“And this vacant space,” asked Tigellinus, after [7] various details had been explained by the Emperor: “What do you mean, Sire, to do with this?”
A huge blank had been left in the middle of the map, covering nearly the whole of the Palatine and Esquiline Hills.
“That is meant to be occupied by my palace and park,” said the Emperor.
The Prime Minister, if one may so describe him, could not restrain an involuntary gesture of surprise.
Nero’s face darkened with the scowl that never failed to show itself at even the slightest opposition to his will.
“Think you, then,” he cried in an angry tone, “that it is too large? The Master of Rome cannot be lodged too well.”
Tigellinus felt that it would be safer not to criticise any further. Popp?a, who, to do her justice, was never wanting in courage, now took up the discussion. The objection that she had to make was in keeping with a curious trait in her character. “Pious” she certainly was not, though Josephus saw fit so to describe her, but she was unquestionably superstitious. The terrors of an unseen world, though they did not keep her back from vice and crime, were still real to her. She did not stick at murder; but nothing would have induced her to pass by a temple without a proper reverence. This feeling quickened her insight into an aspect of the matter which her companion had failed to observe.
[8] “You will buy the houses which you will have to pull down?” she said.
“Certainly,” the Emperor replied; “that will be an easy matter.”
“But there are buildings which it will not be easy to buy.”
The scowl showed itself again on Nero’s face.
“Who will refuse to sell when I want to buy?” he cried. “And besides, you may be sure that I shall not stint the price.”
“True, Sire, but there are the temples, the chapels; they cannot be bought and sold as if they were private houses.”
Nero started up from his couch, and paced the room several times. He could not refuse to see the difficulty. Holy places were not to be bought and pulled down as if they were nothing but so many bricks and stones.
“What say you, Tigellinus?” he cried after a few minutes of silence. “Cannot the Emperor do what he will? Cannot the priests or the augurs, or some one smooth the way? Speak, man!” he went on impatiently, as the minister did not answer at once.
“The gods forbid that I should presume to limit your power!” said Tigellinus. “But yet�may I speak freely?”
“Freely!” cried Nero; “of course. When did I ever resent the truth?”
Tigellinus repressed a smile. His own rise was certainly not due to speaking the truth. He went on:�
[9] “One sacred building, or two, or even three, might be dealt with when some great improvement was in question. That has been done before, and might be done again, but when it comes to a matter of fifty or sixty, or even a hundred,�very likely there are more, for they stand very thick in the old city,�the affair becomes serious. I don’t say it would be impossible, but there would be delay, possibly a very long delay. The people feel very strongly on these things. Some of these temples are held in extraordinary reverence, places that you, Sire, may very likely have never heard of, but which are visited by hundreds daily. To sweep them away in any peremptory fashion would be dangerous. There would have to be ceremonies, expiations, and all the thousand things which the priests invent.”
“Well,” exclaimed the Emperor after a pause, “what is to be done?”
“Sire,” replied Tigellinus, “cannot you modify your plan? Much might be done without this wholesale destruction.”
“Modify it!” thundered the Emperor. “Certainly not. It shall be all or nothing. Do you think that I am going to take all this trouble, and accomplish, after all, nothing more than what any ?dile could have done?”
He threw himself down on the couch and buried his face in the cushions. The Empress and the Minister watched and waited in serious disquiet. There [10] was no knowing what wild resolve he might take. That he had set his heart to no common degree on this new scheme was evident. In all his life he had never given so much serious thought to any subject as he had to this, and disappointment would probably result in some dangerous outburst. After about half an hour had passed, he started up.
“I have it,” he cried; “it shall be done,�the plan, the whole plan.”
“Sire, will you deign to tell us what inspiration the gods have given you?” said Tigellinus.
“All in good time,” said the Emperor. “When I want your help I will tell you what it is needful for you to know. But now it is time for my harp practice. You will dine with us, Tigellinus, and for pity’s sake bring some one who can give us some amusement. Antium is delightful in the daytime, but the evenings! …”
“Madam,” said Tigellinus, when the Emperor had left the room, “have you any idea what he is thinking of?”
“I have absolutely none,” replied Popp?a; “but I fear it may be something very strange. I noticed a dangerous light in his eyes. It has been there often lately. Do you think,” she went on in a low voice, “there is any danger of his going mad? You know about his uncle Caius.” (Footnote: The fourth Emperor, commonly called Caligula.)
“Don’t trouble yourself with such fears,” replied [11] Tigellinus. “It is not likely. His mother had the coolest head of any woman that I have ever seen; and his father, whatever he was, was certainly not mad. And now, if you will excuse me, I have some business to attend to.”
He saluted the Empress and withdrew. Popp?a, little reassured by his words, remained buried in thought,�thought that was full of disquietude and alarm. She had gained all, and even more than all, that she had aimed at. She shared Nero’s throne, not in name only, but in fact. But how dangerous was the height to which she had climbed! A single false step might precipitate her into an abyss which she shuddered to think of. He had spared no one, however near and dear to him. If his mood should change, would he spare her? And his mood might change. At present he loved her as ardently, she thought, as ever. But�for she watched him closely, as a keeper watches a wild beast�she could not help seeing that he was growing more and more restless and irritable. Once he had even lifted his hand against her. It was only a gesture, and checked almost in its beginning, but she could not forget it. “Oh!” she moaned to herself,�for, wicked as she was, she was a woman after all,�“Oh, if only my little darling had lived! Nero loved her so, and she would have softened him. But it was not to be! Why did I allow them to do all these foolish idolatries? And yet, how could I stop it? Still, I am sure that God [12] was angry with me about them, and took the child away from me. And now there are these new troubles. I will send another offering to Jerusalem. This time it shall be a whole bunch of grapes for the golden vine.” (Footnote: Popp?a’s child died before it was four months old. Nero welcomed the birth with extravagant delight. Among the honours with which he celebrated it was the erection of a temple to the goddess of Fertility. Popp?a is known to have had a strong leaning to the Jewish faith, or to speak more exactly, a strong liking for Jewish practices. Hence the curiously inappropriate epithet, which, as has been said, Josephus applies to her.)
Poor creature! the thought of a sacrifice of justice and mercy never entered into her soul.
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THE HATCHING OF A PLOT
[13] ON the very day of the meeting described in my last chapter, a party of six friends was gathered together in the dining-room�I should rather say one of the dining-rooms�of a country house at Tibur. The view commanded by the window of the apartment was singularly lovely. Immediately below, the hillside, richly wooded with elm and chestnut, and here and there a towering pine, sloped down to the lower course of the river Anio. Beyond the river were meadow-lands, green with the unfailing moisture of the soil, and orchards in which the rich fruit was already gathering a golden hue. The magnificent falls of the river were in full view, but not so near as to make the roar of the descending water inconveniently loud. At the moment, the almost level rays of the setting sun illumined with a golden light that was indescribably beautiful the cloud of spray that rose from the pool in which the falling waters were received. It was an effect that was commonly watched with intense interest by visitors to the villa, for, indeed, it was just one of the beauties of nature which a Roman knew how to appre- [14] ciate. Landscape, especially of the wilder sort, he did not care about; but the loveliness of a foreground, the greenery of a rich meadow, the deep shade of a wood, the clear water bubbling from a spring or leaping from a rock, these he could admire to the utmost. But on the present occasion the attention of the guests had been otherwise occupied. They had been listening to a recitation from their host. To listen to a recitation was often a price which guests paid for their entertainment, and paid somewhat unwillingly and even ungraciously. Rich dishes and costly wines, the rarest of flowers, and the most precious of perfumes were not very cheaply purchased by two hours of boredom from some dull oration or yet duller poem. There was no such feeling among the guests who were now assembled in this Tibur villa. The entertainment, indeed, had been simple and frugal, such as it befitted a young disciple of the Stoic school to give to a party of like-minded friends. But the intellectual entertainment that followed when the tables were removed (Footnote: “Removed” is the right word rather than “cleared.” The actual tables were taken away. “Table,” in Latin, in fact means a “course” of a meal, as well as that on which it was served.) had been a treat of the most delightful kind. This may be readily understood when I say that the host of the evening was Lucan, and that he had been reciting from his great poem of the Pharsalia the description of the battle from which it took its name. [15] To modern readers of Latin literature who find their standard of excellence in Virgil and Horace, the Pharsalia sounds artificial and turgid. But it suited the taste of that age, all the more from the very qualities which make it less acceptable to us. And, beyond all doubt, it lent itself admirably to recitation. A modern reader often thinks it rhetoric rather than poetry. But the rhetoric was undeniably effective, especially when set off by the author’s fiery declamation, and when the recitation came to an end with the well-known lines:�