The Golden Ass

by Peter Singer

  Then along came a traveler who noticed me wandering all alone and seized me. He climbed quickly on my back and led me along a hidden winding path, beating me with a staff he was carrying. I was quite willing to let him lead me on his course, leaving behind the horrific butcher of my manhood, and I wasn’t really bothered by his blows, since of course I was used to being thrashed by clubs “to the full extent of the law.”

  But once again Fortune, so persistent in persecuting me, had already, amazingly quickly, detected my getaway, and concocted a new trap. The shepherds where I’d been stabled were hunting for a lost calf and, while wandering around various parts, ran into us by chance. They recognized me immediately, grabbed me by my halter, and tried to drag me away. But he (the one who found me) resisted bravely and valiantly and called on the gods to witness, crying:

  “What is this? Why are you assaulting me and dragging me off so roughly?”

  “Ya say? We treating you outside the law, when you’ve stolen and led off our ass? How ’bout instead you tell us where you’re hiding the boy ass-driver? Probably killed him.”

  And on the spot they dragged him to the ground and pummeled him with punches and crushed him with kicks, while all the time he swore that he hadn’t seen any driver, but had encountered the ass untethered and alone and had taken possession of him in the hopes of a reward—but would be glad to restore him to his master just the same. “And I wish that this ass himself,” he said, “which I sure wish I’d never seen, could emit a human voice and provide testimony of my innocence. Then you would surely regret this injustice.” But he gained nothing by these oaths, and the awful herdsmen led him away with a rope around his neck, across the woody groves of the mountain where the boy used to gather his wood in other days.

  That boy they didn’t find anywhere in the countryside, but his body could be seen out in the open, torn limb from limb and scattered all over. There was no doubt in my mind that this was the work of that bear’s teeth, and, by Hercules, I would have said what I knew if I’d had the resources of speech available. But the only thing I could do was rejoice, albeit quietly, in this belated revenge. When they finally found all the dispersed parts of his corpse, they managed to fit them together and entrusted them to the earth on the spot. As for my “Bellerophon,”* they charged him as the indubitable cattle-rustler and bloody murderer and led him off in chains to their huts for the time being, until the following daybreak when they would take him to the authorities, as they said, to meet his punishment.

  Meanwhile, even as the boy’s parents were in mourning, beating their breasts and wailing, that peasant arrived as promised, insisting on my surgery. But one from the crowd said, “Our present loss is not his fault, but you’re more than welcome to come tomorrow and remove not just the ‘natural parts’ of this worst-ass-ever, but even his head. And help will not be lacking among those here!”

  Thus it was that my catastrophe was postponed to the next day. I was thanking that fine boy since his death had given me one little day’s respite from my butchery. But I wasn’t even granted this tiny interval for satisfaction or rest; you see, the boy’s mother burst into my stable lamenting her son’s terrible death, overcome with weeping, dressed in black, tearing her white ash-laden hair with both hands, shrieking and crying out, beating and violently bashing her breasts. And she spoke:

  “Just look at him leaning over his manger without a care, indulging his voracious appetite, stuffing his deep, insatiable belly by constant eating. No pity for my anguish, no thought for the awful fate of his dead master. I bet he has nothing but contempt and scorn for old, weak me, and thinks he’s going to get away with this crime scot-free. He’s probably figuring he’ll be found innocent; it’s typical of those who do wrong to expect a safe outcome despite their guilty conscience. No, not now, by the trustworthy gods, you four-footed good-for-nothing! Even if somehow you got the use of a borrowed voice, who, in the end, could you persuade, what idiot, that this atrocity of yours wasn’t to be blamed on you, when you could have put up a fight with your feet and kept him from my poor boy with your teeth? You sure did attack him often enough with your hooves, but didn’t have the energy to defend him like that when he was going to die? For sure, you could have carried him off quickly on your back and snatched him from the bloody hands of that violent outlaw. And finally, you shouldn’t have deserted and abandoned him, your fellow slave, your master, companion, and caretaker, and fled all alone. Don’t you know that even one who refuses to give help and safety to those facing death is subject to punishment—since he’s behaving contrary to good moral conduct? But you’re not going to take joy from my hardships anymore, murderer! I’ll make sure you get the point: that people gain strength naturally from wretched grief.”

  After this speech, she ran her hands under her breast-band to unfasten it, and used it to bind my back legs one by one and knot them very tightly together—obviously so that there would be no way for me to retaliate. Then she removed the wooden bar they used to secure the stable doors, and didn’t stop beating me until she was exhausted, her strength vanquished, and the cudgel dropped from her hands by the force of its own weight. Then, while complaining that her arms had grown tired so fast, she ran to the hearth and carried back a glowing firebrand, which she jammed up between my thighs. At this point, I relied on the only protection left to me: I squirted out a foul stream of liquid dung into her face and eyes. So, blind and stinking, this disaster of a woman was finally driven away from me. Otherwise, I would have perished on the spot.

  * In Greek mythology, the hero Bellerophon was granted Pegasus, the winged horse, to ride. Another connection to the current passage is that Bellerophon was falsely accused of having assaulted a host’s wife.

  At cockcrow, a young man arrived in a great rush from a neighboring village, with a sorrowful tale. After Charite was so happily married, a jealous suitor who had earlier been rejected in favor of Tlepolemus contrived during a boar hunt to kill Tlepolemus, making it appear as if the boar had killed him. Charite, however, discovered the truth and heroically took revenge on the suitor. Then she committed suicide. The household’s slaves, fearful that a new master would be more severe on them than Charite and Tlepolemus had been, took advantage of the disarray to flee. Among them was the slave who had been in charge of the stables, to whom Charite and Tlepolemus had explained how I was to be well cared for and allowed to run free with the mares. He took me from the stable and claimed me as his own, as he now had great need of me.

  The slave in charge of the stables gathered everything from his hut that was precious or had been stowed away for safekeeping and placed it on our backs (mine and the other pack animals). Then he left the land of his birth. We carried tiny babies and women, we carried chickens, pet sparrows, goats, and puppies. Whatever was slow-paced and would have been a drag on our flight also walked along on our feet. But the weight of the baggage, although it was enormous, didn’t bother me, since of course I was leaving behind that detestable slicer of my manhood—in joyous flight!

  We had traveled over the rugged peak of a wooded mountain and traversed yet again an expanse of fields below. Evening was darkening the path when we came to a populous and prosperous village. But the villagers insisted we not depart at night, or even in the morning. “Wolves,” they said, “large and numerous, burdened by the bulk of their own bodies, savage and exceedingly fierce, are infesting the whole region, marauding widely. They lie in wait right by the road, just like robbers, and attack people as they pass by. More than that, they’ve become so mad with their ravening hunger that they’re storming the nearby farmhouses and threatening even humans with the kind of death normally reserved for passive sheep.” And they went on to say that the road we had to travel was strewn with half-eaten human bodies, and the whole route gleamed white with bones stripped of their flesh. We, too, should approach this road with the utmost caution, and particularly should be sure to travel in broad daylight, when the day was well along and the sun most brilliant. That way,
we might avoid the hidden ambushes, since the light itself seemed to make the terrifying beasts more sluggish. Further, if we moved along gathered tightly in a wedge, not scattered in a line loosely, we might get past these dangers.

  But those worthless men leading our flight spurned this beneficial advice in their reckless, blind haste. Fearing potential pursuit, they didn’t wait for the next morning’s light, but loaded us up before dawn and drove us back on the road. After what I’d heard, I wasn’t taking any chances, so I stealthily hid myself as much as possible in the middle of the throng and in the thick of the pack animals to protect my haunches from wolf attacks. Everyone was amazed that I was running even faster than the horses, but that speed was a sign of terror, not eagerness. And I was reflecting to myself that the famous Pegasus was actually airborne from fear, and therefore rightly known as winged, as he jumped up high and leapt into the sky, fearing, I think, the bite of the fire-breathing Chimaera. Well, these herdsmen leading us had taken up arms as if it were a war zone: this one had a lance and another a hunting spear, someone else had a javelin and another a club; but they also had rocks, which the bumpy road offered in abundance. Others were holding up sharp stakes, but most were scaring off the wild animals with burning torches. The only thing lacking to make it a real line of battle was a trumpet. But as it turned out, we suffered these empty fears needlessly and got entangled in worse snares. We did frighten off the wolves; perhaps it was the noisy throng, or more likely the bright light of all the torches—or maybe they were prowling in other parts. But none of them approached us, and none even appeared in the distance.

  However, the farmers on a country estate along the way mistook us for a gang of robbers and grew extremely anxious and concerned for their property. So they incited their dogs against us with their accustomed whoops and whistles and calls of all sorts—immense and mad dogs, more savage than any wolves or bears, which they had raised carefully to protect themselves. Thus, beyond their natural ferocity, they were further incensed by their masters’ uproar, and rushed at us, surrounding us on all sides, leaping up on us, lacerating us, not discriminating between men and pack animals, raging unrestrained relentlessly, and knocking the majority to the ground. Then, by Hercules, you could see not so much a memorable as a miserable sight: a multitude of dogs with furious intent, some seizing those in flight, others clinging to those upright, several climbing on those prone, and, through our whole throng, dogs biting as they walked along.

  But then a calamity even worse than this followed. These farmers started quickly hurling rocks down on us from the tops of their roofs and the nearby hill. There was no way to decide which of the threats we should most avoid, the dogs up close or the stones from a distance. One of these suddenly struck the head of a woman sitting on my back, and she instantly started to weep and cry out in pain, and called for help from her husband, the shepherd I mentioned earlier.

  At that, he began to call for the gods’ support, and as he wiped the blood from his wife’s head, demanded at the top of his voice, “Why are you being so cruel and attacking and crushing downtrodden folk and weary travelers? Are you out to plunder us? What have we done to deserve this? You don’t seem the sort that enjoys spilling human blood like animals living in caves or barbarians living on hard crags!” Scarcely had he said this when the thick hail of stones suddenly ceased and the storm of hostile dogs was called back and quieted. One of the villagers finally spoke from the very top of a cypress tree: “No, no, we aren’t brigands greedy for your spoils; we’re trying to beat off that very same devastation at your hands! You can go safely now; go quietly in peace.”

  When he had spoken, we resumed our journey, albeit severely wounded, some sustaining wounds from rocks, others from dog bites, but absolutely everyone injured. We had covered some distance on our route when we arrived at a grove planted with tall trees, lovely with its meadowland shrubs. Our leaders decided to rest there awhile for refreshment and for nursing their bodies, variously savaged, with care. And so, scattered prostrate and prone on the soil, they rushed first to catch their breath and rest, then to apply different remedies to their wounds: one washed away the blood with the water of a rushing stream; another pressed his swellings with vinegared sponges, yet another bound his gaping gashes with strips of cloth. In this way, each ministered to his own health.

  Meanwhile, an old man looked out from the top of a hill. The goats grazing around him virtually screamed that he was a goatherd. So one from our group asked him whether he had milk for sale, either liquid or starting to ferment into cheese. But he shook his head for a long time and said, “How can you possibly be thinking about food or drink or any restoratives at a time like this? Don’t you have any idea what kind of place you’ve stopped in?” With these words, he gathered his flock, turned around, and moved far off. His words and withdrawal struck fear into our shepherds, and not a moderate fear! So as they tried to ask around about the nature of the place, totally terrified, and there was no one to inform them, another old man approached—he was big, but weighed down by years, leaning totally into his cane and dragging his tired feet. Weeping floods of tears, he came near the road, and when he saw us, he grasped the knees of each of the young men in turn to beg for their help:

  “By your fortunes and your guardian spirits, may you live to be as old as I am, happy and hearty, if you help me, an old man cheated of his bloodline, and rescue my little grandson from the underworld and return him to this white-haired old man. You see, my grandson, who was such pleasant company as I strolled along this path, was trying to capture a songbird singing in a hedge, and fell into a well nearby, which lay beneath some brambles. Now he stands in extreme peril for his life; for sure, I can tell he’s alive from his weeping and the sound of his voice calling “Grandfather!” over and over. But because of the decrepit state of my body, I can’t help him. However, for you, given the benefits of your youth and strength, it would be easy to come to the aid of this pitiful old man and save this boy, the last remaining in my bloodline and my only descendant!”

  Everyone pitied the old man as he begged and tore his white hair. But one of them, braver in spirit, younger in years, and stronger in body, and who alone had emerged unscathed from the earlier battle, leapt up eagerly and asked where the boy had fallen in. Then he briskly followed the old man to where he was pointing with his finger: to the bristly brambles not far off.

  Later, when everyone was revived, we by our fodder and they by self-care, and they were all lifting up their satchels and getting back on the road, people first began to call for the youth over and over again by name. After a while, they were disturbed by the delay and sent out a one-person search party to find him, bring him back, and alert him to our imminent departure. After a moment, the scout returned trembling and, with a face as pale as beechwood, told this remarkable story about his fellow slave: he had seen him lying supine and already mostly consumed, and on top of him sat a huge dragon, chewing. The pitiful old man was nowhere to be seen. When they learned this and compared the story with the goatherd’s words, they saw that he was warning them about this inhabitant of the place and no other. So they left this pernicious region and tore off at high velocity, pushing us on and beating us incessantly with their staffs.

  And so we traveled over a long distance very quickly and came to a village where we rested for the night.

  The next day, we set out again, and after traveling over country roads all day, we finally came to a well-populated and renowned city, exhausted. The rustics decided to settle here permanently and make it their home, first because it seemed a good place to hide from anyone tracking them down, and then because the blessed amplitude of the copious corn supply was enticing. So after three days spent restoring the pack animals’ bodies to make us more salable, we were led to market. The auctioneer shouted out the prices for each of us, and the horses and other asses were snapped up by wealthy buyers. But most people passed me by with disgust, leaving me alone like some kind of castoff. After a while, I
grew tired of being manhandled by people who were calculating my age by the state of my teeth. One of them kept scraping at my gums, over and over, with his disgusting fingers, so I grabbed and bit his filthy, smelly hand and ground it down utterly. This act discouraged the bystanders from buying me, since clearly I was very fierce. So then the auctioneer, yelling so loud that he disjointed his jaws and hawked his wares in a hoarse, husky voice, began to make absurd jokes at my expense: “To what end, citizens, will we keep trying to sell this no-good old nag, weak on his worn-out hooves, deformed by distress, listless and lazy—but ferocious! He’s nothing but a braying sieve! Hey, we’ll even give him away if, and only if, you don’t mind wasting the fodder on him!”

  With jokes like these, the auctioneer kept on getting laughs from the crowd. Eventually, a miller from a nearby village bought me and immediately loaded me up with grain he had bought there as well, and led me through a steep path, hazardous with its jagged rocks and splintery stumps, to the mill that he managed.

  THERE IN THE MILL, CONTINUOUS ORBITS OF numerous pack animals turned the mechanisms at varying speeds. Not in daytime alone, but all night long, they manufactured round-the-clock flour by lamplight through the machine’s dizzying revolutions.

  But my new master generously granted me comfortable quarters, presumably so that I wouldn’t recoil in terror when I began my servitude. That first day, he gave me a holiday and furnished my manger lavishly with fodder. But that heaven of leisure and bingeing didn’t last long, and the next morning I was hooked up to what was surely the largest mill, and immediately blindered. Then I was propelled forward into the curved space of the twisting track, so that I kept meandering uncertainly along a fixed course, retracing my footprints with repeated steps, round and round in a bounded, ever-flowing circle.