This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of thefile for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making anentire meal of them. D.W.]
By Georg Ebers
Scarcely had Macrinus closed the door behind him, when Caracalla threwhimself exhausted on the throne, and ordered wine to brought.
The gloomy gaze he bent upon the ground was not affected this time.The physician noted with anxiety how his master's breast heaved and hiseyelids quivered; but when he offered Caesar a soothing potion, he wavedhim away, and commanded him to cease from troubling him.
For all that, he listened a little later to the legate, who broughtthe news that the youths of the city assembled on the race-coursewere beginning to be impatient. They were singing and applaudingboisterously, and the songs they so loudly insisted on having repeatedwould certainly not contain matter flattering to the Romans.
"Leave them alone," answered Caesar, roughly. "Every line is aimed at meand no other. But the condemned are always allowed their favorite mealbefore the last journey. The food they love is venomous satire. Letthem enjoy it to the full once more!—Is it far to Zminis's prison?"
The reply was in the negative; and as Caracalla exclaimed, "So much thebetter!" a significant smile played on his lips.
The high-priest of Serapis had looked on in much distress of mind. He,as the head of the Museum, had set high hopes on the youth who had cometo such a terrible end. If Caesar should carry his threats intoexecution, there would be an end to that celebrated home of learningwhich, in his opinion, bore such noble fruits of study. And what couldCaracalla mean by his dark saying that the sport and mockery of thoseyouths below was their last meal? The worst might indeed be expectedfrom the fearful tyrant who was at once so deeply wounded and sogrievously offended; and the high-priest had already sent messengers—Greeks of good credit—to warn the insurgent youths in the stadium. But,as the chief minister of the divinity, he also esteemed it his duty, atany risk to himself, to warn the despot, whom he saw on the verge ofbeing carried away to deeds of unparalleled horror. He thought the timehad come, when Caracalla looked up from the brooding reverie into whichhe had again sunk, and with an ominous scowl asked Timotheus whether hiswife, under whose protection Melissa had been seen the day before, hadknown that the false-hearted girl had given herself to another man whileshe feigned love for him.
The high-priest repelled the suspicion with his usual dignity, and wenton to adjure Caesar not to visit on an industrious and dutiful communitythe sins of a light-minded girl's base folly and falsehood.
But Caracalla would not suffer him to finish; he wrathfully inquired whohad given him a right to force his advice on Caesar.
On this Timotheus replied, with calm dignity:
"Your own noble words, great Caesar, when, to your honor be it spoken,you reminded the misguided skeptic of the true meaning of the old godsand of what is due to them. The god whom I serve, great Caesar, issecond to none: the heavens are his head, the ocean is his body, and theearth his feet; the sunshine is the light of his all-seeing eye, andeverything which stirs in the heart or brain of man is an emanation ofhis divine spirit. Thus he is the all-pervading soul of t