appellations.
But we must not suppose that among the cities of Magna Graecia, Isis was
worshipped with those forms and ceremonies which were of right her own.
The mongrel and modern nations of the South, with a mingled arrogance
and ignorance, confounded the worships of all climes and ages. And the
profound mysteries of the Nile were degraded by a hundred meretricious
and frivolous admixtures from the creeds of Cephisus and of Tibur. The
temple of Isis in Pompeii was served by Roman and Greek priests,
ignorant alike of the language and the customs of her ancient votaries;
and the descendant of the dread Egyptian kings, beneath the appearance
of reverential awe, secretly laughed to scorn the puny mummeries which
imitated the solemn and typical worship of his burning clime.
Ranged now on either side the steps was the sacrificial crowd, arrayed
in white garments, while at the summit stood two of the inferior
priests, the one holding a palm branch, the other a slender sheaf of
corn. In the narrow passage in front thronged the bystanders.
'And what,' whispered Arbaces to one of the bystanders, who was a
merchant engaged in the Alexandrian trade, which trade had probably
first introduced in Pompeii the worship of the Egyptian goddess--'what
occasion now assembles you before the altars of the venerable Isis? It
seems, by the white robes of the group before me, that a sacrifice is to
be rendered; and by the assembly of the priests, that ye are prepared
for some oracle. To what question is it to vouchsafe a reply?'
'We are merchants,' replied the bystander (who was no other than Diomed)
in the same voice, 'who seek to know the fate of our vessels, which sail
for Alexandria to-morrow. We are about to offer up a sacrifice and
implore an answer from the goddess. I am not one of those who have
petitioned the priest to sacrifice, as you may see by my dress, but I
have some interest in the success of the fleet--by Jupiter! yes. I have
a pretty trade, else how could I live in these hard times?
The Egyptian replied gravely--'That though Isis was properly the goddess
of agriculture, she was no less the patron of commerce.' Then turning
his head towards the east, Arbaces seemed absorbed in silent prayer.
And now in the centre of the steps appeared a priest robed in white from
head to foot, the veil parting over the crown; two new priests relieved
those hitherto stationed at either corner, being naked half-way down to
the breast, and covered, for the rest, in white and loose robes. At the
same time, seated at the bottom of the steps, a priest commenced a
solemn air upon a long wind-instrument of music. Half-way down the
steps stood another flamen, holding in one hand the votive wreath, in
the other a white wand; while, adding to the picturesque scene of that
eastern ceremony, the stately ibis (bird sacred to the Egyptian worship)
looked mutely down from the wall upon the rite, or stalked beside the
altar at the base of the steps.
At that altar now stood the sacrificial flamen.
The countenance of Arbaces seemed to lose all its rigid calm while the
aruspices inspected the entrails, and to be intent in pious anxiety--to
rejoice and brighten as the signs were declared favorable, and the fire
began bright and clearly to consume the sacred portion of the victim
amidst odorous of myrrh and frankincense. It was then that a dead
silence fell over the whispering crowd, and the priests gathering round
the cella, another priest, naked save by a cincture round the middle,
rushed forward, and dancing with wild gestures, implored an answer from
the goddess. He ceased at last in exhaustion, and a low murmuring noise
was heard within the body of the statue: thrice the head moved, and the
lips parted, and then a hollow voice uttered these mystic words:
There are waves like chargers that meet and glow,
There are graves ready wrought in the rocks below,
On the brow of the future the dangers lour,
But blest are your barks in the fearful hour.
The voice ceased--the crowd breathed more freely--the merchants looked
at each other. 'Nothing can be more plain,' murmured Diomed; 'there is
to be a storm at sea, as there very often is at the beginning of autumn,
but our vessels are to be saved. O beneficent Isis!'
'Lauded eternally be the goddess!' said the merchants: 'what can be less
equivocal than her prediction?'
Raising one hand in sign of silence to the people, for the rites of Isis
enjoined what to the lively Pompeians was an impossible suspense from
the use of the vocal organs, the chief priest poured his libation on the
altar, and after a short concluding prayer the ceremony was over, and
the congregation dismissed. Still, however, as the crowd dispersed
themselves here and there, the Egyptian lingered by the railing, and
when the space became tolerably cleared, one of the priests, approaching
it, saluted him with great appearance of friendly familiarity.
The countenance of the priest was remarkably unprepossessing--his shaven
skull was so low and narrow in the front as nearly to approach to the
conformation of that of an African savage, save only towards the
temples, where, in that organ styled acquisitiveness by the pupils of a
science modern in name, but best practically known (as their sculpture
teaches us) amongst the ancients, two huge and almost preternatural
protuberances yet more distorted the unshapely head--around the brows
the skin was puckered into a web of deep and intricate wrinkles--the
eyes, dark and small, rolled in a muddy and yellow orbit--the nose,
short yet coarse, was distended at the nostrils like a satyr's--and the
thick but pallid lips, the high cheek-bones, the livid and motley hues
that struggled through the parchment skin, completed a countenance which
none could behold without repugnance, and few without terror and
distrust: whatever the wishes of the mind, the animal frame was well
fitted to execute them; the wiry muscles of the throat, the broad chest,
the nervous hands and lean gaunt arms, which were bared above the elbow,
betokened a form capable alike of great active exertion and passive
endurance.
'Calenus,' said the Egyptian to this fascinating flamen, 'you have
improved the voice of the statue much by attending to my suggestion; and
your verses are excellent. Always prophesy good fortune, unless there
is an absolute impossibility of its fulfilment.'
'Besides,' added Calenus, 'if the storm does come, and if it does
overwhelm the accursed ships, have we not prophesied it? and are the
barks not blest to be at rest?--for rest prays the mariner in the AEgean
sea, or at least so says Horace--can the mariner be more at rest in the
sea than when he is at the bottom of it?'
'Right, my Calenus; I wish Apaecides would take a lesson from your
wisdom. But I desire to confer with you relative to him and to other
matters: you can admit me into one of your less sacred apartments?'
'Assuredly,' replied the priest, leading the way to one of the small
chambers which surrounded the open gate. Here they seated themselves
before a small table spread with dishes containing fruit and eggs, and
various cold meats, with vases of excellent wine, of which while the
companions partook, a curtain, drawn across the entrance opening to the
court, concealed them from view, but admonished them by the thinness of
the partition to speak low, or to speak no secrets: they chose the
former alternative.
'Thou knowest,' said Arbaces, in a voice that scarcely stirred the air,
so soft and inward was its sound, 'that it has ever been my maxim to
attach myself to the young. From their flexile and unformed minds I can
carve out my fittest tools. I weave--I warp--I mould them at my will.
Of the men I make merely followers or servants; of the women...'
'Mistresses,' said Calenus, as a livid grin distorted his ungainly
features.
'Yes, I do not disguise it: woman is the main object, the great
appetite, of my soul. As you feed the victim for the slaughter, I love
to rear the votaries of my pleasure. I love to train, to ripen their
minds--to unfold the sweet blossom of their hidden passions, in order to
prepare the fruit to my taste. I loathe your ready-made and ripened
courtesans; it is in the soft and unconscious progress of innocence to
desire that I find the true charm of love; it is thus that I defy
satiety; and by contemplating the freshness of others, I sustain the
freshness of my own sensations. From the young hearts of my victims I
draw the ingredients of the caldron in which I re-youth myself. But
enough of this: to the subject before us. You know, then, that in
Neapolis some time since I encountered Ione and Apaecides, brother and
sister, the children of Athenians who had settled at Neapolis. The death
of their parents, who knew and esteemed me, constituted me their
guardian. I was not unmindful of the trust. The youth, docile and mild,
yielded readily to the impression I sought to stamp upon him. Next to
woman, I love the old recollections of my ancestral land; I love to keep
alive--to propagate on distant shores (which her colonies perchance yet
people) her dark and mystic creeds. It may be, that it pleases me to
delude mankind, while I thus serve the deities. To Apaecides I taught
the solemn faith of Isis. I unfolded to him something of those sublime
allegories which are couched beneath her worship. I excited in a soul
peculiarly alive to religious fervor that enthusiasm which imagination
begets on faith. I have placed him amongst you: he is one of you.'
'He is so,' said Calenus: 'but in thus stimulating his faith, you have
robbed him of wisdom. He is horror-struck that he is no longer duped:
our sage delusions, our speaking statues and secret staircases dismay
and revolt him; he pines; he wastes away; he mutters to himself; he
refuses to share our ceremonies. He has been known to frequent the
company of men suspected of adherence to that new and atheistical creed
which denies all our gods, and terms our oracles the inspirations of
that malevolent spirit of which eastern tradition speaks. Our
oracles--alas! we know well whose inspirations they are!'
'This is what I feared,' said Arbaces, musingly, 'from various
reproaches he made me when I last saw him. Of late he hath shunned my
steps. I must find him: I must continue my lessons: I must lead him
into the adytum of Wisdom. I must teach him that there are two stages of
sanctity--the first, FAITH--the next, DELUSION; the one for the vulgar,
the second for the sage.'
'I never passed through the first, I said Calenus; 'nor you either, I
think, my Arbaces.'
'You err,' replied the Egyptian, gravely. 'I believe at this day (not
indeed that which I teach, but that which I teach not). Nature has a
sanctity against which I cannot (nor would I) steel conviction. I
believe in mine own knowledge, and that has revealed to me--but no
matter. Now to earthlier and more inviting themes. If I thus fulfilled
my object with Apaecides, what was my design for Ione? Thou knowest
already I intend her for my queen--my bride--my heart's Isis. Never
till I saw her knew I all the love of which my nature is capable.'
'I hear from a thousand lips that she is a second Helen,' said Calenus;
and he smacked his own lips, but whether at the wine or at the notion it
is not easy to decide.
'Yes, she has a beauty that Greece itself never excelled,' resumed
Arbaces. 'But that is not all: she has a soul worthy to match with mine.
She has a genius beyond that of woman--keen--dazzling--bold. Poetry
flows spontaneous to her lips: utter but a truth, and, however intricate
and profound, her mind seizes and commands it. Her imagination and her
reason are not at war with each other; they harmonize and direct her
course as the winds and the waves direct some lofty bark. With this she
unites a daring independence of thought; she can stand alone in the
world; she can be brave as she is gentle; this is the nature I have
sought all my life in woman, and never found till now. Ione must be
mine! In her I have a double passion; I wish to enjoy a beauty of
spirit as of form.'
'She is not yours yet, then?' said the priest.
'No; she loves me--but as a friend--she loves me with her mind only.
She fancies in me the paltry virtues which I have only the profounder
virtue to disdain. But you must pursue with me her history. The brother
and sister were young and rich: Ione is proud and ambitious--proud of
her genius--the magic of her poetry--the charm of her conversation.
When her brother left me, and entered your temple, in order to be near
him she removed also to Pompeii. She has suffered her talents to be
known. She summons crowds to her feasts; her voice enchants them; her
poetry subdues. She delights in being thought the successor of Erinna.'
'Or of Sappho?'
'But Sappho without love! I encouraged her in this boldness of
career--in this indulgence of vanity and of pleasure. I loved to steep
her amidst the dissipations and luxury of this abandoned city. Mark me,
Calenus! I desired to enervate her mind!--it has been too pure to
receive yet the breath which I wish not to pass, but burningly to eat
into, the mirror. I wished her to be surrounded by lovers, hollow,
vain, and frivolous (lovers that her nature must despise), in order to
feel the want of love. Then, in those soft intervals of lassitude
that succeed to excitement--I can weave my spells--excite her
interest--attract her passions--possess myself of her heart. For it is
not the young, nor the beautiful, nor the gay, that should fascinate
Ione; her imagination must be won, and the life of Arbaces has been one
scene of triumph over the imaginations of his kind.'
'And hast thou no fear, then, of thy rivals? The gallants of Italy are
