Behold me, therefore, in the midst of the Flavian Amphitheatre, and seated, under the wing of the luxurious Rubellia, in a very convenient situation. There was a general silence in the place, because proclamation had just been made that the gladiators, with whose combats the exhibition was to commence, were about to enter upon the arena, and shew themselves in order to the people. As yet, however, they had not come forth from that place of concealment to which so many of their number would never return; so that I had leisure to collect my thoughts, and survey for a moment, without disturbance, the mighty and most motley multitude, piled above, below, and on every side around me, from the lordly senators, on their silken couches, along the parapet of the arena, up to the impenetrable mass of plebeian heads which skirted the horizon, above the topmost wall of the Amphitheatre itself. Such was the enormous crowd of human beings, high and low, that when any motion went through their assembly, the noise of their rising up or sitting down might be likened to the sullen roaring of the sea, or the rushing of a great night-wind in a forest. Not less than eighty thousand human beings, they told me, were here met together. [pg 94]Such a multitude could no where be regarded, without inspiring a certain indefinable sense of majesty; least of all, when congregated within the wide sweep of such a glorious edifice, and surrounded on all sides with every circumstance of ornament and splendour, befitting an everlasting monument of Roman victory and imperial munificence. Judge, then, with what eyes all this was surveyed by me, who had but of yesterday emerged from a British valley—who had been accustomed all my life to consider as among the most impressive of spectacles, the casual passage of a few scores of legionaries through some dark alley of a wood, or awe-struck village of barbarians.

Trajan himself was already present—his ivory chair distinguished only by its canopy from that of the other Consul who sate over against him; tall and majestic in his demeanour; grave, sedate, and benign in countenance, as you have seen in his medals and statues. He was arrayed in a plain gown, and appeared to converse quite familiarly, without affectation of condescension, with such Patricians as had their places near him; among whom Sextus and Rubellia pointed out many remarkable personages to my notice; as Adrian, afterwards emperor; Pliny, the orator, a man of courtly presence, and lively, agreeable aspect; and, above all, the historian Tacitus, the worthy son-in-law of our Agricola, in whose pallid countenance I could easily recognize the depth, but sought in vain to discover any traces of the sternness of his genius. Of all the then proud names that were whispered into my ear, could I recollect or repeat them now, how few would awaken any interest in your minds! Those, indeed, which I [pg 95]have mentioned, have an interest that will never die. Would that the greatest and the best of them all were to be remembered only for deeds of greatness and goodness!

The proclamation being repeated a second time, a door on the right hand of the arena was laid open, and a single trumpet sounded, as it seemed to me, mournfully, while the gladiators marched in with slow steps, each man—naked, except being girt with a cloth about his loins—bearing on his left arm a small buckler, and having a short straight sword suspended by a cord around his neck. They marched, as I have said, slowly and steadily; so that the whole assembly had full leisure to contemplate the forms of the men; while those skilled in such business were fixing, in their own minds, on such as they thought most likely to be victorious, and laying wagers concerning their chances of success, with as much unconcern as if they had been contemplating irrational animals, or rather, indeed, I should say, so many pieces of ingenious mechanism. The diversity of complexion and feature exhibited among these devoted athletes, afforded at once a majestic idea of the extent of the empire, and a terrible one of the purposes to which that wide sway had often been made subservient. The beautiful Greek, with a countenance of noble serenity, and limbs after which the sculptors of his country might have modelled their symbols of graceful power, walked side by side with the yellow-bearded savage, whose gigantic muscles had been nerved in the freezing waves of the Elbe or Ister, or whose thick strong hair was congealed and shagged on his brow with the breath of Scythian or [pg 96]Scandinavian winters. Many fierce Moors and Arabs, and curled Ethiopians, were there, with the beams of the southern sun burnt in every various shade of swarthiness upon their skins. Nor did our own remote island want her representatives in the deadly procession, for I saw among the armed multitude—not surely without some feelings of more peculiar interest—two or three gaunt barbarians, whose breasts and shoulders bore uncouth marks of blue and purple, so vivid in the tints, that I thought many months could not have elapsed since they must have been wandering in wild freedom along the native ridges of some Silurian or Caledonian forest. As they moved around the arena, some of these men were saluted by the whole multitude with noisy acclamations, in token, I suppose, of the approbation wherewith the feats of some former festival had deserved to be remembered. On the appearance of others, groans and hisses were heard from some parts of the Amphitheatre, mixed with contending cheers and huzzas from others of the spectators. But by far the greater part were suffered to pass on in silence;—this being in all likelihood the first—who could tell whether it might not also be the last day of their sharing in that fearful exhibition!

Their masters paired them shortly, and in succession they began to make proof of their fatal skill. At first, Scythian was matched against Scythian—Greek against Greek—Ethiopian against Ethiopian—Spaniard against Spaniard; and I saw the sand dyed beneath their feet with blood streaming from the wounds of kindred hands. But these combats, although abundantly bloody and terrible, were regarded only as preludes to the serious [pg 97]business of the day, which consisted of duels between Europeans on the one side, and Africans on the other; wherein it was the well-nigh intransgressible law of the Amphitheatre, that at least one out of every pair of combatants should die. Instead of shrinking from these more desperate brutalities, the almost certainty of their termination seemed only to make the assembly gaze on them with a more intense curiosity and delight. Methinks I feel as if it were but of yesterday, when,—sickened with the protracted terrors of a conflict, that seemed as if it were never to have an end, although both the combatants were already covered all over with hideous gashes,—I at last bowed down my head, and clasped my hands upon my eyes. I had scarcely done so, when Rubellia laid her hand upon my elbow, whispering, “Look, look, now look,” in a voice of low, steady impatience. I did look, but not to the arena: No; it was upon the beautiful features of that woman’s face that I looked, and truly it seemed to me as if they presented a spectacle almost as fearful. I saw those rich lips parted, those dark eyes extended, those smooth cheeks suffused with a steadfast blush, that lovely bosom swelled and glowing; and I hated Rubellia, for I knew not before how utterly beauty can be brutalized by the throbbings of a cruel heart. But I looked round to escape from the sight of her;—and the hundreds of females that I saw fixed with equal earnestness on the same horrors, taught me, even at the moment, to think with more charity of that pitiless gaze of one.

At that instant all were silent in contemplation of the breathless strife; insomuch, that a groan, the first that had escaped from either of the combatants, although [pg 98]low and suppressed, sounded distinctly amidst the deep hush, and being constrained to turn once more downwards, I beheld that, at length, one of the two had received the sword of his adversary quite through his body, and had sunk upon the sand. A beautiful young man was he that had received this harm, with fair hair, clustered in glossy ringlets upon his neck and brows; but the sickness of his wound was already visible on his drooping eye-lids, and his lips were pale, as if the blood had rushed from them to the untimely outlet. Nevertheless, the Moorish gladiator who had fought with him had drawn forth again his weapon, and stood there awaiting in silence the decision, whether at once to slay the defenceless youth, or to assist in removing him from the arena, if perchance the blood might be stopped from flowing, and some hope of recovery even yet extended. There arose, on the instant, a loud voice of contention; and it seemed to me as if the wounded man regarded the multitude with a proud, contemptuous glance, being aware, without question, that he had executed all things so as to deserve their compassion, but aware, moreover, that even had that been freely vouchsafed to him, it was too late. But the cruelty of their faces, it may be, and the loudness of their cries, were a sorrow to him, and filled his dying breast with loathing. Whether or not the haughtiness of his countenance had been observed by them with displeasure, I cannot say; but those who had cried out to give him a chance of recovery, were speedily silent, and Cæsar looking round, and seeing all the thumbs turned downwards, was constrained to give the sign, and forthwith the young man, receiving again without a struggle the sword of the Moor into his gashed bosom, breathed forth [pg 99]his life, and lay stretched out in his blood upon the place of guilt. With that a joyous clamour was uplifted by many of those that looked upon it, and the victorious Moor, being crowned with an ivy garland, was carried in procession around the arena by certain young men, who leaped down for that purpose from the midst of the assembly. In the meantime, those that had the care of such things, dragged away, with a filthy hook, the corpse of him that had been slain; and then, raking up the sand over the blood that had fallen from him, prepared the place, with indifferent countenances, for some other tragedy,—while all around me, the spectators were seen rising from their places, and saluting each other; and there was a buzz of talking as universal as the silence had been during the combat; some speaking of this thrust and that ward, and paying and receiving money lost and won; some already discoursing of other matters, as if nothing uncommon had been witnessed; while others, again, appeared to be entirely occupied with the martial music which ever struck up majestically at such pauses, beating time upon the benches before them, or joining their voices with the proud notes of the trumpets and clarions. Rubellia talked gaily with Sextus, inviting him to ridicule me with her, for the strangeness of behaviour I had displayed.

The sun, by this, had already mounted high in the heavens, and the glare became so intolerable, that men could no longer fight on equal terms; which being perceived, Cæsar gave command to look after the wild beasts, and, in the meantime, (for I heard his voice distinctly,) to give warning to the Flamens that they should have their altar set forth.

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