[There are many versions extant of the so-called “Alcestiad of Catullus.” That which Caesar sent as Entry 996 of his journal-letter to Lucius Mamilius Turrinus is substituted here for Asinius Pollio’s briefer account.]
Every child knows, Oh King, that Alcestis, the wife of Admetus, King of Thessaly, was the golden pattern of all wives. As a girl, however, marriage was the last thing she wanted. She was tormented by just such a question as has been placed before us today. She wished before her life ended to have acquired some certain answers to the most important questions which can be asked. She wished complete assurance that the Gods existed and that They were attentive to her; that the promptings of her heart were guided by Them and that the good things and the ill that might befall her were known to Them and, as it were, designed by Them for purposes of Their own. She looked about her and saw that there was little likelihood of her learning these things if she were to pass her life as Queen, wife, and mother. Her heart was filled with one ambition: to become a priestess of Apollo at Delphi. There she had heard one lived in the very presence of the God; there messages were received from Him daily; there one could be certain. It is reported of her that she said of wives and mothers that there were many; that to them there was nothing more important than the good or ill-will of their husbands; that the sun rose only for their children to whom they were bound by that furious love that tigresses feel for their cubs; that their years passed, filled with the innumerable duties of ordering a household, as their minds were filled with the fears and prides and joys of their possessions; and that finally they were laid to rest, knowing no more of why they lived and suffered than the animals of the hills. She felt that there was more to be obtained from life than being the instrument of its forces and that that more could be obtained at Delphi. The priestesses of Apollo, however, are called by the God; and for her, in spite of all her prayers and sacrifices, no call came. Her days were spent in waiting for a message and in trying to read the will of the God in signs and portents.
Now Alcestis was the wisest and the most beautiful of the daughters of King Pelias. All the heroes of Greece sought her hand in marriage; but the King, wishing to keep her beside him, imposed upon these suitors an all but impossible task. He declared that Alcestis would be given as a bride only to that man who, harnessing together a lion and a boar, could drive them once around his city’s walls. Year followed year and suitor after suitor failed in the attempt. Peleus, who was to be the father of Achilles, failed and the sagacious Nestor; Laërtes, the father of Ulysses, failed and Jason the mighty leader of the Argonauts. Lions and boars fell upon one another in fury and the drivers barely escaped with their lives. And the King laughed and was well pleased and the Princess interpreted their failures as a sign from the God that she was destined to remain a virgin and to serve Him at Delphi.
Finally, as is well known, Admetus, King of Thessaly, came down from his mountains. He drove the lion and boar like mild oxen about the city and won the hand of the Princess Alcestis. With love and rejoicing he carried her off to his palace at Pherai and great were the preparations for the wedding.
Alcestis was not yet ready, however, to become wife and mother. Daily, with a sort of fear, she felt herself coming to love Admetus more and more, but she continued to await the call of Apollo and with one pretext after another she deferred the day of the wedding.
Admetus for a time was patient throughout these delays, but finally he could contain his ardor no longer. He besought her to give him an explanation of this reluctance and in reply she told him all that was in her mind. Now Admetus was a pious and devout man, but he had long ceased to look outside himself for any aid or consolation from the Gods. On one occasion in his life, however, he had felt Their closeness to his interests and this he now reported to her eagerly:
“Alcestis,” he said, “look no further for a sign from Apollo concerning your marriage, for that sign has clearly come. It is He alone who has brought you here, as you will see from my story.
“Before I returned to Iolcos to attempt the trial, I fell ill, as well I might, for my great love was at war with my despair lest I fail to harness the lion and the boar. For three days and nights I lay at the point of death. I was tended by Aglaia who had been my nurse and my father’s before me. It is she who tells me that in my delirium during the third night she was aware that Apollo was present in my mind and was teaching me how to yoke together a lion and a boar. Aglaia is here now; you have but to ask her.”
“Admetus,” said Alcestis, “there is no lack of reports about the Gods from the delirium of young men and the tales of old nurses. It is just such stories which have increased the confusion in which all men live. No! Admetus, let me go to Delphi! Even though I have not been chosen to be priestess there, I can be a servant. I can serve His servants and clean the steps and pavements of His house.”
Admetus did not understand her difficulty, but he was sadly giving her his permission when their conversation was interrupted. Word was brought them that a visitor had arrived at the palace, an old blind man who turned out to be Tiresias the priest of Apollo at Delphi. In amazement, Admetus and Alcestis went to the courtyard to receive him. When they drew near he called out in a loud voice:
“I bring a message to the house of Admetus, King of Thessaly. I am in haste to deliver it and to return whence I came. It is the will of Jupiter that Apollo live on earth as a man among men for the space of a year. And Apollo has chosen to live here as a herdsman of Admetus. I have given my message.”
Admetus took a step forward and asked: “Do you mean, noble Tiresias, that Apollo will be here, daily, daily,—?”
“Outside the gate,” shouted Tiresias, “are five herdsmen. One of them is Apollo. Do not seek to know which one is He. Assign them their duties; do justly; and ask me no more questions, for I have no answers.”
With these words and without any sign of reverence, he called the herdsmen to come into the court and himself went on his way. The five herdsmen that slowly came into the courtyard were like any herdsmen; they were covered with dust after their long journey and greatly abashed by the intense gaze that was fixed upon them. King Admetus could scarcely find his voice, but finally he welcomed them and directed they be given their lodging and their dinner. For the rest of the day a silence fell upon all the people in Pherai. They knew that some great honor had come to their country, but it is difficult to be at once happy and puzzled.
Toward the end of that day, when the first stars were appearing, Alcestis slipped out of the palace and went to where the herdsmen were sitting about a fire. She stood at the edge of the firelight and besought Apollo to speak to her in His own person, to emerge from that hiding in which the Gods delight, and to give her an answer to the questions that were her very life. Her prayer was not short. The bewildered shepherds were at first quiet and respectful; then they began passing the wineskin from hand to hand, grunting; one fell asleep and snored. Finally, the shortest one dried his mouth with the back of his hand and said:
“Princess, if there be a God here, I do not know which it is. For thirty days we five have walked across Greece. We have drunk from the same wineskin, have put our hand in the same dish, and slept by the same fire. If there were a God among us, would I not know it? Yet, lady, this I shall say: these are no ordinary herdsmen. That fellow that’s asleep—there’s no illness he can’t cure, snake bite or broken bones. When I fell into a quarry five days ago I was most certainly a dead one, but that fellow leaned over me and said some abracadabra and look at me now. Yet I know well that he’s no God, Princess. Why, in one town, Princess, there was a child with a stopped-up throat, Princess; she’d turned purple and it would have cut your heart to see her. This fellow wanted to sleep. He wouldn’t cross the road to see her. Is that a God? And that fellow beside him, that one—can’t you stop drinking while the Princess is looking at you?—he never loses his way. In the darkest night he knows his north from his south. But I know well that he’s not the God of the Sun. Now the re
dhaired one, he’s no ordinary herdsman, either. He performs miracles and wonders. He reverses the order of nature. He is an inventor.”
With these words the herdsman walked over to his redhaired companion and began kicking him awake. “Wake up. Wake up. Show the Princess some wonders.” The sleeping man stirred and groaned. Suddenly from the upper air and from the distant hills voices could be heard calling “Alcestis! Alcestis!” Whereupon the man turned over and fell asleep. Again he was kicked awake. “Do some more. Do the waterfall from the treetops. Do the balls of fire.” The man swore gruffly. Balls of fire began racing across the ground. They slid up the trees and burst; they climbed onto his companions’ heads; they played with one another drolly like animals. Finally the glade fell into darkness. “Those are indeed things which no other man can do, but I would take my oath, Princess, that he is no God. One of the reasons is that none of his wonders mean anything. We are astonished and after astonishment comes disappointment. During the first days of our journey we asked for more and more wonders, for they diverted us; but finally we were tired of them and to tell the truth, we were ashamed of them and he was ashamed of them, for his tricks had no relation to anything outside themselves. Would a God be ashamed of his wonders? Would He ask Himself what they meant?
“So, you see, Princess!” he concluded, stretching out his arms as though he had finished his reply to her prayer. But Alcestis would not be put off so easily. She pointed to the fourth herdsman.
“That man? He is no ordinary herdsman, either. He is our singer. Believe me, when he plays his lyre and sings, lions hang suspended in their leap. It is true that at times I have said to myself, ‘Surely, this is a God.’ He can fill us to the brim with joy or sorrow at times when we have no reason to rejoice or grieve. He can make the memory of love more tender than love itself. His wonders are greater than those of our healer, our nightwalker, and our miracle worker; but I have watched him,—Princess, his wonders have more effect upon us than upon him. He soon rejects the song he has made. Us it can transport each time, but not him. He loses joy in the thing he has made and is in labor to fashion another. That is enough to assure me that he is not a God, nor even a messenger of the Gods, for the Gods cannot be thought of as despising their handiwork.
“And I? What do I do? What I am doing now. My interest is to inquire into the nature of the Gods—whether they exist and in what ways we may find Them. You may well imagine—”
[Here the narrative was interrupted, and we return to Asinius Pollio’s letter.]
At this moment the Dictator arose and murmuring, “Continue, my friend,” began to cross the room. Catullus repeated, “You may well imagine,” but had scarcely said the words when Caesar fell to the floor in a convulsion of the Sacred Malady. In his writhing he tore the bandages from his side and the floor was soon streaked with his blood. I had been present before at these seizures. I made a ball of the folds of his robe and placed it between his teeth. I directed Catullus to help me straighten his body and Clodia to bring all the robes she could find to warm him. Soon his babbling ceased and he fell into a deep sleep. We watched beside him for a time, then placed him in his litter and the poet and I accompanied him to his home.
Such were the events of Clodia’s twice-interrupted dinner. Both my friends were to die within the year. The poet who had seen that greatness humbled in insanity wrote no more stinging epigrams against him. My master never alluded to his illness, but on several occasions he reminded me of the “happy occasion” when we dined with Clodia and Catullus.
Dawn has come as I have dictated these words. My pain has been forgotten or has abated, and I have acquitted myself of a debt which I have been owing my friends.
Book Two
The reader is reminded that the documents in each Book begin at an earlier date than those in the preceding Book, traverse the time already covered, and continue on to a later date.
XXII Anonymous Letter [written by Servilia, mother of M. Junius Brutus] to Caesar’s wife.
[August 17.]
Madam, it is not likely that the Dictator has yet informed you that the Queen of Egypt will soon arrive in Rome for an extended visit. Should you wish confirmation of this fact you have only to visit your villa on the Janiculan Hill. On the farther slope you will find workmen engaged in constructing an Egyptian temple and in elevating obelisks.
It is important that your attention be called to this visit and to its political dangers, for it is the subject of laughter around the world that you are completely inadequate to the high place you occupy and that your understanding of the political situation of Rome is no better than that of a child.
Cleopatra, madam, is the mother of a son by your husband. The boy’s name is Caesarion. The Queen has kept him hidden from the eyes of her court, but continually spreads about the rumor that he is of divine intelligence and great beauty. The truth on very good authority, however, is that he is an idiot and that although he has passed his third birthday he is unable to talk and is scarcely able to walk.
The Queen’s sole aim in coming to Rome is to legitimize her son and to establish his succession to the mastery of the world. The plan is preposterous, but there are no limits to the ambition of Cleopatra. Her skill at intrigue and her ruthlessness—which did not stop short of the assassination of her uncle and of her brother-husband—and her ascendancy over your husband’s lust are sufficient to bring confusion to the world even though she cannot dominate it.
This is not the first time that you have been publicly insulted by your husband’s ostentatious adulteries. That his infatuation should blind him to the danger this woman brings to the public order is but another evidence of the senility which has begun to be apparent in his administration.
There is little you can do, madam, either to safeguard the State or to defend the dignity of your position. You should be informed, however, that the women of the aristocracy of Rome will refuse to be presented to this Egyptian criminal and will make no appearance at her court. Should you show a similar firmness you will be making some first steps in regaining the respect of the City which you have lost through your selection of friends and through the thoughtlessness of your conversation—a thoughtlessness which even your extreme youth cannot excuse.
XXIII Caesar’s Journal—Letter to Lucius Mamilius Turrinus on the Island of Capri.
[About August 18.]
942. [On Cleopatra and her visit to Rome.]
Last year the Queen of Egypt began requesting permission to pay a visit to Rome. I finally granted it and have offered her for residence my villa across the river. She will stay at least a year in Italy. The whole matter is still a secret and will not be announced to the City until the very eve of her arrival. She is now approaching Carthage and should be here in about a month.
I confess that I look forward to this visit with much pleasure and not only for the reason which first leaps to the mind. She was a remarkable girl. Even at twenty she knew the loading capacity of each of the major wharves of the Nile; she could receive a deputation from Ethiopia and refuse all of its requests and make the refusals appear to be benefits. I have heard her scream at her ministers’ stupidity during a discussion of the royal tax on ivory and she was not only right, but right with a wealth of detailed and ordered information. Indeed, she is one of the few persons I have known who have a genius for administration. She will have become a still more remarkable woman. Conversation, conversation will be a pleasure again. I shall be flattered, understood and flattered, in a realm where few are capable of understanding my achievements. What questions she asks! There are few pleasures equal to that of imparting to a voracious learner the knowledge that one has grown old and weary in acquiring. Conversation will be a pleasure again. Oh, oh, oh, I have sat holding that catlike bundle on my lap, drumming my fingers on ten brown toes and heard a soft voice from my shoulder asking me how to prevent banking houses from discouraging the industry of the people and what are the just wages of a chief of police relative to those of the gover
nor of a city. Everyone in our world, my Lucius, everyone is lazy in mind except you, Cleopatra, this Catullus, and myself.
And yet she is lying, intriguing, intemperate, indifferent to the essential well-being of her people, and a lighthearted murderess. I have been receiving a series of anonymous letters warning me of her propensity to murder. I have no doubt that the lady is not long separated from a beautifully wrought cabinet of poisons; but I know also that at her table I need no taster. The prime object of her every thought is Egypt and I am its first security. If I should die, her country would fall a prey to my successors—patriots without practical judgment or administrators without imagination—and this she knows well. Egypt will never recover its greatness; but Egypt, for what it is, lives by me. I am a better ruler over Egypt than Cleopatra; but she shall learn much. During her stay in Rome I shall open her eyes to things that no Egyptian ruler has ever conceived of.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
946. [Again, on Cleopatra and her visit to Rome.]
Cleopatra can never do a thing without pomp. She asked to be permitted to bring a court of two hundred and a household of a thousand, including a large royal guard. I have cut down these numbers to a court of thirty and a retinue of two hundred, and have told her that the Republic will undertake the responsibility of guarding her person and her party. I have directed, also, that outside of her palace grounds—my villa has already been renamed the Palace of Amenhotep—she may not employ the insignia of royalty except on the two occasions of her official welcome on the Capitoline Hill and of her officiai leave-taking.
The Ides of March Page 9
