XIV
Julian passed the winter in preparations for his Persian campaign. Atthe beginning of spring, on the fifth of March, he quitted Antiochwith an army of sixty-five thousand men. The snow was melting from themountains. In fruit-gardens the leafless young apricot trees weretrimmed with pink blossoms. The soldiery marched gaily to the war asto a festival.
The dockyards of Samos had built a fleet of twelve hundred ships,wrought of enormous cedars, pine, and oak from Taurus gorges, and thefleet had ascended the Euphrates as far as the city of Leontopolis.
By forced marches Julian passed by Hieropolis to Carrhae, and thencealong the Euphrates as far as the southern Persian frontier. In thenorth, another army of thirty thousand men had been sent out under thegenerals Procopius and Sebastian. Joined to the forces of the ArmenianArsaces, these were to lay waste Adiabene, Apolloniatis, andtraversing Corduene rejoin the principal army on the banks of theTigris at Ctesiphon.
All had been provided for, combined and planned with ardour by theEmperor himself. Those who understood the plan of campaign wereamazed, and not without reason, at its wisdom, simplicity, andgreatness of conception.
At the beginning of April, the army reached Circesium, a postremarkably fortified by Diocletian on the frontier of Mesopotamia, atthe junction of the Araxes and the Euphrates. There a bridge of boatswas constructed, Julian having given the order to cross the frontieron the following morning. Late that evening, when all was ready, hereturned to his tent, fatigued but satisfied. He lit his lamp in orderto resume his favourite work, for which part of his night wasreserved. It was a study in pure philosophy: _Against the Christians_.He used to write it in snatches, within sound of the trumpets andcamp-songs and challenging sentries. He rejoiced in the idea that hewas fighting the Galilean with every weapon lying to his hand; bybattlefield and book, by Roman sword and Hellenic learning. Never didthe Emperor part with the works of the Fathers, ecclesiastical canonsand creeds of the councils. On the margin of the New Testament, whichhe studied with no less care than Plato and Homer, he would makecaustic annotations with his own hand.
Julian took off his dusty armour, sat down before his table, anddipping his reed-pen in ink, began to write. His leisure wasimmediately invaded. Two couriers had just arrived in camp, one fromItaly, the other from Jerusalem. Their news was by no means agreeable.An earthquake had destroyed the city of Nicomedia in Asia Minor, andsubterranean rumblings had raised to the highest pitch the terror ofthe inhabitants of Constantinople. The books of the sibyls, moreover,forebade the crossing of the frontiers before the year had elapsed.The courier from Jerusalem brought a letter from the dignitary Alipiusof Antioch. By a strange contradiction Julian, the worshipper of themanifold Olympus, had decided to rebuild the temple, destroyed by theRomans, of the one God of Israel, in order to refute, in the face oftime and the world, the prophecy of the Gospel, "_There shall not be__left here one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down_"(Matt. xxiv. 2). The Jews responded with enthusiasm to the Emperor'sappeal. Gifts flowed in from all sides. The plan of rebuilding was asuperb one. The work was promptly taken in hand, and Julian confidedthe general supervision to his friend, the learned and noble Alipiusof Antioch, formerly proconsul of Britain.
"What has happened?" asked Julian, before unsealing the missive,perturbed at the sombre face of the courier.
"A great misfortune, well-beloved Caesar!"
"Speak, fear nothing."
"So long as the workmen were working at the ruins and demolishing theold walls, all went well. But hardly had they proceeded to lay thefirst stone of the new edifice, when flames, in the shape of balls offire, escaped from the vaults, overturned the blocks, and scorched theworkmen. On the following day, on the order of the most noble Alipius,the works were resumed. The miracle was repeated, and so also a thirdtime. The Christians are triumphant; the Hellenes in despair; and nota single workman will consent to go down into the vaults. Nothingremains of the edifice, not one stone!"
"Hush, fool! You must be a Galilean yourself!" exclaimed the Emperor."These are old wives' tales!"
He broke the seal, unfolded, and read the letter. The courier spokethe truth. Alipius confirmed his words. Julian could not believe hiseyes. He re-read the message carefully, bringing it nearer to thelamp. His face flushed with anger and shame. He bit his lips and threwthe crumpled papyrus to the physician Oribazius, who stood hard by.
"Read!... Either Alipius has gone mad, or indeed.... No! that'simpossible!"
The young Alexandrian doctor picked up and read the letter with thecalmness which never deserted him. Lifting his clear and intelligenteyes to Julian's, he answered--
"I see in this no miracle. Scientific men described the phenomenonlong ago. In the vaults of old buildings which have been sealed fromthe air for centuries, there collects a dense inflammable gas. To gowith a lighted torch into these vaults is enough to explain theexplosion and kill the rash workman. To the ignorant and superstitiousthis of course appears a miracle, but it is perfectly natural andexplicable."
He laid the letter on the table with a slightly pedantic smile on histhin lips.
"Ah, yes! to be sure," said Julian, not without bitterness. "Theearthquakes at Nicomedia and Constantinople, the prophecies of thesibylline books, drought at Antioch, conflagrations at Rome,inundations in Egypt, all are perfectly natural! Only it is odd thateverything is in league against me, earth and water, fire and sky, andeven the gods, I believe!"
Sallustius Secundus came into the tent.
"Sublime Augustus! Tuscan wizards, charged by you to ascertain thewill of the gods, beg you to wait; not to cross the frontierto-morrow. The birds of the oracles, despite all prayers, refuse food,and will not even pick at the grains of barley!"
At first Julian frowned angrily, but his face immediately brightened,and he burst into a surprising fit of laughter.
"Really, Sallustius? They won't peck at anything, eh? Then what mustwe do with these obstinate beasts? Suppose we retrace our steps toAntioch, amid the laughter of the Galileans?... My dear friend, goback immediately to these Tuscan wizards and tell them my will. Letthe fowls be thrown into the river. Do you understand? These pamperedbirds are not pleased to eat. Let's see if they will drink.... Carrymy orders."
"Is this some jest, Caesar? Do I understand you rightly? In spite ofeverything, we are to cross the frontier to-morrow?"
"Yes! And I swear by my next victory, and the greatness of Rome, thatno prophetic bird shall daunt me, neither water, earth, nor fire, noteven the gods! It is too late! The die is cast. My friends, is thereanything in all nature superior to the will of man? In all thesibylline books is there anything stronger than the words 'I will'?More than ever I feel the mystery of my life. No auguries shall enmeshme. To-day I believe in, and yet I laugh at them. Is it sacrilege? Somuch the worse. I have nothing to lose! If the gods abandon me I willdeny them!"
When everybody had gone out, Julian approached the little statue ofMercury, with the intention of praying, as he usually did, and castingsome grains of incense on the tripod; but suddenly he turned away witha smile, lay down on the lion-skin which served him as bed, andextinguishing the lamp fell into a deep and careless slumber, as folkoften do on the brink of misfortune.
Dawn had hardly risen when he awoke in higher spirits than on theevening before. The trumpet sounded. Julian leapt on horseback androde to the banks of the Araxes. It was a cool April morning. A gentlewind bore the nocturnal desert warmth from the banks of the greatAsiatic river. All along the Euphrates, from Circesium as far as theRoman camp, stretched the fleet, over a space of nearly two miles.Since the reign of Xerxes no such display of forces had ever been seenhere. The sun's first rays glittered behind the mausoleum raised toGordian, the conqueror of the Persians, killed in that place by theArab Philip. The edge of the purple disk rose from the desert like aburning coal, and all the tops of the masts and sails grew red in themorning fog. The Emperor raised his hand, and the earth-shaking massof sixty-five thousand men began the ma
rch. The Roman army began tocross the bridge that separated it from the Persian frontier. Julian'shorse carried him over the bridge and up a high sandy hill on theenemy's soil. The centurion of the Imperial Guard, Anatolius, theadmirer of Arsinoe, marched at the head of the palatine cohort.
Anatolius looked at the Emperor. A great change had come over Julianduring the month passed in the open air, amidst the healthy toils ofcampaigning. It was difficult to recognise in this masculine warrior,so hale of visage, whose young glance was brilliant with gaiety, thethin and yellow-faced philosopher, dull-eyed, ragged-bearded, nervousin movement, with ink-stained fingers and toga, Julian therhetorician, who had served as butt for the street-boys of Antioch.
"Hark! hark! Caesar is going to speak!"
All was silent. The clink of arms, the noise of waves lapping sides ofships, and the silky rustle of the standards were the only soundsaudible.
"Warriors, my bravest of the brave," said Julian in his strong voice,"I read such gaiety, such boldness on your faces, that I cannot helpaddressing you some words of welcome. Remember, comrades, the destinyof the world is in our hands! We are going to restore the oldgreatness of Rome! Steel your hearts; be ready for any fate. There isto be no turning back.
"I shall be at your head, on horseback or on foot, taking all dangersand toils with the humblest among you; because, henceforth, you are nolonger my servants, but my children and my friends! If fate kills me,happy shall I be to die for our great Rome, like Scaevola and theCuriatii and the noblest of the Decii. Courage, then, my comrades! andremember that the strong are always conquerors!"
He stretched his sword, with a smile, toward the distant horizon. Thesoldiers in unison held up their bucklers, shouting in rapture--
"Glory, glory to conquering Caesar!"
The galleys glided down the reaches of the river. The Roman eagleshovered above their cohorts, and the Emperor rode on his white horse,to meet the rising sun, across the cold blue shadow, on the desertsand, cast from the pyramid of Gordian. Soon, soon was Julian to quitthe light of day for the long shadow of the solitary grave.
The Death of the Gods Page 38