The Last Galley; Impressions and Tales Read online

  III THE FALL OF MAXIMIN

  For three years the soldier Emperor had been upon the throne. His palacehad been his tent, and his people had been the legionaries. With them hewas supreme; away from them he was nothing. He had gone with them fromone frontier to the other. He had fought against Dacians, Sarmatians,and once again against the Germans. But Rome knew nothing of him, andall her turbulence rose against a master who cared so little for her orher opinion that he never deigned to set foot within her walls. Therewere cabals and conspiracies against the absent Caesar. Then his heavyhand fell upon them, and they were cuffed, even as the young soldiershad been who passed under his discipline. He knew nothing, and cared asmuch for consuls, senates, and civil laws. His own will and the powerof the sword were the only forces which he could understand. Of commerceand the arts he was as ignorant as when he left his Thracian home. Thewhole vast Empire was to him a huge machine for producing the money bywhich the legions were to be rewarded. Should he fail to get that money,his fellow soldiers would bear him a grudge. To watch their intereststhey had raised him upon their shields that night. If city funds had tobe plundered or temples desecrated, still the money must be got. Suchwas the point of view of Giant Maximin.

  But there came resistance, and all the fierce energy of the man, all thehardness which had given him the leadership of hard men, sprang forth toquell it. From his youth he had lived amidst slaughter. Life and deathwere cheap things to him. He struck savagely at all who stood up to him,and when they hit back, he struck more savagely still. His giant shadowlay black across the Empire from Britain to Syria. A strange subtlevindictiveness became also apparent in him. Omnipotence ripened everyfault and swelled it into crime. In the old days he had been rebuked forhis roughness. Now a sullen dangerous anger arose against those who hadrebuked him. He sat by the hour with his craggy chin between hishands, and his elbows resting on his knees, while he recalled all themisadventures, all the vexations of his early youth, when Roman wits hadshot their little satires upon his bulk and his ignorance. He could notwrite, but his son Verus placed the names upon his tablets, and theywere sent to the Governor of Rome. Men who had long forgotten theiroffence were called suddenly to make most bloody reparation.

  A rebellion broke out in Africa, but was quelled by his lieutenant. Butthe mere rumour of it set Rome in a turmoil. The Senate found somethingof its ancient spirit. So did the Italian people. They would not be forever bullied by the legions. As Maximin approached from the frontier,with the sack of rebellious Rome in his mind, he was faced with everysign of a national resistance. The countryside was deserted, the farmsabandoned, the fields cleared of crops and cattle. Before him lay thewalled town of Aquileia. He flung himself fiercely upon it, but was metby as fierce a resistance. The walls could not be forced, and yet therewas no food in the country round for his legions. The men were starvingand dissatisfied. What did it matter to them who was Emperor? Maximinwas no better than themselves. Why should they call down the curse ofthe whole Empire upon their heads by upholding him? He saw their sullenfaces and their averted eyes, and he knew that the end had come.

  That night he sat with his son Verus in his tent, and he spoke softlyand gently as the youth had never heard him speak before. He had spokenthus in old days with Paullina, the boy's mother; but she had been deadthese many years, and all that was soft and gentle in the big man hadpassed away with her. Now her spirit seemed very near him, and his ownwas tempered by its presence.

  "I would have you go back to the Thracian mountains," he said. "I havetried both, boy, and I can tell you that there is no pleasure whichpower can bring which can equal the breath of the wind and the smell ofthe kine upon a summer morning. Against you they have no quarrel.Why should they mishandle you? Keep far from Rome and the Romans. OldEudoxus has money, and to spare. He awaits you with two horses outsidethe camp. Make for the valley of the Harpessus, lad. It was thencethat your father came, and there you will find his kin. Buy and stocka homestead, and keep yourself far from the paths of greatness and ofdanger. God keep you, Verus, and send you safe to Thrace."

  When his son had kissed his hand and had left him, the Emperor drew hisrobe around him and sat long in thought. In his slow brain he revolvedthe past--his early peaceful days, his years with Severus, his memoriesof Britain, his long campaigns, his strivings and battlings, all leadingto that mad night by the Rhine. His fellow soldiers had loved him then.And now he had read death in their eyes. How had he failed them? Othershe might have wronged, but they at least had no complaint against him.If he had his time again, he would think less of them and more of hispeople, he would try to win love instead of fear, he would livefor peace and not for war. If he had his time again! But there wereshuffling Steps, furtive whispers, and the low rattle of arms outsidehis tent. A bearded face looked in at him, a swarthy African face thathe knew well. He laughed, and, bearing his arm, he took his sword fromthe table beside him.

  "It is you, Sulpicius," said he. "You have not come to cry 'AveImperator Maximin!' as once by the camp fire. You are tired of me, andby the gods I am tired of you, and glad to be at the end of it. Comeand have done with it, for I am minded to see how many of you I can takewith me when I go."

  They clustered at the door of the tent, peeping over each other'sshoulders, and none wishing to be the first to close with that laughing,mocking giant. But something was pushed forward upon a spear point, andas he saw it, Maximin groaned and his sword sank to the earth.

  "You might have spared the boy," he sobbed. "He would not have hurt you.Have done with it then, for I will gladly follow him."

  So they closed upon him and cut and stabbed and thrust, until his kneesgave way beneath him and he dropped upon the floor.

  "The tyrant is dead!" they cried. "The tyrant is dead," and from all thecamp beneath them and from the walls of the beleaguered city the joyouscry came echoing back, "He is dead, Maximin is dead!"

  I sit in my study, and upon the table before me lies a denarius ofMaximin, as fresh as when the triumvir of the Temple of Juno Monetasent it from the mint. Around it are recorded his resoundingtitles--Imperator Maximinus, Pontifex Maximus, Tribunitia potestate, andthe rest. In the centre is the impress of a great craggy head, a massivejaw, a rude fighting face, a contracted forehead. For all the pompousroll of titles it is a peasant's face, and I see him not as the Emperorof Rome, but as the great Thracian boor who strode down the hillside onthat far-distant summer day when first the eagles beckoned him to Rome.