Virgilia

“ The Christians came forward slowly, the women clinging together in their physical weakness, though their souls were strong in the strength of their faith.
There was Octavia, leading Hermione and Virgilia. The widow's face was bright with a great light. There was Martius almost blinded by the contrast between the terrible darkness of the dungeon beneath Jupiter's temple, where he had spent four days and nights of misery, frantic when he thought of Virgilia and what her fate might be. ”

“ She is ill. I saw it but now in the Circus. Hast thou no heart?"
"What, thou, too, Aurelius! Thou art but half a man, and worshipeth the gods only in form. Long have I suspected that Virgilia had been infected by this poisonous virus, this doctrine of a malefactor. Thy son taught it to her, thy son, Martius, who is, thanks to Jupiter, far away from here." ”

“ Preciosa, with whom a growing admiration for these abundant decorative details seemed to be overlaying her sense of fun, stopped in her account and then complaisantly gave forth the laugh that Virgilia seemed to expect.
"Oh, these young men!" exclaimed Virgilia, with a gasp and a gurgle to indicate that the limit was nearly reached; "these young men whom you never heard of, whose names you can't pronounce, and who live you don't know where! They will be too much for your poor grandfather. Let him escape them while he can. ”

“ Martius shrugged his shoulders.
"I know not. But he is right, Virgilia. Thou must wait. For a time, we must worship in secret. Some day, all will be open to the light and we must suffer what comes. Christ will help us."
"Yes, Christ will give us strength."
All that afternoon, Virgilia sat patiently by her mother's couch. The change in the proud woman during these weeks of illness was only too apparent. ”

“ There was eating and drinking and merriment, in which Virgilia, in spite of her sadness, tried to join. It did not occur to her to protest or question her father's judgment. A daughter must accept the husband chosen for her; but she wished with all her heart that it might have been Marcus, the son of Octavia, who was sitting by her side, wearing the bridal garland, rather than this feeble old man. ”

“ But Virgilia is cast in a gentler mould; though neither is she lacking in character, spirit and magnanimity. Of course she is not an aggressive woman, and she feels that the home is the place for her. She speaks seldom, and when she does her words are few. It is typical that she greets her husband when he returns a victor with no articulate welcome, but with her more eloquent tears. He addresses her in half humorous, half tender reproach ”

“ Thou wilt surely be safe."
"But thou—and Hermione—and—Marcus?"
"God is all-powerful. We are in his hands."
There came the messenger from the Lady Octavia bearing a pearl anklet as a wedding gift to Virgilia with many greetings and good wishes. And if it were possible, would they all come "to celebrate the Feast of the Grapes, in five days?"
"I will not go," said Claudia. "The Lady Octavia is not to my liking."
"Nor I," added Aurelius, "but we must not be discourteous, she is a good client. It will be an enjoyable feast in this fine weather. Virgilia's cheeks are too pale. ”

“ During the silent meal, eaten by the father and son under the torch-light, so dark was the room, Aurelius did think seriously.
Of the two evils, marriage for Virgilia was, probably the one which would cause her the least suffering. To send her away to a lonely mountain place, to the holy women who dwelt apart, might break her will, but it would ruin her health. Yes, marriage would open out a new life and in the splendid home to which the Senator would be only too happy to welcome her, she would forget this new and detestable religion. ”

“ In one corner of a dark, damp cell, several persons were kneeling in prayer. The voice of an old man could be heard, petitioning God, for Christ's sake, to lead them through this valley of the shadow of death and bring them to the holy city in its beauty and into the presence of their Lord and Master.
"There, that is Virgilia, the fair one, yonder, with face upraised," said Alyrus.
Lycias took a long look at the young girl, so that he would know her again.
"Next to her is Hermione, and Octavia, widow of Aureus Cantus and her son. All three are there!" ”

“ Even in his anguish of soul, the lawyer smiled, grimly. When the Senator sent to reclaim his valuable gift, he would not find it. At least, he would have contributed that much to Virgilia's future happiness. His wealth was so great that he would not miss the game.
"I will gather together all the jewels, my master, also those of the Lady Claudia, and will hide them in my bosom. No one will imagine that the kitchen-maid carries such treasures."
"A quick-witted girl," muttered Aurelius, "and now for my part. If the gods please, they will escape, and we shall be happy again. ”

“ As she talked, the lawyer's brain cleared. He was more himself than he had been since the children had disappeared. Now, he knew the worst. Sometimes certainty, even though bad, is better than the agony of suspense. There was a chance, and if they escaped—a thought came to him.
"Thou wilt dress thy Lady."
Lidia nodded.
"And gather together the jewels. Bring the diadem sent by the emperor to Virgilia and the necklace, the gift of Adrian." ”

“ Martius and the Lady Virgilia went to visit the widow of Cantus outside the gate, on the day when the Feast of the Grapes was celebrated. They have never returned. Nor has Alyrus, who was sent on an errand by Aurelius that afternoon, nor Alexis, the Greek. Not one has come back to tell of their fate. This morning, Sahira, my Lady Claudia's waiting-maid disappeared and the mistress lies there moaning and crying. It is pitiful. Everyone is in disorder of spirit. I, even though I am but a scullery-maid, did creep into my Lady's room and put cold cloths on her head and fanned her face. ”

“ The Greek returned, promptly. If it stopped raining, the Senator would come to the house of the lawyer Aurelius Lucanus that evening, after sundown, accompanied by the notary.
Then he summoned Sahira.
"Thou wilt clothe the Lady Virgilia in her most costly garments. Thou wilt bind jewels in her hair and hang strings of pearls about her neck. Her fingers, too, shall be laden with rings. Tell Alexis to decorate the whole house with flowers and make it beautiful for a feast." ”

“ Some day the Christians of Rome would be enveloped in the darkness and then would come death, as it had come in other times to other martyrs of the Cross.
Martius had only time to seize his sister's had and press it warmly, when his father's voice was heard behind them.
"Virgilia, thy mother needs thee. Go to her. She seems to be very weak. Do nothing to agitate or excite her. Sacrifice thine own wishes to hers." ”

“ That Virgilia Jeffreys should have tried to make her think anything else, and that she should have permitted Virgilia to make the attempt! She should see Virgilia soon, somewhere, and should regain the lost ground; she should not allow herself to be walked over a second time. She should probably say something very cutting, too—if she could but find the right words. Suppose she were younger than Virgilia and less expert? Was that any reason why she should be played with, be cajoled into making fun of a——Yes, Ignace Prochnow was a fine clever fellow; good-looking too, in a way ”

“ The Senator Adrian Soderus, who visited the lawyer and his wife frequently and in view of the coming marriage was permitted to see Virgilia, confirmed the news, entirely unaware of the fact that both his betrothed and her brother Martius belonged to the despised people.
"They multiply like rats," he said, sipping from a silver goblet the sweet orange juice Sahira prepared. "And like rats they live in holes in the ground. There they hold their wicked meetings and form their impious designs. They are a menace to Rome and must be destroyed." ”

“ But it is not easy—when culling for comparison some of the majestic or softer strains into which Virgil has thrown his full soul, which he has wrought with his most loving and exquisite skill—wholly to shut the door of belief against the uncharitable suggestion,—that the Translator less livelily apprehended, than you yourself do, some Virgilian charm, which lay away from his own manner of thinking, and feeling, and of poetical art. ”

“ Other images are suggested by the poet’s delicate sense of grace in flower or plant, combined with his tender compassion for the beauty of youth perishing prematurely. Such are those which enable us more vividly to realise the pathos of the death of Euryalus and of the burial of Pallas. Yet though these images are characteristically Virgilian, they also bear unmistakeable traces of imitation. ”

“ If aught have terrified or work’d him woe:
And would have cried: “There is no dram of blood,
That doth not quiver in me. The old flame
Throws out clear tokens of reviving fire:”
But Virgil had bereav’d us of himself,
Virgil, my best-lov’d father; Virgil, he
To whom I gave me up for safety: nor,
All, our prime mother lost, avail’d to save
My undew’d cheeks from blur of soiling tears.
“Dante, weep not, that Virgil leaves thee: nay,
Weep thou not yet: behooves thee feel the edge
Of other sword, and thou shalt weep for that.” ”

“ Amid them the infuriate queen holds her blazing pine-torch on high, and chants the wedding of Turnus and her daughter; and rolling her bloodshot gaze, cries sudden and harsh: 'Hear, O mothers of Latium, wheresoever you be; if unhappy Amata hath yet any favour in your affection, if care for a mother's right pierces you, untie the chaplets from your hair, begin the orgies with me.' Thus, amid woods and wild beasts' solitary places, does Allecto goad the queen with the encircling Bacchic madness. ”

“ Knoweth the sound, the promised help, his Goddess-mother's meed.
He saith: "Yea, verily, O host, to ask is little need
What hap this portent draweth on: the Gods will have me wend;
The God that made me promised erst such heavenly signs to send
If war were toward; and through the sky she promised to bear down
Arms Vulcan-fashioned for my need.
Woe's me for poor Laurentium's folk! what death, what bloody graves!
—Ah, Turnus, thou shalt pay it me!—how many 'neath thy waves,
O Father Tiber, shalt thou roll the shields and helms of men,
And bodies of the mighty ones! ”

“ Since Virgil was afterwards a Bishop and a Saint, we may fairly conclude that he died in the full flower of his orthodox reputation. It has been supposed—and it seems probable—that Virgil maintained that the earth is peopled all the way round, so that under some spots there are antipodes; that his contemporaries, with very dim ideas about the roundness of the earth, and most of them with none at all, interpreted him as putting another earth under ours—turned the other way, probably, like the second piece of bread-and-butter in a sandwich, with a sun and moon of its own. ”

“ Rome stands behind all that Virgil wrote as a passion profoundly felt. He conceived that the ideals of his civilization were a proper subject for poetry and that a life-time devoted to setting them to verse, though it involved the most interminable patience and the most exacting labour, was a life-time well spent.—Ah, Virgil, I am afraid that all Professor Mackail's eloquence will never sell you to "the world of to-day": for one thing you took life too slowly and for another you took poetry too seriously. ”

“ Virgil—Publius Vergilius Maro—was born at Andes near Mantua, in the year 70 B.C. His life was uneventful, though he lived in stirring times, and he passed by far the greater part of it in reading his books and writing his poems, undisturbed by the fierce civil strife which continued to rage throughout the Roman Empire, until Octavian, who afterwards became the Emperor Augustus, defeated Antony at the battle of Actium. Though his father was a man of humble origin, Virgil received an excellent education, first at Cremona and Milan, and afterwards at Rome. ”

“ But fierce Æneas on his foeman pressed.
His tree-like spear he poises for the fray,
And pours the pent-up fury of his breast.
"Why stay'st thou, Turnus? Wherefore this delay?
Fierce arms, not swiftness, must decide the day.
Shift as thou wilt, and every shape assume;
Exhaust thy courage and thy craft, and pray
For wings to soar with, or in earth's dark womb 1027 Sink low thy recreant head, and hide thee from thy doom."
CXVI . Thus he; but Turnus shook his head, and said,
"Ruffian! thy threats are but as empty sound;
They daunt not Turnus; 'tis the gods I dread,
And Jove my enemy." ”

“ Without this weighed I not a drachma's weight.
And to have lived upon the earth what time
Virgilius lived, I would accept one sun
More than I must ere issuing from my ban."
These words towards me made Virgilius turn
With looks that in their silence said, "Be silent!"
But yet the power that wills cannot do all things;
For tears and laughter are such pursuivants
Unto the passion from which each springs forth,
In the most truthful least the will they follow. ”

“ But it was possible for him to give substance and reality to the shadowy connexion, existing in legend and in the works of older national writers, between the beginnings of Roman history and this distant region of poetry and romance. Virgil’s imagination, as was seen in the examination of the Georgics, was peculiarly susceptible of the impressions produced by a remote antiquity and by old poetic associations. If he was deficient in spon [pg 306] taneous invention, he possessed a remarkable power of giving new life to the creations of earlier times. ”

“ Her, one saith, Mother Earth, when stung by wrath against the gods, bore last sister to Coeus and Enceladus, fleet-footed and swift of wing, ominous, awful, vast; for every feather on her body is a waking eye beneath, wonderful to tell, and a tongue, and as many loud lips and straining ears. By night she flits between sky and land, shrilling through the dusk, and droops not her lids in sweet slumber; in daylight she sits on guard upon tall towers or the ridge of the house-roof, and makes great cities afraid; obstinate in perverseness and forgery no less than messenger of truth. ”