A Captive of the Roman Eagles Part 14

Ah, my friend, with the feelings that come to me, I am often ashamed of the half century I bear with me. Fain would I sacrifice something to Anteros--most willingly my gray hairs!

A short time ago the little maid amazed us all (Saturninus was even more surprised than I; for I am already beginning to believe her almost supernatural) by showing strategic insight. It was mentioned that while making a tour on the southwestern wall I had saved her little hut from burning, while our cohorts usually flung the torch with eager zeal into the wooden houses of the Barbarians. Then Saturninus remarked that by accident another building had been spared, a house with a lofty gable roof rising on a hill farther toward the southwest. None of our reconnoitring parties had marched in that direction. My nephew called one of his men and ordered two of them to ride over the next day and burn the dwelling down.

Suddenly the girl, with flashing eyes, cried: "How stupid!" and laughed. Courtesy is not her favorite virtue, and she and my nephew waste little love on each other. "How stupid!" she repeated, "The building is very solid, the fence inclosing it very high; it is almost a citadel like your camp here; and it is between you and the lake--to which you must fly if my people come. You could fortify yourselves there again, if you are forced to leave here as the fox darts from its burrow."

Hercula.n.u.s laughed sneeringly; but Saturninus cast a glance from the top of the wall to that hill and the lofty building, and said in the quiet tone which quells contradiction: "I myself had resolved to have the dwelling burned to-morrow. But the child is right. The solid house will not be burned, but perhaps, later, occupied--when the ships arrive."

If those ships would only come! The eager Tribune is fairly consumed with impatience for action. Already he has gone across the lake repeatedly in a wretched rotting boat belonging to the Barbarians, which we found hidden among the thickest growth of rushes near Bissula's hut, and urged Nannienus to hasten. But the latter might truthfully say with Homer: "Why dost thou urge one who is willing?" We cannot make up in days for the neglect of months. The Emperor's own miserable officials do him more harm than the Barbarians. And we do not even know where these strange defenders of the country have vanished.

Ah, that reminds me of another anecdote of the little maid. How constantly she steals into my thoughts! Of course--in jest and earnest--we have tried to obtain information about the hiding--places of the enemy from the only captive of whose possession hitherto we can boast; but there we "victors" met with small success, as you may guess.

"Where are your heroes hiding?" I asked once laughing, toward the end of a meal in my tent. "Truly, their heroism is as hard to find as themselves."

"They will hardly have told this little maid," replied Saturninus. "For Barbarian women can probably keep secrets no better than Roman ones.

She does not know."

"Yes, she does!" cried the rogue, pouting defiantly.

"Indeed? Then we'll question you," I cried, "on the rack."

"That isn't necessary. I am willing to tell."

"Well, where are they?" asked the Tribune seriously.

She glided out of the tent, thrust her head saucily through the opening, and laughed mischievously: "They dwell with Odin and the nixie in the lake. Search for them there yourself!" And she vanished.

Her favorite resting-place is at the foot of a huge pine-tree; it is sacred, dedicated to a German G.o.ddess who, according to the description, probably corresponds with Isis. I have repeatedly found her there. Once she was swinging among the branches like a little bird.

She begged me not to betray her hiding-place to the others--the Tribune and my nephew. She often liked to dream there all alone. Well, I certainly shall not betray her. If _I_ know where to look for her, the others shall not find her against her will.

IV. BEFORE THE KALENDS OF SEPTEMBER.

I regretted the artist's absence a short time since, and cannot get him to come here. But perhaps Bissula will go later to the artist, to Burdigala. How I wished it long ago! Oh, Paulus, if only I could show her to you! The more I write of her and think of her, the more she pleases me. Or perhaps the contrary is the case. I will write and think of her no more.

You will not believe, my dear friend, how much I enjoy the military life I have not witnessed for so long. I understand little about it, but the pomp and pride and power of war stir me very strongly.

It is a pleasure to see the rule of a man like Saturninus. He cannot scan a verse of Alcaeus, but he knows how to arrange a camp according to the demands and advantages of the location, better than I can write an Alcaean strophe. Here, on this steep hillside in the midst of the Barbarian forests, he had applied Frontinus's rules to the given s.p.a.ce most admirably. It would please an old soldier like you to see our camp, the strength of wall and moat, the arrangement of the s.p.a.ces between the tents, the distribution of horse and foot-soldiers, luggage, and camp followers.

III. BEFORE THE KALENDS OF SEPTEMBER.

And why should you not see it? For what purpose has Athene or the clever Ph[oe]nicians taught us the art of writing? I begged Saturninus to dictate to his fat slave scribe a sketch of our whole camp, with all the points important for defence and the distribution of our troops. I will put it on the papyrus.

How stately is the entrance! Four squadrons of mailed warriors at the Porta Dec.u.mana, and all the baggage also piled up there. The wall eight feet high; the ditch five feet deep. The weakest point is the northwest corner, so the best troops are there: Batavian and spearmen of the Emperor's Thracian Guard: etc.

I will not repeat here in detail what the inclosure will contain; but the paper is not yet finished. He has taken it away to make the drawing more accurate.

II. BEFORE THE KALENDS OF SEPTEMBER.

Ah, what avails dissimulation, playing hide and seek with myself? If you drive her out with a pitchfork, Nature will always return, says the Bandusian fellow. I am trying to make you--and myself--believe that my thoughts are on ditch and wall and mailed soldiers. It is not true. I think only of the little maid. Her image alone hovers before my eyes day and night. It is already half decided that you shall see her.

When this expedition is over, I at any rate shall return to Gaul, perhaps the whole army; for the Emperor Valens seems to be able to deal with the Goths without needing our aid; he does not ask for us. Then I can take the little maid as my guest for a short visit to Burdigala.

True, she is still considered the Tribune's slave. It is an odd caprice of the valiant soldier. No, no, my Paulus! It is not what you suppose that influences him. I have watched him suspiciously, almost jealously, as sharply as a father--or can it be a lover? But I did him injustice--or too much honor? He has nothing in his head except those invisible Alemanni and our ships, still delayed at Arbor.

Yet why only for a visit? Why should she not remain in my house always to beautify my advancing years with the roseate dawn of her youth?

Yes. Eos, Aurora: it is a fitting symbol for her. So young, so full of the dewy freshness of the morning, with her ruddy curling locks floating saucily around her.

Perhaps, now that she has grown more sensible, she will joyfully accept the offer I made when she was a child: to go with me as my adopted daughter.--Daughter? That is not the right word; no longer the right word: she has blossomed into womanhood: I should not think of lifting her on my knee, as I did years ago. She has become too mature.

And I am still too young to regard her only as a daughter.--Rather as a brother, her loving brother who rejoices in her beauty. No, it will not do.

A short time ago her round arm brushed me (the German women go with bare arms); a fiery thrill darted through my veins. I can scarcely doubt it, I---

My feelings for her do not concern other people. I might at any rate first take her with me--and then adopt her? No matter what the legal form may be, I am determined to keep her near me always.

I can no longer do without her charming presence; everything would grow dark and cold. Already I shiver at the thought of again living alone with the icy-hearted Hercula.n.u.s.

She has become my muse! A barbarian one, do you scoff? Aha, are these lines so barbaric?

"Incarnate joy! Caressing bliss! O thou embodiment of sportive grace!

How the Barbarian maid the fair ones of Latium hath vanquished!

Bissula! Plebeian her name may sound in the ears of aliens: But to Ausonius it echoes with harmonies sweet and bewitching."

CHAPTER XXIV.

It is useless to conceal it from myself any longer, and what I admit to myself must also be confessed to you, my Paulus, my second self, at the same moment. Alas, I fear you read it long ago from these words in prose and verse.

I beseech you not to shake your cool, cautious head as usual over your "too youthful" Ausonius: I hope my heart will throb warmly till it ceases to beat.

I know all you will say--of course against it. For you would speak in favor only if you had seen her. Yet I rejoice that you are not here: I have no desire to be warned.

True, it is one thing to toy with the sweet illusion within my own breast and to the friend who will keep my secret; and quite another to transfer it to practical reality.

My thoughts are contradictory. I am fifty--ah no; fifty-two years old!

But what happiness it will be for the young girl to share not only my wealth but the whole Latin civilization with me! She is a pagan. Pshaw!

The baptismal water will no more wash away her charm than it has driven the pagan Muses from me. She can believe after baptism precisely what she believed before. And she shall offer sacrifices to golden Aphrodite and to Hymen!

I hesitate. She is very fond of me, but I often find her dreaming, gazing out with yearning eyes beyond the walls of the camp: strangely enough, it is not eastward in the direction of her home, but always toward the northwest. At that point the wall rises almost to the height of her huge pine tree, whose branches reach the ground: I again found her hidden among them yesterday. She climbs so far up among the boughs that she can look over the wall to the distant hills, and hides among the dense foliage like a martin.