The Corn King and the Spring Queen

by Naomi Mitchison

  Antigonos was consolidating himself politically, making himself popular with the rest of Greece, and seeing that his Macedonians treated the cities in which they were quartered with the utmost respect. Aetolia, Elis and Messenia kept out, and so did Athens, though with great politeness and many speeches and garlands and decrees. The Athenians had never cared very much for Leagues which were not managed by themselves. Perhaps the best move Antigonos made was when he declared to the Assembly of his own new and enlarged League that he was making war, not with Sparta, but with Kleomenes. Not with one of the oldest and most respected states in Greece, but with social revolution and the class war; not with the ephors and the great Spartiate families, the solid body of Spartan citizens who had been living reasonably and peacefully for generations, but with this lawless and murderous King and his creatures and helots! The Assembly cheered and cheered him.

  And it had more effect on Sparta itself than the King or Eukleidas liked to think. While Kleomenes had been having his success, while it seemed that at least his revolution had been worth while for the sake of his victories, every one had acquiesced and most had been enthusiastic. Now the party that was against him began to show its numbers and feelings. There was a growing demand for a new Board of Ephors to be elected and take over their old powers. It was too late, for him now to exile or condemn. Besides, that was no part of his plan, in Sparta. He was the Head of the State, the property of the State, not a tyrant. Also, this party against him was on the whole a headless thing with no special leaders or speakers, but no less formidable for that—a general, slow movement against his revolution. He felt the women working against him, the women who, as Agiatis had always said, had least to gain from the rules of Lycurgos. Now that she was dead he could not see what they were doing, still less have any influence on it. His mother was too old and too much of an aristocrat to be a good persuader. He got the Queen’s girls together, Deinicha and Philylla and those he knew he could trust, and asked them to help him. They did what they could, but the trouble was mostly in the generation a little older than theirs, who had known the other world, and perhaps also in the generation a little younger who would not accept what they were growing up into. It was all very difficult.

  Money was short, and he and his friends had no more of their own to use for the State. He had kept some of the oldest gold and silver vessels of the King’s household which he considered State property, cups he might have drunk from when the Council of the League came to ask him to take command of them! Now he sent them out of Sparta to be sold, mostly to Athens. They were often very beautiful, engraved with rows of heraldic animals and stiff, soaring Victories with spotted wings, made in the beginnings of Sparta, before they had seen that Beauty was a dangerous goddess. But that was not the kind of thing that people cared for nowadays. They were almost all sold by weight, to be broken up and made into something new. Philylla, very much distressed about this—for she had handled and loved them all—told Erif Der, who bought a few of them; so did Berris when he came back. Kleomenes suspected that there was more money about in Sparta than he knew of; all sorts of traffics and dealings went on. But he could not get hold of it, short of a house-to-house search, including the women’s rooms. He could not do that to his citizens; if he did he would probably be murdered—and most likely rightly. Some prices are too high.

  Berris Der gave the finest of the cups he had bought back to Philylla, telling her to keep it for Sparta, for the King’s children. She did not say much, but she looked happier than he had seen her for a very long time. Afterwards he told Erif what he had done. ‘Was it wise of me?’

  ‘Wise, Berris? That depends on what you did it for.’

  ‘I only did it for her. She was glad. She looked at me—oh, sweetly, Erif! What is happening about her marriage?’

  ‘Panteus is up at Tegea. He has not got down to Sparta for weeks except once for a couple of nights when the King was there, and then he was making plans with Eukleidas all the time.’

  ‘I know all that. Tell me something I don’t know, Erif!’

  Erif said: ‘I don’t understand the patterns of Sparta, but, as I see it, Panteus is turned away from her, towards the King.’

  ‘Leaving her in pain! Oh, Erif, I would be kind to her if I had the chance! I would never hurt her by word or deed.’

  ‘What a promise to make! As if a man can ever tell when he’s hurt a woman. If ever you have that chance, Berris, you’ll hurt her just as much as anyone. And you won’t know. At least, she knows she is hurting you, and she would help you if it was anyhow in this pattern of hers. But it isn’t.’

  ‘I thought—oh, Erif, I thought she was so much gentler to me lately! She talked about my sort of things as though she were very open to them. She made me a crown of myrtle and wild flowers and put it on my head herself; her hands stayed and touched my ears. Supposing her marriage is not going to happen?’

  ‘But it is—unless Panteus is killed. Even then she’d marry another Spartiate. Oh, Berris, my darling, come away before she hurts you any more!’

  ‘But, Erif, if you’d seen how sweet she’s been to me lately, how different! She answers to the least thing one does for her.’

  Erif said: ‘Don’t you see? Oh, Berris, you are stupid! Poor lamb, she’s got no one to be kind to her now. Her man is turned from her, so she has turned to you. She can’t help it any more than a flower can help turning to the sun. Her mother and sister are on the other side; they hate the things she loves. She’s very fond of you, Berris! But not the way you want. Either you’ve got to take this new kindness as the pleasant, pretty thing it is, knowing—really knowing, Berris!—that it can’t last, that it’s only till Panteus, who’s her other half and has been for years, turns back to her. Or else you should go away.’ Berris began to draw in the dust with a stick he’d broken, curls and criss-crosses he rubbed out with his foot and then made again, always a little differently. Suddenly it annoyed his sister too much; she snatched the twig away from him. ‘Berris!’ she said, ‘do you understand or don’t you?’

  Before he answered he got his stick back, after a small fight that ended with Erif being shoved into a bush of prickles, half laughing but a good deal angry. At the end he said: ‘Yes, I understand quite well, in spite of being a man. I probably knew already, and just made the other up because I wanted it more than anything in the world. Oh yes, I understand! I’m sorry if you’ve pricked yourself, Erif, but it was your own fault. I wish I could see why Philylla thinks there’s no one but Panteus. Do you see that at all yourself?’

  Erif sucked her hand. ‘You are a beast, Berris. Why couldn’t you choose a soft bush?’

  ‘There aren’t any.’

  ‘Well, Panteus is a good soldier. And that’s his job.’

  ‘Yes but—’

  ‘Ssh! And he’s intelligent and brave and kind, really, though it’s inside out now for her, and they both care very much for the same things in the same way, and he’s beautiful. But he’s not good enough for her.’

  ‘Of course not!’

  She jumped straight up into the air off both feet. ‘Caught, Berris! Oh, you can’t ever possibly see one another true. And she’d so like you to, poor sweeting. Berris, I’ve seen her through the worst of her time—well, you and I—and now I must go. I’m getting no nearer Tarrik here. His letters make me anxious, even the last one when he sent me the ruby. I think he’s beginning to doubt if I shall ever get right, and he hasn’t told me yet about Harvest. I’m going to Delphi to ask the God there. Philylla herself thinks that would be wise. It will be difficult for me to go alone. Will you come too?’

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ said Berris.

  Chapter Seven

  IN LATE AUTUMN, BUT before the weather broke, Erif Der and Berris Der went to Delphi to consult the God. Antigonos and his army were wintering in Argos and Corinth. Sparta was watching. A little time after they left, another rather terrible thing happened to Kleomenes. Ptolemy wrote promising help, but he insisted on hostage
s: the King’s mother and his children. That was the Egyptian price.

  For a good many days Kleomenes could not make up his mind to it. What a trick of the gods, to take them away, most of all Nikomedes, when they were just making friends, when this winter was going to make an island of joy among the troubles for them both! He could not bear to think of his boys in Egypt, taking away their class, their Spartiate companionship, changing over from that to palace life with Ptolemy and his courtiers and mistresses. He wrote again. But these were the only terms Ptolemy would take, and Ptolemy’s was the only help he could get. He tried to speak to Kratesikleia, but somehow could not. It was bad enough in his own mind—in speech it would be terrible.

  Kratesikleia saw that something was the matter with her son and asked Therykion, who told her with an ironic smile. She went to the King and made him tell her too. She laughed and said: ‘So you were afraid to get it out! Kleomenes, you must leave your children in the Gods’ hands and trust to their innocence that they may escape. After all, Egypt is not so far. Ptolemy is a Greek, and so are all the people we are likely to be brought into contact with. The children shall read and write, and not of course go about with the common folk, and you shall send someone with us who can practise the boys in spear-throwing and wrestling. Yes, yes! there is nothing so difficult about it. As for me, my two husbands are dead and Agiatis is dead. I am not in love with life. Make haste and put me on shipboard and use my old carcass where it will serve Sparta, or I may die unprofitably at home.’ So she started getting everything ready, and chose what women she would take with her, and Kleomenes sent for his sons.

  He told them himself. Nikolaos was furious and wept, but was then consoled by the idea of going in a ship to a country full of monkeys and crocodiles. Nikomedes was much more deeply hurt. He did not say much. Only: ‘It’s a pity. There are all sorts of things here. Father, do you remember saying you’d hunt with me this winter?’

  ‘I do remember,’ said Kleomenes. ‘Oh, my dear son, we’ll do that yet! In a year or two you’ll be that much bigger and stronger. We’ll have days and days of it, up in the hills together.’

  ‘I would have liked it this year,’ said Nikomedes. He had a horrid, blind hopelessness in his voice, the hopelessness of a child who has not seen enough years to believe much in the future.

  It sounded to Kleomenes terribly like Agiatis. He was sending her Nikomedes away, uncomforted.

  ‘It’s for Sparta,’ he said. ‘You’re a soldier now, going into battle for Sparta.’

  ‘I would rather do it that way,’ Nikomedes said, ‘but I see you’ve got to, father.’ He rubbed his fists over his eyes and said with a valiant but rather unfortunate attempt at gaiety: ‘I expect Gorgo will learn to talk Egyptian just as well as she talks Greek. That will be funny, won’t it!’ Then he said: ‘Can I see Philylla before I go?’

  Kleomenes sent for her at once. She begged to go with Kratesikleia to Egypt, but her father and mother would not hear of it, and the King, too, said she should stay at home. She and Nikomedes talked together for a long time, partly about his mother and partly about Sparta, and how Nikomedes was going to go on being a Spartan in this foreign place and to help his brother and sister. They talked a lot about games they’d played in old days. When they went down to Gytheum she came too. Part of the army marched with them; that pleased the children anyhow.

  Kleomenes felt miserably that he had sold them just as Aratos had sold the League. He and Nikomedes could now hardly look at each other, it made them both begin to cry. At Poseidon’s temple, Kratesikleia pulled him in with her; people thought she had a vow to make. It was the old helot sanctuary; there were rows of names there of men and women who had been freed. The King looked at them blindly. Kratesikleia’s face was wet now with tears in the wrinkles, but she pulled herself up sharply and spoke to him as if he’d been a child still, scolding him.

  ‘When we come out,’ she said, ‘nobody is going to see so much as a red eye on either of us! We ought to be ashamed of ourselves, doing this in front of the children and every one. There’s little enough we can do nowadays, in all conscience, but at any rate we’re going to be an example of how Spartans can behave! As for what’s going to happen, that’s not in our hands and nothing we can do will change it. Don’t think too much about it, Kleomenes. Keep your own soul free and I’ll try to keep mine.’ Then they came out, and she and the children went on board, and the King watched them away. He managed not to cry, but Philylla was crying bitterly. Panteus came away from Tegea for a couple of days and stayed with the King in his very empty house and comforted him and talked about the boys and their future. But Philylla went home again and there was not even Berris Der to comfort her.

  Those two from Marob landed at dawn at Cirrha and hired mules after much bargaining and quarrelling with the drivers, who took them for more complete barbarians than they were. Erif had insisted on wearing Marob clothes, white linen with stripes of coloured linen laid on to it in criss-crosses about the skirt, and a short coat. She had it in her head that she must show herself to the God as nearly as possible as she really was. It certainly looked as though she were the kind of person who ought to be over-charged for her mule up to Delphi.

  They went gently across a rising plain of deep and ancient olive groves. Erif Der did not like olives, but Berris did; they were ripe now. There were a good many wild birds, but they could not see far on either hand because of the thick trees. Then they took a turning to the right, momentarily getting a glimpse of near and enormous mountains, and as they went the plain narrowed down into a glen still full of the terraced olive groves. Their road began to slope, zigzagging steeply past ancient and knotted roots and built walls and landmark stones. At the end of a zigzag they came out at last between two great plane trees into an open place.

  Ahead of them Parnassos went up in flight after flight of great red, clefted cliffs; small trees rooted themselves in the cracks, clinging between earth and sky. Behind them their glen of olives dropped steeply, far deeper than they’d thought it, and rose again at the far side towards other mountains; at its head the range closed in, peak behind peak, distant and blue and very high. And between them and the red cliffs was the shining town of Delphi. On their own level there were low houses spreading to right and left a long way, houses for priests and pilgrims, and shops and stables. From among them one lovely street went winding up, steeply enough for most of the buildings on either side to show clear, the treasuries of the cities of Hellas, each one gay and square and solid and quite small—a god’s or goddess’s cottage—with leaping ridge tiles and a carved and painted frieze, most of these from quite early times, stiff and smiling battles and rapes and Councils of Olympos. On their walls of white blocks there were lines of names of men who had brought gifts to Apollo. There were statues in bronze and gilt and marble, from the earliest beginnings until now, tripods of inlaid bronze and pure gold, and shields, and pictures under small porticoes; and a very lovely little stream came down with the street, sometimes beside it and sometimes under it, from basin to clear basin, and men and women stooped and drank from it. There were green trees between the curves of the street and a great many young leaves of iris, coming up fresh again after summer, and at the head of the winding road was Apollo’s temple, cool and quiet and very much larger than anything else. There were people moving about on its steps, all in white; at the foot of the steps the stream flowed out into its first basin.

  The mule boy stopped to let them look, himself turning his back on it proudly, as though it all belonged to him. They found a suitable guest-house and made terms for themselves. Delphi was very full of pilgrims just now; they would probably have to wait for some time. There was nothing to be done that day, but they were up before dawn the next, and in time to see a very pretty sight—one of the sights of Delphi, in fact—the young priests who had been sweeping the temple, feeding the birds afterwards. The sun crept down the cliffs of Parnassos and the birds began to sing and flutter as the new warmth rea
ched to their nests in the crevices and rooting bushes. The priests threw out handfuls of corn, and they came flitting down to the steps and chirped their thanks to the Dawn God.

  After that Berris and Erif made their first offerings at the temple and were told when they could come back with another offering and their question. There were a good many priests, intelligent and sometimes fierce-looking men who walked proudly, staring back at the timid crowd of worshippers. No one ever saw the prophetess, the girl-child who was inspired by the God. People said she was just a peasant girl who could not read nor write and knew nothing of the great world; some said that she could go on prophesying until she was old and bent, beyond the age of any priestess of any other god, but others said that the service of Apollo wore her out and she must be replaced every few years.

  There was plenty to do during the weeks of waiting. There was a theatre where the sacred plays and dances were given, and between times secular ones, singing and recitations and sometimes even modern comedy, for after all the Muses had it all in their hands. There were all the monuments to be seen, and their inscriptions, some in fine verse to be read, and on certain days one or another of the treasuries would be open. They drank the waters of Castaly as it poured out through lion heads, and bought a handful of the tiny green snail shells that come out of the rock there; Erif thought they might be useful to her one day. And there were many thousands of offerings to the God. After a time it became apparent to Erif that the one thing her brother wanted to see—in fact, what he really came to Delphi thinking of—was his own cup, Kleomenes’ last offering in the days of his power. On the other hand, he did not like to mention it directly to one of the priests who showed the gifts. He was so terribly afraid the priest might say he thought the cup was not so beautiful as some others—then Berris Der would cease entirely to believe in Apollo. He did ultimately see it, and thought how much better it was than he remembered it! But it got no special mention from the priest. In the club-house above the temple there were two great pictures by Polygnotos, each with fifty or more figures in it, story-pictures which brought many sightseers. Berris did not think well of them at all, but somehow Erif found them rather interesting and went back to look when he was seeing something else. She also much liked the gilded statue of Aphrodite-Phryne, made by one of Phryne’s own lovers. It was a story too, something to fill her mind, though she agreed with Berris that as sculpture it was soft and uninteresting.