Darkness and Dawn; Or, Scenes in the Days of Nero. An Historic Tale

by F. W. Farrar

  CHAPTER XLVI

  _THE DEATH OF OCTAVIA_

  ‘O gioia! O ineffabile allegrezza! O vita intera d’amore e di pace! O senza brama sicura ricchezza!’

  DANTE, _Paradiso_, xxvii. 7-9.

  In one sense all the people of Rome were the friends of Octavia; inanother she was nearly friendless. For the multitudes of every rankwere degraded by selfishness and cowed by terror. So long as theywere personally untouched by the orgies and crimes of the Emperor,and so long as he was supported by the swords of the Prætorians, theyneither wished nor dared to interfere. Rome lay helpless under thebonds of the tyranny which her own vices had riveted. Nero mightindeed be murdered, but in what respect would the Empire be betteroff? There was no Cæsar left. If Nero died, there seemed to beno prospect for Rome except the horrors of civil war with all itsattendant pillage, massacre, and crime. It seemed better to endureNero’s infamies than to see the Empire torn to pieces. After all,were not many of the senators, of the generals, of the aristocracy,capable of becoming as licentious and as cruel as he was, and wouldnot their elevation make their vices loom as monstrous as his?

  They rejoiced, therefore, that the popular tumult had been sospeedily repressed, and they steeped their consciences in immoralacquiescence. The bad plunged themselves yet more shamelessly intovice, and manœuvred to make their vices known as a passport toimperial favour. As for the better Romans, they tried to burythemselves in such obscurity as would shelter them from notice;or they sought solace in the refined egotism of the Epicureans; orinured themselves to the chances of death and ruin by assuming thehaughty self-dependence of the later Stoics. Pætus Thrasea and hisfriends took refuge in the belief that it would be an absurdity toattempt the impossible. The heart of Seneca was torn with misgivings;but was not he himself in peril? What could he do? He had neverspoken out against any one of Nero’s crimes, or lifted a finger toprevent them. Lucan longed to overwhelm the Emperor with invective;but he could only brood in silence over his wrongs, and gloomilyawait the day of vengeance.

  From none of these did Octavia receive any help. If theycompassionated her misery, no murmur of pity reached her ears. Butfrom those who were now her fellow-Christians she received both helpand consolation. Pomponia, whose gentle influence moved fearlesslywith halcyon wings over the turbid abyss of crime, exerted herselfto add comfort to the dreary retreat of the Empress in the volcanicisle. With her strong good sense she made arrangements for Octavia’scomfort. She obtained the leave of her husband, Aulus Plautius,to despatch some of her slaves to Pandataria the very day that thedecree of Octavia’s banishment was published, with directions tosecure for her as fitting a home as was possible, and to take withthem such things as might conduce to her well-being. In this she wassecretly aided by Acte. The beautiful and generous girl sought aninterview with Octavia before she left Campania, fell at her knees,and begged the daughter of Claudius to pardon the wrong which inearlier days her beauty had inflicted. ‘I was but a slave once,’ shesaid; ‘nor did I know the truths which have since been taught me. Ihave forsaken the past. Empress, you will forgive me, and accept suchlittle services as I can render?’

  ‘Rise, Acte!’ said Octavia, with tender dignity. ‘I know that thyheart was innocent, and that no wiles of thine were spread to catchNero’s love. I forgive thee. Who am I, in my misery, that I shouldcondemn thee?’

  She raised the weeping girl from the ground, and gently kissed her.‘Do not weep any more,’ she said. ‘Acte, it has been told me thatthou art a Christian. Nay, start not, and see how much I trust thee.I am a Christian, too.’

  Acte was almost speechless with surprise; but Octavia continued:‘Yes; thou seest that I put my life in thy hands; but are we notsisters now? I used to talk with my brother Britannicus about thisnew faith, and often with Pomponia, and now I have seen Lucas ofAntioch, and from him I have heard of Jesus. Lucas has lent me theletters of Paulus of Tarsus. He has written that “not many rich, notmany noble, not many mighty are called;” but though I am noble, I ampoor, and weak, and unhappy except for that consolation which He whodied for us sends to the sorrowful.’

  ‘God be praised,’ said Acte, ‘that thou hast found that peace.’

  ‘Yes,’ answered the Empress; ‘peace I can truly say in the midst ofshame, and slander, and tumult. My life will be short; but for us,Acte, the islands of the blest, of which the poets sang, are neitherdreams nor fables. Farewell.’

  ‘Farewell, Empress,’ said Acte. ‘Day and night will our brethren liftup holy hands for thee, and many a purer prayer than mine will risefor thee like incense.’

  As Acte left the villa she passed Onesimus. She had long beenignorant of his fate, and shame prevented him from speaking to her.He recognised her at a glance, but she did not penetrate the disguisewhich changed him into a fair-haired slave, and he shrank backfrom her presence. He regretted when it was too late that he hadnot revealed himself to her, for even now she might possibly haveretarded the tragedies which were to ensue. Alas! when once men haveshown themselves unfaithful, how often do their best impulses cometoo late!

  But he devoted himself heart and soul to the service of the youngEmpress. She had been permitted to take with her into exile one ortwo only of her hundreds of slaves. She had chosen Tryphæna to be oneof these, though the poor girl, after her cruel torments, was stillbarely able to stand. She had also chosen Onesimus, by the advice ofPomponia, though she did not yet know that he had been brought underChristian influence.

  Nor was he the only disguised Christian in that small and saddenedhousehold. The position of Hermas since his rescue from the houseof Pedanius had been very perilous. If he were recognised, the factof his having escaped might be fatal to others besides himself. TheChristians were mostly too poor to introduce a stranger into theirhouseholds. They would have been willing to share with each otherthe last crust; but the crowded state of the _insulæ_,[88] in whichthey mostly lived, rendered it difficult and dangerous to procureextra accommodation. The only thing possible, therefore, had beento conceal him in the house of Pudens; but as it was now necessaryto find a new home for him he had been enrolled among the out-doorslaves in the villa of the Empress, and was selected to accompanyher to the lonely island, until his history and face should havebeen forgotten.

  Anicetus, who had been made the vile instrument of Octavia’sdestruction, received the guerdon of his infamy, and was dismissedinto nominal exile in Sardinia. To such a man--a slave by birth anda villain by nature--the exile was nothing. He had never regardedlife as anything but a feeding-trough, and as long as he had wealthto spend on his own indulgences Sardinia served him as well as Rome.It happened that the ship which was to carry him to Caralis, theSardinian capital, sailed from Ostia on the day that Octavia was tobe conveyed to Pandataria. Thousands of spectators, and among themmany Christians, had flocked to Ostia to see her embark. If theydared not express their feelings, they longed at least silently toshow their sympathy. They recognised Anicetus. He embarked amid atempest of groans and hootings so full of execration that he trembledlest he should be torn to pieces by the mob, and abjectly entreatedthe protection of his guards. Thenceforth he vanishes from history.He died in Sardinia, rich and impenitent; but even there he did notescape the hatred which he felt more than the load of infamy withwhich he had crushed down his worthless soul.

  Later in the afternoon the multitudes caught sight of the litterwhich was bearing Octavia to the shore. A trireme was waiting to takeher away forever from the home of the rulers of the world. Prætorianguards marched on either side of her with drawn swords. Behind her,in a humble _carruca_, came her few household slaves, and the scantypossessions which alone she could take with her. A deep murmur ofpity arose, and as she approached the quay it swelled into a cheer,in which the spectators gave vent to the indignation which they feltagainst her oppressors. At one time it seemed as if they might breakout into violence; but the Prætorians menaced them with their swords,and the angry murmurs died away.

>   The Christians--who recognised Tryphæna and others of their brethrenamong Octavia’s slaves, and who, though they did not know the secretof Octavia’s conversion, knew her innocence--showed their sympathy inmore quiet ways. They sighed forth prayers and blessings, and strewedwith flowers her pathway to the vessel. Onesimus, as he passed,caught sight of Nereus and Junia. No one knew him, but he felt almostcertain that he had seen a flash of recognition in Junia’s eyes.Beyond doubt she stood gazing intently on him as he leaned overthe vessel’s side. Ah, well! the day might come, he thought, when,purified from shame by suffering, he might obliterate the memories ofhis dishonoured past, and be worthy once more to stand by her side.

  And one incident occurred which, not for him only, but for all thatlittle company, was fraught with blessed consequences. Linus stoodwith Luke of Antioch in the undistinguished throng, but neither ofthem had been forgetful of the sorrowful sighing of those who weregoing into captivity. Linus had told to Paul the prisoner, in deepsecrecy, the story of Octavia’s baptism, and the heart of the Apostlewas sad at the thought of her sufferings. He had written her a briefletter of comfort, which Linus slid into the hand of Hermas amid thebustle of the embarkation. Nor was this all. Luke also had not beenforgetful of the anguish of the last of the Claudian house. Filledwith that deep sense of brotherhood which linked all ranks togetherin the Christian community, he had written out for the exiles someinestimably precious fragments of the materials which he had beencollecting for his Gospel. He found means unobserved to give them toTryphæna, when ceasing for a moment to lean on the arms of the twoslaves who were supporting her feeble footsteps, she turned to bidfarewell to her mother, Nympha.

  The emotion of the spectators made it more easy for the watchfulChristians to communicate with each other. For there were few dryeyes among them. Some of them were old enough to have seen Julia, thelovely daughter of Augustus, sail to the same sad bourne. They hadseen her daughter, the younger Julia, banished by Claudius to the yetmore distant island of Tremerus. They had wept tears almost as bitterwhen they saw the elder Agrippina driven to the same prison by theinsatiable malice of Tiberius. But the case of Octavia was far sadderthan that of her noble kinswomen. The elder Julia was steeped inshame, and had well-nigh broken the heart of her father. The youngerJulia had also disgraced her high lineage. The wife of Germanicushad been a Roman matron of the purest stamp, yet her passionatehaughtiness had diminished the sympathy which would otherwise havebeen felt with her in her calamities. And, further, these others hadenjoyed their days of superb sunlight and prosperity. Ruin had notovertaken them till the happiness and beauty of their youth werepast. Not so the pale and hapless girl who was now embarking. Octaviahad known no joy. Her childhood had been darkened by the threemurders of those whom she best loved. From the first her husband hadhated her. His youthful love had been given, not to her, but to herfreedwoman; and now, unprotected by her own white innocence, she hadbeen smitten to the earth by a horribly false condemnation. She wasstill scarcely twenty years old![89] And she was being conductedamid centurions and soldiers to a barren rock, which was hauntedby memories of death and anguish. She was as one dead, but withoutthe peace of death:--so thought her pagan sympathisers, and wereconfirmed in their misgiving that either there are no gods or theycare not for the affairs of men.

  And Octavia did not deceive herself. She well knew that those isletsof the Tyrrhene Sea were wet with the blood of noble exiles; and thatCaligula, on being told by one who had been recalled from banishmentthat the exiles spent their time in praying for the death of thereigning Emperor, had sent soldiers round the islands to put allthe prisoners to death. She knew her peril, but she clung to lifewith the tenacity of youth. Nero had no child. She thought that hisexcesses would precipitate his end, and that some virtuous man mightbe chosen by the Senate to succeed. After the death of Narcissus shehad been told the anecdote of the physiognomist who had prophesiedthat Titus would one day be Emperor, and she thought that under herbrother’s devoted friend there might be the dawn of brighter days.She therefore wrote a letter to Nero, before the trireme started, inwhich she said she would but live as his widow and his sister, withno thought of returning to the Palace. She even ventured to remindhim that she had always experienced his mother’s protection, andthat, as long as Agrippina lived, her marriage dignity had not beenassailed.

  All was now ready. The sailors drew up the anchor, and the assembledcrowd watched the white sails of the trireme till they became rosy inthe light of sunset, and the vessel dipped beneath the horizon.

  Octavia awaited, in deep anxiety, the answer to her letter. Therewere points in it which might perhaps have touched the heart of Neroif Poppæa and Tigellinus had not been at his elbow as the evil geniiof his degradation. But, when the tablets of Octavia came, Nerowas sitting with the enchantress. Taking them out of his hands, sheturned the letter into such ridicule, and laughed over it so sweetlyand so immoderately, and mixed her silvery laughter with so many actsof fascination, that the fear of her ridicule--to which, like allvain persons, Nero was inordinately sensitive--quenched in his heartall thoughts of mercy. She also played upon his fears. ‘As long asOctavia lives,’ she said, ‘neither you nor I will be safe. You sawhow the people rose in her behalf. You do not know what assassins shemay have in her pay. All that the spirit of insurrection needs is aleader, and, while Octavia lives, conspirators have only to provideher with a husband, and she will bring him the Empire as her dower,as she did to you. The tomb is the only safe prison. The dead exciteno tumult and tell no tales.’

  So the messenger was sent back without an answer, and Octavia knewthat she had only to prepare for her fate. No day dawned that mightnot be her last; no sail shone on the horizon which might not bebringing her executioners from Rome--nay, the orders might even nowbe in possession of her military guard, and the tramp of the changingsentries each morning and evening might be to her the echoingfoot-fall of death. No situation in the world is more harrowing ormore terrific than this. We can confront death when we know that westand face to face with him; but to have his sword dangling over ournecks by a thread of gossamer, and not to know at what moment it willfall; to know that somewhere near us he lies in wait, but not to knowwhere or how he will leap out upon us--this adds a nameless dreadto the king of terrors, and it has been sufficient to break down theiron nerves even of trained soldiers who have ridden fearlessly tomany a bloody fight.

  There was not a person on the little island who was not aware thatOctavia was thus standing on the edge of the awful precipice. Great,therefore, was the astonishment of all, and especially of the Romansoldiers, at the strange placidity, the sweet fortitude which shedisplayed. None else could laugh during those sad days; but shecould laugh--laugh more gaily than she had ever done in the gorgeouschambers of the Palatine. As escape was impossible, she was leftfree, and she loved to sit on the rocks in the evening sunlight andenjoy the cooler breeze. Unfamiliar with the sea-shore, it was apleasure to her to watch the black-headed sea-mews rising and fallingon the gentle swell of the tideless waters, or waving over it theirimmaculate white wings, or suddenly dashing down on some fish, andbreaking the surface into concentric rings of rippled gold. She foundpleasure in the shells, and sea-weeds, and purple medusæ, and laughedagain and again as she noticed for the first time the curious motionof the hippocampi as they gambolled in the shallow waves. It wasstrange, too, to the few islanders to see her gathering garlandsof their wild flowers, and having them placed in her bare,half-furnished rooms. She had never cared for splendour. It wearieda soul which had never seen it dissociated from guilt. The simplicityof her new life had a charm for her, and if Nero would but relent shecould gladly live here, reading and doing her little acts of kindnessand musing on the high thoughts which had recently become so radiantto her--sustained by the hope that better days would come on earth,or that, if not, there was a heaven beyond.

  There were three of her household who knew the secret of the calm andresignation which struck her Prætorian custodians wit
h astonishment.One of the officers, a rough youth named Vulfenius, had been heardsaying to his comrade that the Empress must have been getting privatelessons from the Stoics or Cynics;--‘only,’ he said, ‘a hundred ofthose philosophers are not worth a cracked farthing--arrant humbugsnearly all of them. But this girl--she smiles death in the face!--Oris it that she does not know?’

  Yes, she knew; but the source of her cheerful courage lay in thosescrolls which had been handed to her attendants by Linus and by Luke.Ever since the lustral dews of baptism had touched her brow, she hadfelt a change in her whole being, but her deep peace was confirmed bywhat was now read to her daily by Onesimus, or Hermas, or Tryphæna.

  It was with strange feelings that when she broke the silken threadof the small waxen tablets of Linus, she had read the salutationin which Paulus, the prisoner, wished grace, mercy, and peace toOctavia, Empress, and now beloved in Christ. But as she eagerly readthe few lines which he had engraved with his trembling stylus--forhe had written this message in large letters with his own hand--shefelt his words thrill into her soul with strange power. He rejoicedand thanked God that He had called her out of darkness into Hismarvellous light, and told her that this was a boon more preciousthan all the kingdoms of the world. He comforted her under all theaffliction with which she was afflicted, with the comfort wherewithhe too was comforted of God. He told her that she was a partaker ofthe sufferings of Christ, and that the sufferings of this presenttime were not worthy to be compared with that glory which shall berevealed in us. He exhorted her to look, not at the things which areseen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which areseen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

  Such words fall too often on our cold and careless ears with thetriteness of long familiarity; but to Octavia, as to all who firstlearnt to feel their meaning in that despairing age, they seemed tobe written in sunbeams. The new wine of the Kingdom of Heaven filledthem as with divine intoxication; that which to the Pagans appearedlike a half-insane enthusiasm or a blank obstinacy[90] was, intruth, but the exhilaration of conviction, in comparison with whosepreciousness the whole world and all the glory of it seemed but asthe light dust of the balances. Octavia had not been unaccustomed tohear the paradoxes of the Stoics; and she regarded them as spuriousornaments of life’s misery--spangles sewed upon its funeral pall.But in the words of Paul the prisoner, and of the poor persecutedChristians, there rang tones of perfect sincerity. Their doctrineswere not _learnt_, but _lived_. They came attested by the evidenceof characters not only innocent but holy; such as had been hithertounknown to the world, and had no antitype even in the fabled ageof gold. They came, morever, as the revelation of a law, not onlygeneral, but individual. In those who had grace to accept them, theSpirit Himself bore witness to their spirit that they were childrenof God.

  Knowing the doom which trembled over Octavia’s head, and theimpossibility of her escape, the soldiers who were in charge wereordered to allow her such liberty as the little islet permitted, andnot to intrude upon the occupations of her household. Hence, duringthe early evening hours, it was possible for her to call one or twoof her Christian handmaids around her, while Onesimus, as the Greekreader, read to them the scrolls which Luke had sent as his partingpresent. He had selected those which he thought would convey thedeepest consolation. As Onesimus read them to that little circle,they were as the oracular gems on Aaron’s breast--Urim and Thummimardent with the light of heaven. One of them was the Parable of theProdigal Son. To Onesimus it was as the voice of God calling himback from the far country and the rags and the swine. As he read itsconcluding verses, again and again his voice was broken with sobs.Even when he had read it aloud on several evenings he could nevercome to the verse--

  ‘I will arise, and go unto my Father, and will say unto Him, Father, I have sinned against Heaven and before Thee--’

  without stopping to recover from the emotion which stifled hisutterance, and the tears which blinded his sight.

  Another little fragment contained the Evangelist’s record of theSermon on the Mount. As Octavia heard it she felt more and more thather miseries had been blessings in disguise, and that if her life hadbeen spent in the blaze of luxury and prosperity she could never havebecome an inheritor of that kingdom of which the commands were notburdens but beatitudes.

  But what came most deeply home to all of them was that scroll onwhich Luke had written the story of the Crucifixion. They could neverhear it read without requiring Onesimus to read after it the recordof the last scroll, which contained the story of the two disciplesat Emmaus, of whom it was privately thought among the Christiansthat Luke himself had been one. As Octavia listened to those inspiredrecords, if the dreadful act of dying had not lost its horror, yetthe grave had lost its victory, and death his sting.

  * * * * *

  Entranced by the rapture of these wondrous narratives, they hadbeen reading later than usual. It was the ninth of June. The dusk ofevening had fallen; the lamps had been lit. They had been too muchabsorbed to notice the Liburnian galley whose red sail on the horizonhad attracted all the inhabitants of their rocky prison to the shore.They had not seen the Prætorians from Rome, who landed at the littlejetty.

  Ah! but they could not be deaf to the unwonted murmur which began toswell about the villa, nor to the clank of legionaries, nor to thegruff unfamiliar voices of command. They knew too well the meaningof those sounds. With faces whitened by terror they heard the summonsat the gate, and the tramp of armed feet, and the cry, ‘A messagefrom the Emperor!’ Hardly knowing what they did, Onesimus and Hermasbarred the entrance to the chamber where they were sitting, whileTryphæna and the two other maidens grouped themselves round theirmistress. There came a thundering challenge, followed by fierceblows rained upon the door. A moment afterwards it gave way with acrash. Hermas and Onesimus, as if by an instinctive motion, thrustthemselves in the path of the advancing soldiers. A legionary struckdown Hermas with the flat of his sword; Onesimus was dashed aside bya blow of the centurion’s iron glaive. They tore away the slave-girlswho clung to their fainting mistress. Her they fettered, and openedher veins in many places. But she had sunk into a swoon, and theblood would not flow. Then they dragged her to the bath, heated itto boiling heat, and suffocated her in the burning vapour.

  Nor was this enough for Nero’s vengeance. The corpse of the daughterof Claudius, the chaste wife of the Emperor, was not suffered to restin peace. Poppæa would not be satisfied with anything short of thevisible proof that her rival had been swept forever out of her path.There lay the fair form, with its long dark hair and girlish beauty,and more beautiful than in life, for a look as of rapturous surprisehad lit up her pale features. It availed not. The head was struck offby the centurion, and he carried to Rome the ghastly relic, at onceto claim his reward, and to glut the eyes of Poppæa with the sightof ‘death made proud by pure and princely beauty.’

  And for this crime the slavish and degraded Senate vowed gifts to thetemples! In those days every unjust banishment, every judicial murderinflicted by the Emperor, was the signal for a fresh outburst ofinfamous adulation. The thanksgivings to the gods, which had oncebeen the signs of public prosperity, became the certain memorialsof private infamy and public disaster.