Historical Tales Volume Xi Part 19

While they were speaking a body of soldiers, led by Anicetus, arrived, and with threats of violence dispersed the peasant throng. Then, planting a guard round the mansion, Anicetus burst open its doors, seized the slaves who appeared, and forced his way to the apartment of the empress.

Here Agrippina waited in fear and agitation the return of her messenger.

Why came he not? Was new murder in contemplation? She heard the tumult and confusion on the sh.o.r.e, and learned from her attendants what it meant. But the noise was suddenly hushed; a dismal silence prevailed; then came new noises, then loud tones of command, and violent blows on the outer doors. In dread of what was coming, the unhappy woman waited still, till loud steps sounded in the pa.s.sage, the attendants at her door were thrust aside, and armed men entered her chamber.

The room was in deep shadow, only the pale glimmer of a feeble light breaking the gloom. A single maid remained with the empress, and she, too, hastened to the door on hearing the tramp of warlike feet.

"Do you, too, desert me?" cried Agrippina, in deep reproach.

At that moment Anicetus entered the room, followed by two other ruffians. They approached her bed. She rose to receive them.

"If you come from the prince," she said, "tell him I am well. If your intents are murderous, you are not sent by my son. The guilt of parricide is foreign to his heart."

Her words were checked by a blow on the head with a club. A sword-thrust followed, and she expired under a number of mortal wounds. Thus died the niece, the wife, and the mother of an emperor, the daughter of the celebrated soldier Germanicus, herself so stained with vice that none can pity her fate, particularly as she had committed the further unconscious crime of giving birth to the monster named Nero.

_BOADICEA, THE HEROINE OF BRITAIN._

Prasutagus, the king of the Icenians, a tribe of the ancient Britons, had ama.s.sed much wealth in the course of a long reign. On his death, in order to secure the favor of the Romans, now masters of the island, he left half his wealth by will to the emperor and half to his two daughters. This well-judged action of the barbarian king did not have the intended effect. No sooner was he dead than the Romans in the vicinity claimed the whole estate as theirs, ruthlessly pillaged his house, and seized all his effects.

This base brigandage roused Boadicea, the widowed queen, to a vigorous protest, but with the sole result of bringing a worse calamity upon her head. She was seized and cruelly scourged by the ruthless Romans, her two daughters were vilely maltreated, and the n.o.blest of the Icenians were robbed of their possessions by the plunderers, who went so far as to reduce to slavery the near relatives of the deceased king.

Roused to madness by this inhuman treatment, the Icenians broke into open revolt. They were joined by a neighboring state, while the surrounding Britons, not yet inured to bondage, secretly resolved to join the cause of liberty. There had lately been planted a colony of Roman veterans at Camalodunum (Colchester), who had treated the Britons cruelly, driven them from their houses, and insulted them with the names of slaves and captives; while the common soldiers, a licentious and greedy crew, still further degraded and robbed the owners of the land.

The invaders went too far for British endurance, and brought a terrible retribution upon themselves. Paulinus Suetonius, an able officer, who then commanded in Britain, was absent on an expedition to conquer the island of Mona. Of this expedition the historian Tacitus gives a vivid account. As the boats of the Romans approached the island they beheld on the sh.o.r.e the Britons prepared to receive them, while through their ranks rushed their women in funereal attire, their hair flying loose in the wind, flaming torches in their hands, and their whole appearance recalling the frantic rage of the fabled Furies. Near by, ranged in order, stood the venerable Druids, or Celtic priests, with uplifted hands, at once invoking the G.o.ds and pouring forth imprecations upon the foe.

The novelty and impressiveness of this spectacle filled the Romans with awe and wonder. They stood in stupid amazement, riveted to the spot, and a mark for the foe had they been then attacked. From this brief paralysis the voice of their general recalled them, and, ashamed of being held in awe by a troop of women and a band of fanatic priests, they rushed to the a.s.sault, cut down all before them, and set fire to the edifices and the sacred groves of the island with the torches which the Britons themselves had kindled.

But Suetonius had chosen a perilous time for this enterprise. During his absence the wrongs of the Icenians and the exhortations of Boadicea had roused a formidable revolt, and the undefended colonies of the Romans were in danger.

In addition to the actual peril the Romans were frightened with dire omens. The statue of victory at Camalodunum fell without any visible cause, and lay prostrate on the ground. Clamors in a foreign accent were heard in the Roman council chamber, the theatres were filled with the sound of savage howlings, the sea ran purple as with blood, the figures of human bodies were traced on the sands, and the image of a colony in ruins was reflected from the waters of the Thames.

These omens threw the Romans into despair and filled the minds of the Britons with joy. No effort was made by the soldiers for defence, no ditch was dug, no palisade erected, and the a.s.sault of the Britons found the colonists utterly unprepared. Taken by surprise, the Romans were overpowered, and the colony was laid waste with fire and sword. The fortified temple alone held out, but after a two days' siege it also was taken, and the legion which marched to its relief was cut to pieces.

Boadicea was now the leading spirit among the Britons. Her wrongs had stirred them to revolt, and her warlike energy led them to victory and revenge. But she was soon to have a master-spirit to meet. Suetonius, recalled from the island of Mona by tidings of rebellion and disaster, marched hastily as far as London, which was even then the chief residence of the merchants and the centre of trade and commerce of the island.

His army was small, not more than ten thousand men in all. That of the Britons was large. The interests of the empire were greater than those of any city, and Suetonius found himself obliged to abandon London to the barbarians, despite the supplications of its imperilled citizens.

All he would agree to was to take under his protection those who chose to follow his banner. Many followed him, but many remained, and no sooner had he marched out than the Britons fell in rage on the settlement, and killed all they found. In like manner they ravaged Verulamium (St. Albans). Seventy thousand Romans are said to have been put to the sword.

Meanwhile Suetonius marched through the land, and at length the two armies met. The skilled Roman general drew up his force in a place where a thick forest sheltered the rear and flanks, leaving only a narrow front open to attack. Here the Britons, twenty times his number, and confident of victory, approached. The warlike Boadicea, tall, stern of countenance, her hair hanging to her waist, a spear in her hand, drove along their front in a warlike car, with her two daughters by her side, and eloquently sought to rouse her countrymen to thirst for revenge.

Telling them of the base cruelty with which she and her daughters had been treated, and painting in vivid words the arrogance and insults of the Romans, she besought them to fight for their country and their homes. "On this spot we must either conquer or die with glory," she said. "There is no alternative. Though I am a woman, my resolution is fixed. The men, if they prefer, may survive with infamy and live in bondage. For me there is only victory or death."

Stirred to fury by her words, the British host poured like a deluge on their foes. But the Roman arms and discipline proved far too much for barbarian courage and ferocity. The British were repulsed, and, rushing forward in a wedge shape, the legions cut their way with frightful carnage through the disordered ranks. The cavalry seconded their efforts. Thousands fell. The rest took to flight. But the wagons of the British, which had been ma.s.sed in the rear, impeded their flight, and a dreadful slaughter, in which neither s.e.x nor age was spared, ensued.

Tacitus tells us that eighty thousand Britons fell, while the Roman slain numbered no more than four hundred men.

Boadicea, who had done her utmost to rally her flying hosts, kept to her resolution. When all was lost, she took poison, and perished upon the field where she had vowed to seek victory or death. With her decease the success of the Britons vanished. Though they still kept the field, they gradually yielded to the Roman arms, and Britain became in time a quiet and peaceful part of the great empire of Rome.

_ROME SWEPT BY FLAMES._

Nero, the cruel coward under whom Rome for its sins was made to suffer, could scarcely devise follies and atrocities enough to please his profligate fancy. He offended the pride and sense of decorum of Rome by forcing senators and women of the highest rank to appear as gladiators in the arena. He exposed himself to ridicule by appearing as an actor in the theatre at Naples, which theatre, as soon as the audience dispersed, tumbled to pieces,--a little late so far as Nero himself was concerned.

Returning to Rome, he indulged in every species of vice and folly, lavishing the wealth of the state with the utmost prodigality. On the lake of Agrippa he had a pavilion erected on a great floating platform, which was moved from point to point by the aid of boats superbly decorated with gold and ivory, while to furnish the banquet here given, animals of the chase were sought in the whole country round, and fish were brought from every sea and even from the distant ocean. When night descended a sudden illumination burst forth from all sides, and music resounded from every grove. These are the mentionable parts of the festival. Vile scenes were exhibited of which nothing can be said.

Finally, at a loss in what deeper excess of vice and ostentation to indulge, the crowned reprobate set fire to Rome that he might enjoy the spectacle of an unlimited conflagration. This wickedness, it is true, is doubted by some historians, but we are told that during the prevalence of the flames a crew of incendiaries threatened anyone with death who should seek to extinguish them, and flung flaming torches into the dwellings, crying that they acted under orders.

In all the history of Rome this fire was far the most violent and destructive. Breaking out in a number of shops stored with combustible goods, and driven by the winds, it raged with the utmost fury, neither the thick walls of the houses nor the enclosures of the temples sufficing to stay its frightful progress. The form of the streets, long, narrow, and winding, added to the mischief, and the flames swiftly sped alike through the humblest and the stateliest quarters of the mighty capital.

"The shrieks and lamentations of women, the infirmities of age, and the weakness of the young and tender," says Tacitus, "added misery to the dreadful scene. Some endeavored to provide for themselves, others to save their friends, in one part dragging along the lame and impotent, in another waiting to receive the tardy, or expecting relief themselves; they hurried, they lingered, they obstructed one another; they looked behind, and the fire broke out in front; they escaped from the flames, and in their place of refuge found no safety; the fire raged in every quarter; all were involved in one general conflagration.

"The unhappy wretches fled to places remote, and thought themselves secure, but soon perceived the flames raging round them. Which way to turn, what to avoid, or what to seek, no one could tell. They crowded the streets; they fell prostrate on the ground; they lay stretched in the fields, in consternation and dismay resigned to their fate. Numbers lost their whole substance, even the tools and implements by which they gained their livelihood, and, in that distress, did not wish to survive.

Others, wild with affliction for their friends and relations whom they could not save, embraced voluntary death, and perished in the flames."

The story goes that, while the city was in its intensest blaze, Nero watched it with high enjoyment from a tower in the house of Maecenas, and finally went to his own theatre, where in his scenic dress he mounted the stage, tuned his harp, and sang the destruction of Troy.

How far Nero was guilty and to what extent the stories told of him were true will never be known, but he was destined to feel the calamity himself, for in time the devouring flames reached the imperial palace, and laid it with all its treasures and surrounding buildings in ruins.

For six days the fire raged uncontrolled, and then, when it seemed subdued, a new conflagration broke out and burned with all the old fury, spreading still more widely the area of ruin and devastation.

The number of buildings destroyed cannot be ascertained. Not only dwellings and shops, but temples, porticos, and other public buildings, were destroyed, among them the most venerable monuments of antiquity, which the worship of ages had rendered sacred; and with these the trophies of uncounted victories, the inimitable works of the great artists of Greece, and precious monuments of literature and ancient genius, were irrecoverably lost.

Whether or not this fire took place through Nero's orders, and was played to by him on the harp, he showed more feeling for the people and more good sense in the rebuilding of the city than could have been expected from one of his weak and vicious character. By his orders the Field of Mars, the magnificent buildings erected by Agrippa, and even the imperial gardens were thrown open to the houseless people, and sheds for their shelter were erected with all possible haste. Household utensils and all kinds of useful implements were brought from Ostia and other neighboring cities, and the price of grain was reduced. But all this failed to gain the good-will of the people, who were exasperated by the story that Nero had exulted in the grandeur of the flames, and harped over burning Rome.

When the fire was at length subdued, of the fourteen quarters of Rome only four were left entire; the remainder presented more or less utter ruin. The conflagration in the time of the Gauls had been little more complete, while the wealth now consumed was incomparably greater. The whole world had been robbed of its treasures to feed the flames of Rome.

But the haste and ill-judged confusion with which the city was rebuilt after the irruption of the Gauls was not now repeated. A regular plan was formed; the new streets were made wide and straight; the elevation of the houses was defined, and each was given an open area before the door, and was adorned with porticos. The expense of these porticos Nero took upon himself. He ordered also that the new houses should not be contiguous, but that each should be surrounded by its own enclosure; and, in order to hurry the work, he offered rewards to those who should finish their buildings in a fixed period. As for the refuse of the fire, it was removed at Nero's expense to the marshes of Ostia in the ships that brought corn up the Tiber.

These regulations, while they must have made much confusion among the rival claimants of building sites, added greatly to the beauty and comfort of the new city, and the Rome which rose from the ruins was far more stately and handsome than the Rome which had vanished in ashes and smoke. But Nero, while showing some pa.s.sing feeling for the people and some wisdom in the rebuilding of the city, did not hesitate to use a generous portion of the devastated s.p.a.ce for his own advantage. His palace had been destroyed, and he built a new and most magnificent one on the Palatine Hill, the famous "golden house," which after-ages beheld with unstinted admiration.

But he did not confine his ostentation to the palace itself. A great s.p.a.ce around it was converted into pleasure-grounds for his amus.e.m.e.nt, in which, as Tacitus says, "expansive lakes and fields of vast extent were intermixed with pleasing variety; woods and forests stretched to an immeasurable length, presenting gloom and solitude amid scenes of open s.p.a.ce, where the eye wandered with surprise over an unbounded prospect."

But nothing that Nero could do sufficed to remove from men's minds the belief that on him rested the infamy of the fire. This public sentiment troubled and frightened him, and to remove it he sought to lay the burden of guilt on others. It was now the year 64 A.D., and for at least thirty years the new sect of the Christians had been spreading in Rome, where it had gained many adherents among the humbler and more moral section of the population. The Christians were far from popular. They were accused of secret and evil practices and debasing superst.i.tions, and on this despised sect Nero determined to turn the fury of the populace.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TOMB OF HADRIAN.]

With his usual artifice he induced a number of abandoned wretches to confess themselves guilty, and on their purchased evidence numbers of the Christians were seized and convicted, mainly on the plea of their sullen hatred of the whole human race. A frightful persecution followed, Nero perhaps hoping, by an exhibition of human suffering, so dear to the rabble of Rome, to turn the thoughts of the people from their own losses.

The captives were put to death with every cruelty the emperor could devise, and to their sufferings he added mockery and derision. Many were nailed to the cross; others were covered with the skins of wild beasts, and left to be devoured by dogs; numbers were burned alive, many of these, covered with inflammable matter, being set on fire to serve as torches during the night.

That the public might see this tragic spectacle with the more satisfaction, it was given in the imperial gardens. The sports of the circus were added to the tortures of the victims, Nero himself driving his chariot in the races, or mingling with the rabble in his coachman's dress. These cruel proceedings continued until even the hardened Roman heart became softened with compa.s.sion, spectators failed to come, and Nero felt obliged to yield to a general demand that the persecutions should cease.

While all this went on at Rome, the people of the whole empire suffered with those of the capital city. Italy was ravaged and the provinces plundered to supply the demand for the rebuilding of the city and palace and the unbounded prodigality of the emperor. The very G.o.ds were taxed, their temples being robbed of golden treasures which had been gathering for ages through the gifts of pious devotees; while in Greece and Asia not alone the treasures of the temples but the statues of the deities were seized. Nero was preparing for himself a load of infamy worthy of the most frightful retribution, and which would not fail soon to reap its fitting reward.