The Brass Bell Part 12

"I possess, friend Bull, certain magic philters to increase the attractiveness of my merchandise. Although you are now quite well filled out, the deprivation of exercise and the open air, the fever which your wounds caused, the sadness which captivity always occasions, and many other things, have dried and dulled your skin, and turned you yellow.

But thanks to my philters, to-morrow morning you will have a skin as fresh and sleek, and a color as ruddy as if you were coming in from the fields some lovely spring morning, my fine rustic. That appearance will last barely a day or two, but I expect, by Jupiter, to have you sold by to-morrow evening, free to turn yellow and waste away under your new master. So I am going to commence by stripping you, and anointing you with this preparation of oil." The "horse-dealer" unlocked one of his flasks.[23]

The performance affected me as so deep a disgrace put upon my dignity, that in spite of the numbness which was more and more depressing me, I sprang to my feet, and shaking my hands and arms, then unshackled, cried out:

"To-day I have no manacles on. If you come near I will strangle you!"

"I foresaw all that, friend Bull," chuckled the "horse-dealer," calmly pouring the oil of his flask into a vase and soaking a sponge in it. "I knew you would get hot and resist. I might have had you bound by the keepers, but in your violence you would have bruised your limbs, a detestable sign for the sale. These bruises always denote a stubborn slave. And all the time, what cries you would have let out! What a rebellion, when your head had to be shaved, in token of your slavery!"

At this last insulting threat, I called up all my remaining strength. I arose, and threateningly cried out at the dealer:

"By Ritha-Gaur, the saint of the Gauls, who made himself a s.h.i.+rt of the beards of the kings he had shaved, if you dare to touch a single hair of my head, I'll kill you!"[24]

"Oh, oh! Rea.s.sure yourself, friend Bull," answered the "horse-dealer,"

pointing to his little sharp instrument. "Rea.s.sure yourself. I shall not cut a single one of your hairs--but all."

I could retain my standing position no longer. Swaying on my legs like a drunken man, I fell back on the straw, and heard the "horse-dealer"

burst out laughing, and, while still pointing at his steel instrument, say:

"Thanks to this, your forehead will soon be as bald as that of the great Caesar, whom, you say, you carried on your horse in full armor. And the magic philter which you drank in that Gallic wine will put you at my mercy, quiet as a corpse."

The "horse-dealer" spoke true. These words were the last I remember. A leaden torpor fell upon me, and I lost all knowledge of what was done with me.

CHAPTER XII.

SOLD INTO BONDAGE.

The experience of that evening was only the prelude for a horrid day, a day doubly horrid due to the mystery that surrounded it.

Aye, to this hour, when I write this for you, O my son Sylvest, to the end that from this truthful and detailed account, in which I recite to you one by one the torments and the indignities heaped upon our country and our race, you may contract a hate implacable for the Romans, while awaiting the day of vengeance and deliverance;--aye, to this hour the mysteries of that horrid day of sale are still impenetrable to me, unless they be explained by the sorceries of the "horse-dealer," many of his people being given to magic. But our venerable druids affirm that magic does not exist.

The day of the auction I was roused from my stupor by my master. I had slept profoundly. I remembered what had occurred the previous evening.

My first movement was to carry my hands to my head. It was shaved, and my beard also! A thrill of anguish shot through me at the discovery; but instead of flying into a rage, as I would have done the evening before, I only shed a few tears, fearfully regarding the "horse-dealer." Aye, I cried before that man--aye, I looked at him with fear.

What could have come over me during the night? Was I still under the influence of the philter poured into the wine? No, my torpor had gone. I found myself active of body, and in sound mind, but in character and heart I found myself softened, enervated, timid,--and, why not say the word?--cowardly! Aye, cowardly! I, Guilhern, son of Joel, the brenn of the tribe of Karnak. I looked timidly around me. Every minute my heart seemed to sink, and tears came to my eyes, as formerly the flush of anger and pride had mantled my forehead. Of this inexplicable transformation, due, perhaps, to sorcery, I was dimly conscious and wondered thereat. Down to this day, when I recall the incident, I wonder, and none of the details of the horrid day has escaped from my memory.

The "horse-dealer" observed me in silence with an air of triumph. He had left me my breeches only. I was stripped to the waist. I was seated on my bed of straw. The dealer addressed me:

"Get up!" said he.

I hastened to obey. My master drew from his pocket a steel mirror, handed it to me, and resumed:

"Look at yourself!"

I looked at myself. Thanks to the witch-craft of my master, my cheeks were red, my face clear, as if awful misfortune had not settled upon me and my family. Nevertheless, on seeing for the first time in the mirror my face and head completely shaved, as the badge of my bondage, I shed fresh tears, but tried to hide them from the "horse-dealer," for fear of annoying him. He replaced the mirror in his pocket, took from the table a braided wreath of beech leaves,[25] and said:

"Put your head down."

I obeyed. The dealer put the wreath on my head. Then he took a parchment on which were written several lines in large Roman characters, and hung the inscription on my chest by means of two strings which he tied behind my neck. Over my shoulders he threw a woolen covering. Then he opened the secret spring which held my chain to the end of the bed, and fastened it to another iron ring which had been riveted on my other ankle during my heavy sleep. This way, although chained by both legs, I could still walk with short steps. Finally, my hands were bound behind me.

Obedient to the "horse-dealer's" orders, whom I followed as quiet and submissive as a dog does his master, I descended the stairs which led from my cell to the shed. The descent was affected not without pain to my limbs owing to the shortness of the chain. In the shed I found several captives, among whom I had pa.s.sed my first night, lying upon straw. No doubt their recovery was far enough advanced to admit of their being put up for sale. Other slaves whose heads had likewise been shaved, either by trick or by force, also wore wreaths on their foreheads, inscriptions on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, handcuffs on their hands and heavy shackles on their feet. They had started, under the supervision of armed keepers, to defile by a door which opened on the town square. It was there the auction sale was to be held. Nearly all the captives seemed to me to be mournful, depressed and submissive like myself. They lowered their eyes like men ashamed to look at one another. Among the last, I recognized two or three men of my own tribe. One of them pa.s.sed close to me, and said in a low voice:

"Guilhern, we are shaven; but hair will grow again, and nails also."

I comprehended that the Gaul wished to give me to understand that some day would come the hour of vengeance. But in the great cowardice which paralyzed me since my awakening, such was my fear of the "horse-dealer"

that I pretended not to understand my countryman.[26]

The s.p.a.ce engaged by the "horse-dealer" for the auction was not a great way from the shed where we had been kept prisoners. We speedily arrived at a sort of booth or stall, surrounded on three sides by planks, covered with canvas, and with the floor strewn with straw. Other booths, similar to it, were arranged to the right and left of a long s.p.a.ce like a street. In this s.p.a.ce Roman officers and soldiery walked in crowds, together with the buyers and sellers of slaves and various other men who follow in the wake of armies. They looked at the captives chained in the booths with a jeering and insulting curiosity. My master had informed me that his stall in the market was directly opposite that of his companion in whose possession were the two children. A cloth was lowered over the opening. I only heard, a few moments later, imprecations and piercing shrieks, mingled with mournful moans, from women, who were crying in Gallic:

"Death, death, but not disgrace!"

"Those timorous fools are playing the vestals, because they are stripped naked to be shown to the customers," said the "horse-dealer," who had kept near me. Presently he took me to the rear of the booth. On the way I counted nine captives, some in their youth, others middle-aged, and only two were past their prime. Some were seated on the straw, their faces turned down to escape the looks of the curious, others were lying p.r.o.ne, their faces to the ground; a few stood erect casting fierce glances around them. The keepers, their scourges in their hands, their swords at their sides, kept watch. The "horse-dealer" pointed to a wooden cage, a sort of large box at the back of the booth, and said to me:

"Friend Bull, you are the pearl, the carbuncle of my a.s.sortment. Enter this cage. The comparisons which would be made between you and my other slaves would lower their value too much. As a thrifty merchant, I will try to sell first what is of least value. One sells the small fry before the big fish."[27]

I obeyed. I went into the cage, and the door was closed upon me. I found that I could stand up. An opening through the top permitted me to breathe without being seen from the outside. Just then a bell sounded.

It was the signal for the sale. On all sides arose the squeaky voices of the auctioneers announcing the bids of the purchasers of human flesh.

The merchants bragged their slaves in the Roman tongue, and invited the purchaser into their booths. Several customers entered to inspect the "horse-dealer's" stock. Without understanding the words that he spoke, I guessed by the inflections of his voice that he strove to capture them, while the auctioneer all the while called out the bids. From time to time a loud tumult arose in the booth, mingled with the sound of the keepers' lashes, and the curses of the dealer. Evidently they were scourging some of my companions in slavery who refused to follow the new master to whom they had been "knocked down." But speedily the clamor ceased, choked off by the gag. Other times I heard the trampings of a confused struggle, desperate, though m.u.f.fled. These struggles also came to an end under the efforts of the keepers. I was frightened at the courage displayed by the captives. I no longer understood resistance or boldness. I was plunged into my cowardly sluggishness. All at once the door of my cage opened, and the "horse-dealer" cried out in great glee:

"All sold, save you, my pearl, my carbuncle. And by Mercury, to whom I promise an offering in recognition of my day's profits, I believe I have found for you a purchaser by private contract."

My master made me step out of my cage; I traversed the booth, in which I saw not a single slave left. I found myself face to face with a gray haired man, of a cold, hard countenance. He wore the military dress, limped very badly, and supported himself on a vine-wood cane, which was the mark of the centurion rank in the Roman army. The dealer lifted from my shoulders the woolen covering in which I was wrapped, and left me stripped to the waist; he then made me get out of my breeches also. My master, with the air of a man proud of his merchandise, thus exposed my nakedness to the customer. Several of the curious, a.s.sembled outside of the stall, looked in and contemplated me. I dropped my eyes in shame and sorrow, not in anger.

After the prospective purchaser read the writing which hung from my neck, he looked me over carefully, answering with affirmative nods of the head to what the merchant, with his usual volubility, was saying to him in Latin. Often he stopped to measure, with his spread out fingers, the size of my chest, the thickness of my arms, or the width of my shoulders.

His first examination must have pleased the centurion, for my master said to me: "Be proud for your master, friend Bull, your build is found faultless. 'See'--I just said to the customer--'would not the Grecian sculptors have taken this superb slave as a model for a Hercules?' My customer agreed with me. Now you must show him that your strength and agility are not inferior to your appearance."

My master pointed to a lead weight in readiness for the trial, and said to me while loosening my arms:

"Now put on your breeches again, then take this weight in your two hands, lift it over your head, and hold it there as long as you can."

I was about, in my stupid docility, to do as I was bid, when the centurion stooped towards the weight, and attempted to lift it from the ground, which he did, with much difficulty, while my master said to me:

"This mischievous cripple is as foxy as myself. He knows that many dealers use hollow weights which appear to weigh two or three times as much as they actually do. Come, friend Bull, show this suspicious fellow that you are as powerful as you are well built."

My strength was not yet entirely returned. Nevertheless, I took the heavy weight in my hands, throwing it over my head, and balanced it there a moment. A vague idea flitted at that instant across my mind to let the weight fall on my master's skull, and thus crush him at my feet.

But that gleam of my bygone courage died out, and I dropped the weight on the ground. The lame Roman seemed satisfied.

"Better and better, friend Bull," said my master to me, "by Hercules, your patron G.o.d, never did a slave do more honor to his owner. Your strength is demonstrated. Now let us witness your agility. Two keepers will hold this wooden bar about half a yard from the ground. Although your feet are in chains, you will jump over the bar several times.

Nothing will better prove the strength and nimbleness of your muscles."

In spite of my recent wounds, and the weight of my chain, I leaped several times with my joined feet over the bar, to the increasing satisfaction of the centurion.[28]

"Better and better," repeated my master. "You are proven as strong as you are powerfully built, and as limber as both. It now remains to exhibit the inoffensive gentleness of your nature. As to this last proof, I am, in advance, certain of your success," saying which he again bound my hands behind my back.