Domitia

“ Then, hearing steps on the pavement, and looking round, Domitia called—“Thou! Elymas! who pretendest to know all things, answer me this, I have an amulet—a fish—what doth it portend?”
“What?—the murex? That gives the imperial purple.”
“Bah! It is no murex, not a sea snail but a fish. What is the signification?”
“Lady, to one so high, ever-increasing happiness.”
“Away! you are all wrong. Happiness is not where you deem it. False thou art, false to thy creed. Thou speak of a divine ray in every man and woman! ”

“ Nothing can save her. Pray for a speedy death.”
With glazed eyes, with a surging in her ears, and throbbing in the temples—as in some paralyzing nightmare—Domitia looked on.
And now the gag was removed, and with dignity the Great Mother of the Vestals descended from the bier. She stood, tall and with nobility in her aspect, and looked round on the crowd, then down into the moat, at the black hole under the roots of the wall. ”

“ It was almost the paladium of the city, the fate of Rome was held to be bound up with its preservation.
And now Domitia and her mother looked on in the gathering darkness at the temple looming out as of gold against the purple black clouds behind, lit with the glare of the flames of the houses below that had been fired by the soldiery.
The roar of conflict came up in waves of sound.
“Really,” said Duilia, “Revolutions are only tolerable when seen from a house-top; that is, to cultivated minds—the common rabble like them.” ”

“ Domitia, here you must stay till somebody comes to take you away. Why! as the Gods love me! I expect yet to hear you proclaimed Augusta, and to have to offer incense and to pour a libation on your altar. Think—what an honor to have your wax head among the ancestors, as a divinity to be worshipped—but no—I am wrong there, you would be in the lararium, or set up in the vestibule, a deified ancestress or member of the family is exalted from the atrium to the temple. I really will go out of my way and have a little supper to honor the occasion. ”

“ The Magus retired, mortified at his doctrine being so ill received.
Then Euphrosyne approached timidly.
Domitia, who was in moody thought, looked up. The girl could not venture to speak till invited to do so by her mistress.
“Your lady mother has desired me to announce to you that Lucius Ælius Lamia hath ridden over from Rome.”
“I will come presently,” said Domitia; “I am just now too troubled in mind. You, child, tell me, where is the physician, Luke?”
“Lady, I do not know; he quitted us on reaching Rome.”
“Stay, Euphrosyne. Thine is a cheerful spirit. Where is felicity to be found?” ”

“ My dear Domitia, you might as well call on the walls to assist you. The Gods! They are just as bad as mortals. You may cry, but they will look between their fingers, accept your prayers and offerings and laugh at you as a fool. Why, as the Gods love me! Does not the family derive from Lamius, and was not he the child of Hercules and Omphale? ”

“ Then he thrust his hand into the folds of his toga, and withdrew, to be at once attacked and wrangled with by the Chaldæan.
Domitia, who had listened with indifference, turned to her mother as soon as he was gone, and said—
“The Summum Bonum, the crown and glory of Philosophy is to become in mind what the slave becomes after many bastinadoes, as callous in soul as he is on the soles of his feet. The lesson of life is not worth the acquisition.” ”

“ Some months passed, and Domitia had not given a thought to Glyceria, and her offer to revisit the sick woman, when, all at once, in a fit of weariness with all things that surrounded her, and a sense of incapacity to find enjoyment anywhere, she started from her languor to bid Eboracus go forth, buy honey-cakes and toys, and accompany her on a visit to the Suburra. ”

“ In the Florence Gallery is one of the same woman after Domitian had snatched her away from Lamia, and hidden her in his Alban villa. Lovely the face is still, but the beautiful soul has lost its light, the softness has gone out of the face, and the shadow of a darkened life broods over it.
At Albanum the solitary Domitia had the satisfaction of being attended by her servant Euphrosyne, and the faithful Eboracus was also allowed to be there as her minister. ”

“ His feelings towards her were a mixture of passionate admiration and savage resentment. From every one else he met with adulation, or at least respect, from her neither. His will was a law to a legion of sycophants, to her it was something she seemed to find a pleasure in defying.
Domitia nursed her resentment, and this soured her nature and reflected itself in her features.
In the long Chiaramonte Gallery of the Vatican Museum is an exquisite and uninjured bust of Domitia Longina as a girl; the face is one that holds the passer-by, it is so sweet, so beautiful, so full of a glorious soul. ”

“ No! matter was not evil. Matter, indeed, without life was not even like the statue—for that was a copy of what lived, and failed just in this, that it fell short of life. Domitia felt as though she were touching the edge of a great verity, but had not set her foot upon it. Then she considered what Euphrosyne had said to her, and she to her slave. Wherever the path of duty lay, there violets bloomed and verbena scented the air. Was not life itself, devoid of the knowledge of its purport, and its obligations and its destiny, like matter uninformed by Life? ”

“ It is something, Domitia, to stand on the soil that was turned by one’s forbears, when they bent as humble farmers over the plough. They were honest men and happy; and when one is down at heart, there is naught like home—the old home where are the bones of one’s ancestors, though they may have been yeomen, and one a commissioner, and another an usurer, and so on. ”

“ My dear Domitia! How can you ask such a silly, infantile question? It was your doing, you must understand that. You threw yourself on her protection, embraced the altar of Vesta, and Cornelia with the assistance of Celer did what she could to further your object in leaving Rome. If people will do donkey-like things they must get a stick across their backs. ”

“ On reaching the entrance to the palace occupied by her mother, Domitia noticed another palanquin and attendants.
“The Vestal Abbess, Cornelia, is with the Lady Duilia,” said Eboracus.
“I will go in!—I know her well, and esteem her,” said Domitia.
She passed the vestibule, traversed the Atrium and entered the Tablinum. But Longa Duilia was not there. A slave coming up, said that she had entered with the Great Mother into a private apartment, where she might not be disturbed.
“Well! I am no stranger. Lead the way.” ”

“ Now about the future of Domitia. I wish her no better fortune than to become the wife of Lucius Ælius Lamia, whom I love as my son. He has been in and out among us at Antioch. He returns with me to Rome. In these evil times, for a girl there is one only chance—to be given a good husband. This I hold, that a woman is never bad unless man shows her the way. If, as you say, there be no stars in the sky—there is love in the heart. By Hercules! ”

“ It is a woman’s sole defence.”
“Come, if a cousin, as your mother asserts,—though by the Gods! I know not where the kinship comes in,—wish me well. Such words as yours are of ill-omen.”
“I wish confusion and destruction to the worst enemies of Rome,” answered Domitia. ”

“ Because you are young and silly, Domitia. When older and wiser, you will understand the value of Push, and appreciate Position. My dear, properly considered, everything can be made use of for the purpose—even widowhood, dexterously dealt with, becomes a vehicle for Push. It really is vexatious that in Rome there should just now be such broils and effervescence of minds, proclamation of emperors, cutting of throats, that I, poor thing, here in Gabii run a chance of being forgotten. ”

“ The Vestal Great-Mother left, and Domitia was glad to be alone.
The habitation of the Vestals was wonderfully peaceful, in the midst of busy, seething Rome, and in the centre of its greatest movement. As already said, it had no windows, and but one door that opened on the outer world. It drew all its air, all its light, from the patch of sky over the central court. Figures of Vestals glided about like spirits, and the white statues stood ghostlike on their pedestals.
But to be without flowers, without a peristyle commanding a landscape of garden and lake and trees and mountains! ”

“ She was as though frantic with despair; her gestures, her cry very different from the formal expressions and utterances of the servile mourners.
But Lamia at length touched her, and said—
“Come away, Domitia. You cannot prevent Fate.” ”

“ Domitia, however, made her way from among the excited and alarmed throng, and finding some of her own slaves, bade them bring Eboracus to her.
“I am here, lady,” answered the Briton.
“Then quick—with me. Not a moment is to be lost. Light a torch and lead the way.”
“Whither, mistress?”
“To the Tullianum.”
He stared at her in amazement.
“Quick—a life, a precious life is at stake. Not a minute must we delay or it will be too late.” ”

“ So be it! as the sword of heaven smites, so does mine. But it falls not on me, but on my enemies. Domitia,” said he, leaving the window, “there has been a conspiracy entered into against my life, and the fools thought to set up Clemens—he, that weakling, that coward; but I have sent him to his death, and those who were associated with him, the sentence is gone forth against them also.”
“I marvel only that any in Rome are suffered to live.”
“Minerva gives me wisdom—to defend myself.”
“Any wild beast can employ teeth and claws.”
“Domitia,” he came close to her, “I am the most lonely of men. ”

“ Then some one looking in the direction of the imperial box noticed Domitia in her blue habit, with her blue eyes wide distended, and the blue ribbons in her hair. Suddenly in a clear voice he cried,—
“The blue! the blue! It is the color of the Augusta! The blue! Sabaste! I swear by her divinity! I invoke her aid! The blue will win.”
Like an electric shock there went a throb through the vast concourse—there were nearly three hundred thousand persons present. At once there rose a roar, it was loud, thrilling, imperious:—
“The blue! It shall win! The color of the Augusta! ”

“ If you are quite positive, then I won’t throw away the kid on Febronia. It is of no use wasting money on a goddess who really has not helped.”
“Mother,” said Domitia, her whole frame quivering with excitement; “I am sure of it. Did not the Augustus give his daughter Julia to Flavius Sabinus? I know that Domitian was alarmed at that. I saw it in his looks, I heard it in his voice; his movements of hand and foot proclaimed it. He feared a rival. He feared what the will of Titus might be—whom he might name as his successor. Mark me, my mother; the first to fall will be Flavius Sabinus.” ”

“ Run, Eboracus,—run and buy me half a dozen dolls—dressed if possible. Domitia, you are determined to bring ill-luck on yourself. There is nothing else to be done but for you to spend an hour in playing with the dolls, and then you can present them at the altar, and the Gods will be none the wiser. Between me and you and the pillars of the peristyle, they are bigger fools than us mortals, and easier gulled. ”

“ But I say, perish all the family rather than offend against hospitality.”
“Mother,” said Domitia. Her face was white as ashes. “Send him forth. If he were not a coward, a mean coward, he would not come here, to the house of two women, and shelter himself behind their skirts. Titus Flavius Domitianus, dost thou call thyself a man?”
He looked furtively at the girl, and muttered something that was unintelligible.
“If thou art a man, go forth, run us not into danger. If thou tarry here—I esteem thee as the basest of men.”
“I praise the Gods!” ”

“ Next appeared mimes, who performed low buffoonery in gesture and dialogue, interspersed with snatches of song, that were so offensive to decency that Domitia, who had never seen and heard anything of the kind at her mother’s house, sprang to her feet with flaming cheeks, brow and bosom, and made a motion to leave. She knew it—this disgusting performance had been commanded by the prince, for the purpose of humiliating her. She would go. ”

“ Come! I did something for your poor Lamia,—I made him consul, and I will do more. Can you be patient and tarry till my strength is restored? I shall return from my family farm in rude health, I trust, and by the Gods! the first matter I will then take in hand will be yours. I know what my brother is. By Jupiter Capitolinus! if Rome should ever have him as its prince, it will weep tears of blood. I know his savage humor and his sullen mind. No, Domitia, you cannot be happy with him. ”

“ I mistrust me,”—Titus smiled, looked at Domitia, with one finger stroked her cheek, and said,—“By the Gods! I do not wonder at it. I would be torn by wild horses myself rather than abandon you, had I been so fortunate——”
“Sire, so wicked——”
“Well, well! you must excuse Domitian. Love, they say, rules even the Gods, and is stronger than wine to turn men’s heads.”
He clapped his hands. A slave appeared. “Send hither the Cæsar,” he ordered. The slave bowed and withdrew.
Domitian entered next moment. He must have been waiting in an adjoining apartment. ”

“ Domitia, set your mind at rest. I have no doubt that there have been little unpleasantnesses. Man and wife do not always agree. Your poor father would not be ruled by me. If he had—ah me!—Things would have been very different in Rome. But he suffered for his obstinacy. You must be content to take things as you find them. Most certainly it would be better in every way if peacocks had eyes on both sides of their tails, but as they have not, only very silly peacocks turn about and expose the eyeless side. Make the best of matrimony. ”