CHAPTER XXIII.
THE MAMERTINE PRISON.
Let us now turn our attention to the fate of the characters in our taleof Christian trial and triumph, around whom its interest chieflycentres. They have been consigned to one of the most dismal of the manygloomy dungeons of Rome--the thrice terrible Mamertine prison--hauntedwith memories of long centuries of cruelty and crime. Manacled each to aRoman soldier, Adauctus, Aurelius, Demetrius, and Callirho[e:], togetherwith other Christians condemned to martyrdom, marched through thestreets under the noontide glare of a torrid sun. A guard armed _cap [a]pi[e/]_, flung open an iron-studded door, and admitted them to a gloomyvault a few steps below the level of the street. Here a brawny Vulcan,with anvil and hammer, with many a brutal gibe smote off the fettersthat linked the prisoners and soldiers together, and riveted them againso that these victims of oppression were bound together in pairs.Sometimes it happened that one of a pair thus bound together died, andthe survivor endured the horror of being inseparably fettered to afestering corpse. To this the apostle refers when, groaning over thecorruptions of his sinful nature, he exclaims: "O wretched man that Iam, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?"
"My dainty lady," said the hideous Cyclops, as he rudely seized the armof Callirho[e:], "this is not the sort of bracelet you've been used towear. I should not much mind, being bound to such as you myself, only Iwould prefer silken fetters to those iron gyves." Then, as she shrankfrom his touch and winced as he bruised her tender flesh in unrivetingthe fetters, he said, with an insolent jeer, "I wont hurt you more thanI can help, my beauty. You are not used to having such a roughchamberlain;" and he uttered a coarse jest with which we shall notpollute our page.
A rosy flush stormed the brow of the maiden as she turned her blushingcheek to the mildewed and cold stone wall, in haughty silence disdaininga word of reply to the brutal ruffian.
"Nay, my fine gentlemen," went on this typical Roman jailer, as Adauctusand the aged Demetrius, weary with their march, sank upon a stone bench,"this is too luxurious an apartment for you. For you we have a deeperdepth." And Be pointed to an opening in the floor, hitherto unnoticed inthe gloom. "Nay, you need not shrink, old man," he went on, as Demetriusrecoiled from the grave-like opening at his feet. "Your betters havebeen there before you."
"Father, your blessing e'er you go," exclaimed Callirho[e:], and flingingherself on his breast, she received his kiss and benediction.
By means of a leathern strap beneath their arms, the prisoners were oneby one let down into a hideous vault, like men to a living burial. Intothis lower dungeon no beam of light struggled, save a precarious rayfrom the opening in the floor above. The loathsome cell was even thendank with the slime of well-nigh a thousand years, its constructionbeing attributed to Ancus Martius, the fourth king of Rome. Here theAfrican prince, Jugurtha, was starved to death. "What a cold bath isthis!" he exclaimed, as he descended into its chilly gloom. Here theGallic king, Vercingetorix, also died. Here the usurper Sejanus wasexecuted, and here the fellow conspirators of Cataline lingered todeath. If we would accept Roman tradition, we would also believe thatSt. Peter and St. Paul were immured in this dismal vault, and in thecase of the latter illustrious martyr it is more than likely that thestory is true. A stairway has now been constructed to this lower depth,and the present writer has stood upon the stone pavement worn by thefeet of generations of victims of oppression, and has drunk of a springat which the Apostle of the Gentiles may have quenched his thirst.
The prisoners enjoyed not long even this sad reprieve from death. Theywere destined soon to finish their course by a glorious martyrdom. TheEmperors determined to gratify at once their own persecuting fury andthe cruel thirst for blood of the Roman mob, by offering a holocaust ofvictims in the amphitheatre. The _Acta Diurna_, a sort of public gazetteof the day, which circulated in the great houses, and baths, and otherplaces of concourse, contained the announcement of a grand exhibition ofthe _ludi circenses_, or gladiatorial games, to be celebrated in honourof the god Neptune--_Neptunus Equestris_. In the public spaces of theForum, and in the neighbourhood of the Flavian Amphitheatre andelsewhere, where the crowd around them would not obstruct the highway,were displayed large white bulletin boards, on which were written incoloured chalks a list of the games--like the playbills which placardthe streets of great cities to-day--and heralds proclaimed through everystreet, even in the crowded Ghetto, the splendour of the approachinggames. These were on a scale on which no modern manager ever dreamed.Trajan exhibited games which lasted a hundred and twenty-three days, inwhich 10,000 gladiators fought and 11,000 fierce animals were killed.Sometimes the vast arena was flooded with water, and _naumachia_ orsea-fights were exhibited. The vast flood-gates and cisterns by whichthis was accomplished may still be seen.
The chief attraction of the games provided by the Emperors Diocletianand Galerius, however, was not the conflict of what might almost becalled armies of trained gladiators, nor the slaughter of hundreds offierce Libyan leopards and Numidian lions, but the sacrifice of somescores of helpless and unarmed Christians--old men, weak women, andtender and innocent children.
There was much excitement in the schools of the gladiators--vast stonebarracks, where they were drilled in their dreadful trade. They wereoriginally captives taken in war, or condemned malefactors; but in thedegenerate days of the Empire, knights, senators, and soldiers soughtdistinction in the arena, and even unsexed women fought half-naked inthe ring, or lay dead and trampled in the sands. To captives of war wasoften offered, as a reward for special skill or courage, their freedomand fierce and fell were conflicts to which men wore spurred by thedouble incentives of life and liberty.
Special interest was given to the forthcoming games by the distinguishedreputation of one of the volunteer gladiators, a brilliant youngmilitary officer, our friend Ligurius Rufus, who, sated and sickenedwith the most frenzied dissipations that Rome could offer, plunged intothis mimic war to appease by its excitement the gnawing ennui of hislife.
The bets ran high upon the reckless young noble who was the favourite ofthe sporting spend-thrifts and profligates of the city. The vilestcondition of society that ever cursed the earth was filling up themeasure of its iniquity, and invoking the wrath of Heaven. The wineshops in the Suburra and the gladiators' quarter were overflowing with abrawling, blaspheming, drunken mob, the vilest dregs of the vilest citythe patient earth has ever borne upon its bosom.
Valeria, the Martyr of the Catacombs: A Tale of Early Christian Life in Rome Page 25