She stands alone; the story of Pilate's wife

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CHAP.

XIX. THE IRON CHAMBER

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Chapter I Euphrosyne

YSANDER the Areopagite was crossing the

J j peristyle, or great central hall, of his house at

Athens, when a slave appeared at the entrance of the women’s apartments, and greeted him with the tidings, —

“ The gods have granted thee a daughter, O master.”

“ I thank the gods,” was the Athenian’s reverent acknowledgment. He had desired a son, but in this new-found joy of paternity the childless man of some fifty years disregarded the misadventure of sex.

He filled a cup from a flagon of wine on a table close by, and poured it in libation before a colossal image of Zeus. Then he followed the messenger to his wife’s chamber.

One greater than the Areopagite had entered before him. Its dread shadow filled the room, and fell upon the floor. Preoccupied by his gladness, he did not perceive the signs of this unseen presence. He did not note the alarmed anxiety of the midwife beside

Sbe Startbs Hlone the bed, the weeping terror of two attendants at the foot, and the hush of the group of women at the farther end who were gathered around the new-born infant ; nor were his fears aroused by the strange stillness of the child-bed martyr upon the couch. He took the cold hand lying on the coverlet between his own strong, warm palms, and murmured as he bent lovingly over her, —

“ I shall love thee better than ever for this precious gift, beloved.”

There was no answering pressure. The eyes remained closed, and the lips did not move. He thought she slept, and turned to look at the atom of humanity who titled him as father, when a cry from the bed arrested his steps. It was a hollow, despairing sound, that froze upon the ears that heard it. It was repeated, louder, sharper, the utterance expressing an infinite yearning of love, regret, amaze — all merging in one sad tone of farewell.

“ The child ! She would see the child ! Bring it quick ! Here ! ” cried the midwife.

Ere it could be brought there was a shivering movement on the couch, a slight convulsion, a sigh — a breath strangled in the throat ere it reached the lips — then a dead silence.

The mother’s life had paid forfeit for that of her child. The soul had rent its prison-house of clay, and had escaped. Whither?

Lysander's eyes were opened now. No need to tell him all was over. He drew his pallium, or upper mantle, over his head — the Greek sign of mourning — and left the chamber of birth and death ; the wail of the women following him into the men’s division of the house.

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The Areopagite had fondly loved his wife, and his grief was real.

Nature, well pleased, also went her way ; for she had accomplished another of her never-ceasing tasks, producing with one hand and destroying with the other.

Man and she are ever at war. He wrests her secrets, subdues her forces, utilizes her powers ; and then when he boasts that he has conquered, “ Death ” steps in and wins.

The naming a child was an important religious rite with the ancient Greeks ; yet no priest, save as a guest, assisted at the ceremony. The worship of the gods was so interwoven with every act of the daily life of these Pagans, they needed neither teaching nor celebrants. Each man was priest in his own house, and performed himself, whether individually or collectively, his public as well as his private devotions. Thus the priests were the necessary servants of the temples — nothing more.

When the day arrived for giving the Areopagite’s infant its name, the outside of the house was not only festooned with wool, the sign of a girl, but also with olive branches, the indication of a boy ; in token that the father considered his child to be both daughter and son to him. The statues of the gods were garlanded with flowers, incense was burnt before them, libations poured, and offerings laid at their feet ; musicians and singers invoked and sang their praises at intervals ; and the fire was prepared and lighted on the sacred hearth.

The rich have many friends, and Lysander was rich, so the house was thronged with guests, who came to share the sumptuous supper prepared for the occasion, and afterwards to be witnesses of the ceremony.

When the feast was over, the company assembled in the great hall, where the fire on the hearth was lighted, and around which a space was left free. The nurse entered with the infant in her arms, and carried her charge solemnly three times round the hearth, as a dedication to the gods of the family. She then approached the father, who stood a little in advance of the semicircle formed by his guests, and gave him his child to name.

The Areopagite stretched forth his arms to embrace the infant, and then hesitated. By a curious oversight, he had forgotten to choose a name for his daughter. Had it been a son many a name of hero or demi-god would have occurred to him in a moment ; but for a woman’s name he was at a loss. His perplexity was interrupted by the baby, who raised itself in the nurse’s arms and pealed forth a succession of infantine sounds, an unknown tongue to the majority of the guests.

But mothers and nurses understand if they do not speak the language of infancy, and the woman in great alarm tried to still the child.

“The darling must not laugh. No! No! No!” whispered the nurse soothingly. In her excitement, she possibly checked the child somewhat roughly, for it again raised itself as if in defiance, and repeated the tiny joy-notes with louder distinctness; and the nurse in an angry voice reproved it sharply for laughing, for so she again named its infantine babble.

Now, by the unwritten laws of Athens, it was an iSupbrospne insult little short of blasphemy to the gods to laugh when an Areopagite spoke ; and although the act was only the innocent audacity of a baby, the assemblage was somewhat scandalised. The awkwardness was, however, happily averted by a popular poet present seizing his lyre, and improvising a graceful verse, in which he compared the music of the laugh to the melody sang by a flower, whose stalk was stirred by the wing of a zephyr, bearing a message from the sun-god.

What name shall it be? Lysander was thinking during the poet’s diversion of the mishap. Irene, after her mother ? Theodora, the gift of the gods ? Aspasia, the queen of men’s hearts and heads ? He could not decide.

When the song was finished, Lysander took the child tenderly in his arms, saying fondly as he did so, “ What shall I call thee, my daughter ? ” The reply was given almost before he had done speaking, by another peal of the strange elfin sound which the nurse had called laughter.

“ A good omen, Areopagite ! ” cried an Epicurean, gracefully turning the mistake into flattery. “The gods are gifting thy child with beauty, health, and riches. How can she better acknowledge such good fortune than by laughter ? ”

“ Thou speakest truth, friend,” replied the host, pleased with a remark that saved his own dignity and augured well for his child. “ A good omen as thou sayest, and three times repeated. I will accept its meaning, and will name my daughter Euphrosyne — the first of the graceful sisters, the offspring of Dionysius and Aphrodite. She shall likewise be the laughing goddess of mirth, good fortune, and joy ;

Sbc Stanbs Hlotte and as her life has begun in laughter, so shall it continue, and so shall it end.’*

“ Nay, pause, Areopagite,” interposed Alcides the Cynic, a friend of Lysander, who never flattered him. “A name symbolising character and fortune should be given not in the cradle, but at the grave.”

“ Away with thy cold words, Cynic,” returned the host. “ What should hinder this Euphrosyne laughing through life, as she has begun it ? Are not all good things secured to her ? What can upset them ? ” “ Only two things, Areopagite : the unexpected and the unforeseen ; ” and shooting this Parthian arrow, Alcides disappeared amongst the company.

The weapon hit its mark, and rankled afterwards in Lysander’s breast. All the same, he formally gave the name of Euphrosyne to the infant ; and then heading his guests, walked with it three times round the family altar, the hearth. Then the ceremony was concluded.

Now it was a curious fact, that from her nameday until her death, Euphrosyne never laughed again. In after years, men called her smile divine ; but none were ever known to hear her laugh.

It was whispered, when this rumour became public, that the gods were jealous of the father’s presumption in so certainly assuming a prosperous future for his daughter. Possibly some such misgiving troubled Lysander himself, for he spoke now and then of exercising the Greek father’s right of changing the name ; but time passed, and his daughter remained Euphrosyne.

Chapter II The Uncrowned King

T HE handwriting on the wall had traced Ichabod upon the glories of Greece. Her wise men were dust, and no second Solon or Socrates had arisen from their ashes. Her sculptors, painters, and architects had left behind them works and monuments of beauty, the like of which the world will never see again ; but the mantle of their genius had not fallen as they departed. Moreover, where were the heroes of Thermopylae and Salamis ? Greece had become a Roman province.

The height of the mountain measures the depth of the lake; and Greece having reached a summit of wisdom, art, and glory far above other nations, was now commencing her descent into an abyss equally below theirs. All upon this earth that hath life must flourish, decay, and die ; and for nations, as well as for individuals, there is no discharge in this war.

But the decline was gradual, at first scarcely perceptible. The political astuteness of the Romans permitted their conquered nations to retain their own laws, customs, and religions ; and to Greece she was specially indulgent, adopting her gods, appreciating her art treasures, and sending her sons to

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Athens, to acquire the philosophy and culture of that polished capital.

It is of Athens, the birthplace of the subject of this history, that I have now to write.

The Athenians, so unlike and yet so like ourselves, owned neither monarchy, hierarchy, nor aristocracy. No royal family led society, no priesthood influenced it, no houses of lords and commons slept or wrangled over politics. There were no handles to names ; the slaves even addressed their masters by their one simple name, and the orators commenced their speeches — not with the sounding “ My lords and gentlemen ” — but with the plain phrase “ Men of Athens.”

Notwithstanding these lacks, the Athens of two thousand years ago very much resembled the London of our own day. It had the same club life for the wealthy and the idle ; the same insatiable delight in hearing and telling some new thing ; the same gulf between rich and poor ; the like chatter about art, with just the difference that the Athenians knew what they were talking about ; the same canker of vice, only that it was paraded, if not gloried in with them, whereas — for the present — it wears a flimsily transparent veil amongst ourselves.

There was likewise much outward observance of the forms of religion in Athens, as is the case in our own country; with this difference the Greek men without exception never neglected the attendance at the temples of their gods, while to-day the services of Christianity are attended almost exclusively by women.

There was no king in Athens ; but as every community must have a nominal individual head,

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whether the title be sovereign, president, consul, or governor, Athens elected to choose an uncrowned, unsceptred ruler, and the lot had fallen upon Lysander the Areopagite.

He was neither an Alcibiades nor an Alexander ; for the day for very great men had passed away in Greece, and in the realm of the blind the one-eyed man is king. Not that Lysander was in any way inferior, far from it. He possessed good, if not great, abilities, vast wealth, and remarkable personal advantages ; the last weighing much with the Greeks, who were great admirers of masculine beauty.

Lysander also had official prestige, being the first magistrate in the Areopagus. True, the absolute power of this body had been curtailed by Pericles, but it was still the ruling one. Moreover, the selected chief was courteous in manner, generous with his money, and an ungrudging patron of art.

The Areopagite had been married many years, but to his deep disappointment his wife had brought him no children. He did not divorce this wife, as he easily could have done. “ The gods have cursed us with barrenness,” he said. “ Why should I add to my partner of the burden the punishment of disgrace ? ” When his wife died it much surprised his friends that for some years Lysander did not supply her place.

It was during a short visit to the isle of Chios that for the first time in his nearly fifty years the one great love of woman had come to him — the love that stands out above all others, in every life of man for woman, and woman for man ; and is, like many complaints, so much less dangerous when taken early. Lysander took it late, and seriously.

IO

He was lingering on the seashore one glorious evening, watching the white-winged boats dotting the sapphire sea, when his attention was attracted by a party of young maidens, who were racing with one another in a swimming match across the bay.

Their light tunics leaving their limbs free, enabled them to lead an amphibious life, and after a long chase, during which the Athenian watched them with amused interest, they landed one after the other on the sands, the last of the group rising like another Aphrodite from the sea foam directly in front of him

Lysander turned and looked at her, and thought that never before, in flesh or marble, had he beheld a face and form like hers.

He did not lose sight of her. He traced her to the home of her fisherman father, and unobserved, as he supposed, followed and watched her everywhere. The Areopagite was not so blinded by her personal beauty and grace as not to keep his eyes open and his judgment cool enough to note her disposition and character. She was wild with the high spirits of youth and health, and her fleet flight up the mountainside was almost as swift as that of the goats she followed ; and she would bound along the plain with the grace and bearing of an antelope of the wilderness. She was free and frank as air with the youths as well as with the maidens ; and Lysander, who was accustomed to see woman’s virtue guarded by lock and key, marvelled with astonishment to perceive that, with all this liberty, the highest purity of woman existed in the condition of a perfect freedom ; for he marked, despite her irrepressible gaiety, that not the rudest youth on the island dared address her save with a rough respect.

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He saw further that she was thoughtful for the old, tender to little children, and, what he even more admired, displayed at times a fearless courage in siding against injustice, and was ever striving to right the wrong. His mind was soon made up. This rare child of nature and purity should be his wife if she willed it so.

The great man’s infatuation had not passed unnoticed, and the neighbours warned the fisherman.

“ The ruler of Athens is after thy daughter, Cimon,’ they said ; “ and the hawk means no good when he swoops over the dove.”

“ Ay, fisherman,” remarked another, “ the poor maid is ever considered the natural prey of the rich man.”

In this instance it was not so.

Scarcely had they done speaking when Lysander entered the fisher’s cot, and saluted all present, with an air rather of a suppliant than an abductor, as he thus addressed the master, —

“ I am come for thy daughter, Cimon.”

“She is not for sale, Athenian,” was the curt answer ; and as the father spoke, he drew a sharp knife from his belt, and held it downward, grasped tightly in his hand.

“ Nor am I come to buy a slave or hire an hetaera,” replied the Areopagite. “ I am here to ask thy consent to make thy daughter Irene my wife.”

“ Thy wife, Athenian ! They tell me thou art all but the king of thy city. My maiden is not fit to be mate with such as thou art.”

“ She is fit to be the wife of Apollo, nay, queen of Zeus himself,” exclaimed the enamoured Lysander.

“Yet thy consent, O father, is not enough. I would take her of her own free will.”

“ Irene, thou hearest,” said Cimon. “ Wilt thou go with this man who offers thee marriage ? ”

Irene came forward, and for some moments looked straight and inquiringly at the Athenian, fearlessly meeting his eyes with her own. Then with a frank yet modest bearing, she offered him her hand, and said, turning to her father, “ I will go with him, for I see that he is good and true.”

Before the week was over the wedding of Lysander and Irene had taken place.

There followed a brief honeymoon of perfect happiness for the young bride. The Areopagite extended his holiday to another month, which was spent in sailing around the islands, wandering amongst the mountains, and making the acquaintance of Irene’s people.

At last they could linger no longer. Lysander bore away his bride to Athens, and the dream of bliss was over. The uncrowned king at once took up his old life, and Irene awoke from her fool’s paradise, to find that the disappointing lot of the woman who loves the most had fallen upon her.

“What has so changed him?” she moaned and questioned. “ He belongs to me no longer. He has ceased to love me.”

She was altogether mistaken. Lysander had not changed, nor had he ceased to love her ; although it was true he no longer belonged to her. She forgot ! that she had passed from the thing coveted to the thing possessed. His was the man’s love, “a thing apart.” Woe to the woman to whom, like Irene, it is her whole existence.

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The Areopagite’s busy life was filled to overflowing with affairs in which his wife had no part. The government of the city, the society of philosophers, and the professors of art occupied him ; and the hours not spent in the duties of his rule were passed in the temples of the gods, the Academy, the theatre, the lecture-halls, and in the excitement of the news of the day, so that very little time could be found or made for intercourse with the fair young captive, who pined, shut up in the women’s side of the house, with only slaves for her companions ; for she cared not for the company of the ladies of other families, who plainly showed that they had little in common with the island fisher’s daughter.

It was no pleasure to go abroad. No unvicious woman, and certainly no woman so lovely as Irene, dared venture into the streets of this impure city, unless closely veiled and carefully attended.

Her spirits failed, and then as a matter of course her health broke down. Her sweet temper grew irritable and fretful, and Lysander at last perceived the change. When he sought the reason, the long pent-up cause burst forth, and she reproached him for being tired of her. The interview began in storm ended in caresses, for Irene’s love for her husband was so strong, a very little manifestation of affection on his part consoled her. But when, time after time, these scenes were renewed, Lysander grew wearied of her complaints, and at times showed his impatience.

Yet he was troubled as well as perplexed. He felt there was something wrong, and knew not how to remedy it. How could he satisfy her? He was ready to share his wealth with her as she already shared his love. Did not the gems, as well as the

S be Stanfcs Blotte gold of Ophir, fill her coffers? Were there not crowds of slaves to do her bidding.

“ What ails thee, my bird of Olympus ? ” he inquired. “ How can I better adorn thy cage ? ”

“ Does the bird beat itself less hardly against the bars of its cage because they are gilded ? ” she answered. “ Oh, husband, give me liberty ; I pine ! I pant for liberty ! The life shut up between these dreadful walls is death. Set me free. Open the doors of my prison-house, and let me go.”

“ Hush, hush, beloved ! ” cried the distressed Lysander. “ I have but clipped the wings of my beautiful butterfly to save them from being soiled. The only safe place for thee, Irene, is in these women’s apartments. Men are evil where women are concerned ; and thou wouldst be in sorry case if unprotected in this defiled city. It was different in thine island, beloved of my heart.”

“ Then send me back to my island,” she cried, in a tone of anguish.

“ Ah, Irene,” he remonstrated, " thou accusest me of ceasing to love thee, and yet thou lovest thine island more than myself.”

Then tears, embraces, and reconciliation followed, and a truce was called for awhile.

By-and-by Irene became curious to know somewhat of the life Lysander led apart from her, and questioned her slaves. She next proceeded to set them to bring her information. In consequence, she became jealous.

“ Thou hast been to Hyla’s house, husband,” she said to him one evening, half pain, half anger, in her tone.

“Yes,” he replied unconcernedly, “I was there i5

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with half Athens, to hear and see a new drama performed. The author did not wish it should be given in public until Hyla’s excellent judgment had declared it successful.”

“ Ah ! ” murmured Irene, in a low tone of envious expression. Then after a pause she called his name as a question. “ Lysander ? ”

“ Yes, wife beloved ? ” he also questioned.

“Let me also go to Hyla’s house, that I may learn to pass judgment on dramas, and meet thee there. The women of Hyla’s house are free, and I am dying for freedom.”

“ No, Irene,” he said gravely. “ My wife cannot go to Hyla’s house.”

“ But thou goest,” she remonstrated.

He did not answer ; but after a few moments’ thought a light seemed to break in upon him.

“ Art thou jealous, star of my soul? ” he remarked with a smile. “ Believe me, there is no cause. Hyla is to me no more than a comrade, like my brethren of the Areopagus, or the stewards of my estates. Her house is the centre of the philosophy and art of the city. Therefore I attend it.”

“ Why should thy wife’s house not be that same centre ? ” she questioned.

“ Because ” He stopped.

“ Thou need’st not explain,” she said coldly. “ I know what the hetaerae and Hyla are. Thou say’st this is an evil city where women are concerned. My husband, it is worse. It is a cruel and unjust one, and its corruption must have come through the bars of my prison, for I envy the hetaerae their liberty.”

Then she fell into a passionate fit of weeping ; and again Lysander felt that there must be something i6 rotten in the position of women, both the good and the bad, in this his highly civilised city of Athens.

It happened fortunately for Irene that about this time an early companion of hers came to Athens from Chios. She had been left a young and poor widow with one infant, and Lysander’s wife gladly accepted her offer to become her freedwoman. Sappho was of a graver, firmer character than her mistress ; and the Areopagite, perceiving her worth and superiority installed her in a post of authority in the household, and also appointed her the chief attendant upon his wife. This happy occurrence doubtless saved the reason, and for the time the life, of Irene.

She grew composed, and comparatively happy, in the wise and sympathetic companionship of her friend, who had been in a higher station than herself, and had received, for a woman of those times, a superior education. Some six months after Sappho’s arrival Irene’s infant was born. The young mother’s fever fit of life was over, and the imprisoned wife regained the freedom for which she had so passionately yearned.

Chapter III “ What Shall I Do With Her?"

HE rich ancient Greeks delighted in country-

X houses within easy reach of their cities, and in the whole neighbourhood of Athens there was not one to rival the retreat of Lysander, which well deserved its name of Arcadia. The walls and ceilings were frescoed with the finest paintings ; costly marbles tesselated the floors, and the private baths rivalled in luxury the public ones of Rome. The large domain surrounding it was laid out in stately avenued walks, shady groves and sparkling fountains, where statuary abounded, of equal merit with those few masterpieces now remaining to us, which are justly valued as the choicest treasures of the world.

A thousand slaves attended to the house, gardens, and large vineyards and olive-yards attached to the estate. Lysander was the largest house owner in Athens, a profitable investment on account of the constant influx of strangers into the city ; but his chief wealth was derived from the purple dye vats of Tyre, in which he was a sleeping partner with his brother, who was a merchant prince in that city.

The gardens were skilfully irrigated, and kept up with the perfect care of an English noble’s pleasaunce ;

i8 but in one respect the two differed : there was no flower cultivation in Arcadia.

As in wine-growing countries the people are the most temperate, so in flower-blossoming soils these lovely products are less estimated than where, under harsh skies, they require labour and money for their production. What is common is unvalued. Flowers enamelled the ground, and grew here, there, and everywhere in this lovely land ; and the Greeks only cared for them as coronets for their guests or garlands for their gods. In this indifference they resembled the Orientals ; for it is to be remarked in that standard of Eastern life, the Bible, that — with the exception of two or three comparisons in Solomon’s Song, and the exquisite allusion of our Lord to the lilies — the flower of the field is only spoken of as an emblem of man’s short life and swift decay. Other lands, other customs. I have known an Italian lady turn faint in a room crowded with cut “ flower blossoms ” — the most cherished adornment of her English sisters’ homes.

To this enchanting Arcadian home, Ly sander, on the death of his wife, brought his little daughter, placing her entirely under the care of the faithful Sappho, who, having lost her own infant about the time of her mistress’ death, had become Euphrosyne’s foster-mother ; and here, for some seven years, the child led a life of perfect liberty and happiness.

The little flower-bud blossomed out of infancy into childhood, free as the air, as the wild creatures of the woods, or the tame ones of the pleasuregrounds ; for it was the Areopagite’s pleasure that every species of animal should be collected and cared for on his estate. She was never immured in the

women’s half of the house, although she was fed and sheltered there. She roamed where she would, did what she liked, the wise and devoted Sappho being ever at hand ; and the child grew daily in perfect health and marvellously increasing beauty.

She was a strange little creature, thoughtful and grave beyond her years in some things, wild and wilful beyond the average in others. She never met, scarcely ever saw, another child, for no other girl would have been allowed the freedom of her habits ; and the rougher boy mates were out of the question. Nor were the children of the resident slaves permitted to enter the bounds ; so that, but for her exceeding natural beauty and grace, she would have been a quaint, stiff imitation of the older generation with whom she associated. Her positively equal companionship with the animal world around tended also to keep her young and simple.

She was always propounding whys and wherefores in her little mind, especially pondering in childish wonderment why the slaves should work and she play — that problem which is not one whit being nearer solved this two thousand years after ; the terrible problem of inequality.

When she asked Sappho this “ Why,” the reply was, “ They are men and women. Thou art a child.” “ Shall I work when I am a woman, Sappho ? ”