A Victor of Salamis Part 26

CHAPTER XVI

THE COMING OF XERXES THE G.o.d-KING

At last the lotus-eating ended. Repeated messengers told how Xerxes was quitting Babylon, was holding a muster in Cappadocia, and now was crossing Asia Minor toward Sardis. Mardonius and his companions had returned to that capital. Daily the soldiery poured into Sardis by tens of thousands.

Glaucon knew now it was not a vain boast that for ten years the East had been arming against h.e.l.las, that the whole power of the twenty satrapies would be flung as one thunderbolt upon devoted Greece.

In the plain about Sardis a second city was rising, of wicker booths and gay pavilions. The host grew hourly. Now a band of ebony archers in leopard skins entered from far Ethiopia, now Bactrian battle-axemen, now yellow-faced Tartars from the northeast, now bright-turbaned Arabs upon their swaying camels,-Syrians, Cilicians, black-bearded a.s.syrians and Babylonians, thick-lipped Egyptians, came, and many a strange race more.

But the core of the army were the serried files of Aryan horse and foot,-blond-headed, blue-eyed men, Persians and Medes, veterans of twenty victories. Their muscles were tempered steel. Their unwearying feet had tramped many a long parasang. Some were light infantry with wicker shields and powerful bows, but as many more hors.e.m.e.n in gold-scaled armour and with desert steeds that flew like Pegasus.

"The finest cavalry in the world!" Mardonius vaunted, and his guest durst not answer nay.

Satrap after satrap came. When at last a foaming Arab galloping to the castle proclaimed, "Next morn the Lord of the World will enter Sardis,"

Glaucon could scarce have looked for a greater, though he had expected Cronian Zeus himself.

Mardonius, as "bow-bearer to the king," a semi-regal office, rode forth a stage to meet the sovran. The streets of Sardis were festooned with flowers. Thousands of spearmen held back the crowds. The Athenian stood beside Roxana and Artazostra at the upper window of a Lydian merchant prince, and his eyes missed nothing.

Never had the two women seemed lovelier than when their hearts ran out to their approaching king. He felt now the power of personal sovranty, how these children of the East awaited not Xerxes the Master, but Xerxes the Omnipotent, G.o.d-Manifest, whose decrees were as the decrees of Heaven. And their awe could not fail to awe the Athenian.

At noon the mult.i.tude caught the first token of the king. Down the road, through the gate, walked a man, bare-headed, bare-footed, alone,-Artaphernes, despot of all Lydia, going to pay his abject homage.

Presently the eunuch priests of Cybele, perched above the gate, clashed their cymbals and raised their hymn of welcome. To the boom of drums the thousand chosen cavalry and as many picked footmen of the Life Guard entered, tall, magnificent soldiers,-caps and spear b.u.t.ts shining with gold. After these a gilded car drawn by the eight sacred horses, each milk-white, and on the car an altar bearing the eternal fire of Mazda.

Then, each in his flashing chariot, moved the "Six Princes," the heads of the great clans of the Achaemenians, then two hundred led desert horses, in splendid trappings, and then-after a long interval, that the host might cast no dust upon its lord, rode a single horseman on a jet-black steed, Artaba.n.u.s-the king's uncle and vizier. He beckoned to the people.

"Have fear, Lydians, the giver of breath to all the world comes now beneath your gates!"

The lines of soldiers flung down their spears and dropped upon their knees. The mult.i.tude imitated. A chariot came running behind four of the sacred steeds of Nisaea,-their coats were like new snow, their manes braided with gold thread, bridle, bits, pole, baseboard, shone with gems and the royal metal. The wheel was like the sun. A girl-like youth guided the crimson reins, a second held the tall green parasol. Its shadow did not hide the commanding figure upon the car. Glaucon looked hard. No mistaking-Xerxes was here, the being who could say to millions "Die!" and they perished like worms; in verity "G.o.d-Manifest."

For in looks Xerxes, son of Darius, was surely the Great King. A figure of august height was set off n.o.bly by the flowing purple caftan and the purple cap which crowned the curling black hair. The riches of satrapies were in the rubies and topazes on sword sheath and baldric. The head was raised. The face was not regular, but of a proud, aquiline beauty. The skin was olive, the eyes dark, a little pensive. If there were weak lines about the mouth, the curling beard covered them. The king looked straight on, unmoved by the kneeling thousands, but as he came abreast of the balcony, chance made him look upward. Perhaps the sight of the beautiful Greek caused Xerxes to smile winsomely. The smile of a G.o.d can intoxicate.

Caught away from himself, Glaucon the Alcmaeonid joined in the great salvo of cheering.

"Victory to Xerxes! Let the king of kings reign forever!"

The chariot was gone almost instantly, a vast retinue-cooks, eunuchs, grooms, hunters, and many closed litters bearing the royal concubines-followed, but all these pa.s.sed before Glaucon shook off the spell the sight of royalty cast on him.

That night in the palace Xerxes gave a feast in honour of the new campaign. The splendours of a royal banquet in the East need no retelling.

Silver lamps, carpets of Kerman rugs or of the petals of fresh roses, a thousand lutes and dulcimers, precious Helbon wine flowing like water, cups of Phnician crystal, tables groaning with wild boars roasted whole, dancing women none too modest,-these were but the incidentals of a gorgeous confusion. To Glaucon, with the chaste loveliness of the Panathenaea before his mind, the scene was one of vast wonderment but scarcely of pleasure. The Persian did nothing by halves. In battle a hero, at his cups he became a satyr. Many of the scenes before the guests emptied the last of the tall silver tankards were indescribable.

On the high dais above the roaring hall sat Xerxes the king,-adored, envied, pitiable.

When Spitames, the seneschal, brought him the cup, the bearer bowed his face, not daring to look on his dread lord's eyes.

When Artaba.n.u.s, the vizier, approached with a message, he first kissed the carpet below the dais.

When Hydarnes, commander of the Life Guard, drew near to receive the watchword for the night, he held his mantle before his mouth, lest his breath pollute the world monarch.

Yet of all forms of seeming prosperity wherewith Fate can curse a man, the worst was the curse of Xerxes. To be called "G.o.d" when one is finite and mortal; to have no friends, but only a hundred million slaves; to be denied the joys of honest wish and desire because there were none left unsatisfied; to have one's hastiest word proclaimed as an edict of deity; never to be suffered to confess a mistake, cost what the blunder might, that the "king of kings" might seem lifted above all human error; in short, to be the bondsman of one's own deification,-this was the hard captivity of the lord of the twenty satrapies.

For Xerxes the king was a man,-of average instincts, capacities, goodness, wickedness. A G.o.d or a genius could have risen above his fearful isolation. Xerxes was neither. The iron ceremonial of the Persian court left him of genuine pleasures almost none. Something novel, a rare sensation, an opportunity to vary the dreary monotony of splendour by an astounding act of generosity or an act of frightful cruelty,-it mattered little which,-was s.n.a.t.c.hed at by the king with childlike eagerness. And this night Xerxes was in an unwontedly gracious mood. At his elbow, as he sat on the throne cased with lapis lazuli and onyx, waited the one man who came nearest to being a friend and not a slave,-Mardonius, son of Gobryas, the bow-bearer,-and therefore more ent.i.tled than any other prince of the Persians to stand on terms of intimacy with his lord.

While Spitames pa.s.sed the wine, the king hearkened with condescending and approving nod to the report of the Prince as to his mad adventure in h.e.l.las. Xerxes even reproved his brother-in-law mildly for hazarding his own life and that of his wife among those stiff-necked tribesmen who were so soon to taste the Aryan might.

"It was in your service, Omnipotence," the Prince was rejoining blandly; "what if not I alone, but a thousand others of the n.o.blest of the Persians and the Medes may perish, if only the glory of their king is advanced?"

"n.o.bly said; you are a faithful slave, Mardonius. I will remember you when I have burned Athens."

He even reached forth and stroked the bow-bearer's hand, a condescension which made the footstool-bearer, parasol-bearer, quiver-bearer, and a dozen great lords more gnaw their lips with envy. Hydarnes, the commander who had waited an auspicious moment, now thought it safe to kneel on the lowest step of the throne.

"Omnipotence, I am constrained to tell you that certain miserable h.e.l.lenes have been seized in the camp to-night-spies sent to pry out your power. Do you deign to have them impaled, crucified, or cast into the adders' cage?"

The king smiled magnanimously.

"They shall not die. Show them the host, and all my power. Then send them home to their fellow-rebels to tell the madness of dreaming to withstand my might."

The smile of Xerxes had spread, like the ripple from a pebble splashing in a pool, over the face of every n.o.bleman in hearing. Now their praises came as a chant.

"O Ocean of Clemency and Wisdom! Happy Eran in thy sagacious yet merciful king!"

Xerxes, not heeding, turned to Mardonius.

"Ah! yes,-you were telling how you corrupted one of the chief Athenians, then had to flee. On the voyage you were shipwrecked?"

"So I wrote to Babylon, to your Eternity."

"And a certain Athenian fugitive saved your lives? And you brought him to Sardis?"

"I did so, Omnipotence."

"Of course he is at the banquet."

"The king speaks by the promptings of Mazda. I placed him with certain friends and bade them see he did not lack good cheer."

"Send,-I would talk with him."

"Suffer me to warn your Majesty," ventured Mardonius, "he is an Athenian and glories in being of a stubborn, Persian-hating stock. I fear he will not perform due obeisance to the Great King."

"I can endure his rudeness," spoke Xerxes, for once in excellent humour; "let the 'supreme usher' bring him with full speed."

The functionary thus commanded bowed himself to the ground and hastened on his errand.