’s
meaning? And if the benefactor so belated should now be slain! The dead
come not back to redeem the pledges of the living. It should not
be—Arrius should not die. At least, better perish with him than survive
a galley-slave.
Once more Ben-Hur looked around. Upon the roof of the cabin the battle
yet beat; against the sides the hostile vessels yet crushed and grided.
On the benches, the slaves struggled to tear loose from their chains,
and, finding their efforts vain, howled like madmen; the guards had
gone upstairs; discipline was out, panic in. No, the chief kept his
chair, unchanged, calm as ever—except the gavel, weaponless. Vainly
with his clangor he filled the lulls in the din. Ben-Hur gave him a
last look, then broke away—not in flight, but to seek the tribune.
A very short space lay between him and the stairs of the hatchway aft.
He took it with a leap, and was half-way up the steps—up far enough to
catch a glimpse of the sky blood-red with fire, of the ships alongside,
of the sea covered with ships and wrecks, of the fight closed in about
the pilot’s quarter, the assailants many, the defenders few—when
suddenly his foothold was knocked away, and he pitched backward. The
floor, when he reached it, seemed to be lifting itself and breaking to
pieces; then, in a twinkling, the whole after-part of the hull broke
asunder, and, as if it had all the time been lying in wait, the sea,
hissing and foaming, leaped in, and all became darkness and surging
water to Ben-Hur.
It cannot be said that the young Jew helped himself in this stress.
Besides his usual strength, he had the indefinite extra force which
nature keeps in reserve for just such perils to life; yet the darkness,
and the whirl and roar of water, stupefied him. Even the holding his
breath was involuntary.
The influx of the flood tossed him like a log forward into the cabin,
where he would have drowned but for the refluence of the sinking
motion. As it was, fathoms under the surface the hollow mass vomited
him forth, and he arose along with the loosed debris. In the act of
rising, he clutched something, and held to it. The time he was under
seemed an age longer than it really was; at last he gained the top;
with a great gasp he filled his lungs afresh, and, tossing the water
from his hair and eyes, climbed higher upon the plank he held, and
looked about him.
Death had pursued him closely under the waves; he found it waiting for
him when he was risen—waiting multiform.
Smoke lay upon the sea like a semitransparent fog, through which here
and there shone cores of intense brilliance. A quick intelligence told
him that they were ships on fire. The battle was yet on; nor could he
say who was victor. Within the radius of his vision now and then ships
passed, shooting shadows athwart lights. Out of the dun clouds farther
on he caught the crash of other ships colliding. The danger, however,
was closer at hand. When the Astroea went down, her deck, it will be
recollected, held her own crew, and the crews of the two galleys which
had attacked her at the same time, all of whom were ingulfed. Many of
them came to the surface together, and on the same plank or support of
whatever kind continued the combat, begun possibly in the vortex
fathoms down. Writhing and twisting in deadly embrace, sometimes
striking with sword or javelin, they kept the sea around them in