The Childhood of Rome Part 2

THE SACRED YEAR

In the month of spring when day and night are equal, and the young lambs frisk on new gra.s.s, a company of young men and girls went slowly out from a little town on the eastern side of a great mountain range. The long narrow country stretching out into the sea, which is now called Italy, is divided by this range lengthwise into two parts, and in the earliest days of the country the people on one side had hardly anything to do with those on the other. On the coast toward the sunrise were many harbors, and seafaring men from other countries came there sometimes to trade. On the other side, the young people who were now setting their faces westward did not at all know what they would find.

They were all of about the same age, and they looked grave and a little anxious; some of the girls had been crying. The day had come when they were to leave the place where they had been born and brought up and go into an unknown world, and it was not likely that they would ever come back.

They belonged to the Sabine people, who used to live on the banks of the rivers not far from the coast, and kept cattle and sheep and goats, and raised grain and different kinds of vegetables, and had vineyards. The land was so rich that they had more food and other things than they needed, and used to trade more or less with the strangers from other countries. So many strangers came there and settled in course of time that the first inhabitants were crowded back toward the mountains, away from the sea. Then war parties of Umbrians from the north came pus.h.i.+ng their way into the country, and the peaceable farming folk were obliged to retreat still farther up the rivers into the mountain, and clear new land and settle it. This happened all a long time ago. It was not easy to live there, and they were poorer than they used to be, for so much of the land was rock and forest that they had to spend a great deal of their time getting it into a fit condition for either grain or cattle or anything else. But they learned to do most things for themselves, as mountain people do; they were not afraid of hard work or danger, and although they lived plainly they were comfortable.

But even here they were not let alone. About twenty years earlier, before any of these boys and girls were born, the Umbrian war parties came up into the higher valleys, and the Sabines had to fight for their very lives. They won the war and drove back the invaders in the end, but it began to seem that some day they would be wiped out altogether and forgotten.

After this war there were some hard years. Many of the men had been killed, and the fields had been neglected when the fighting was going on.

Where the enemy came they trampled down and ruined the vineyards, and burned houses and barns, and drove off the flocks and herds for their own use. That one year of war almost ruined the work that had been done in half a lifetime. If they were to be obliged to spend half their time defending what land they had, every year would be worse than the last.

Finally Flamen the priest, the man most respected in the central and largest of the towns, spoke of an old custom called the "sacred spring."

It was a method of making sacrifice to the G.o.ds when things came to a very evil pa.s.s indeed. In a way it was a sacrifice, and in a way it was a chance of saving something from the general ruin. Flamen believed that if they kept a "sacred spring" their guardian G.o.d, Mars, would help them. All this happened a long time before the calamity that drove the emigrants to set out from the Mountain of Fire. There are all sorts of reasons why people change their place of living and begin new settlements in a strange country, but in those days it was a much more serious matter than it is now, and it took almost a life-and-death reason to make them do it.

When villages agreed to keep a sacred year, as these finally did, they gave to the G.o.ds everything that was born in that year. The cattle, sheep, goats and poultry were killed in sacrifice, when they were grown. But the children born that spring were not killed. They were taught that when they were old enough they were to go out and build homes for themselves in another land, trusting in the great and wise G.o.d Mars to show them where to go. If this was done, even though the Umbrians attacked the country again and again, and killed off the people or made them slaves, there would still be Sabine men and women living in the old ways, somewhere in the world. And now the time had come for them to set out to find their new home.

Flamen the priest gave a daughter in the year of the sacred spring; Maurs the smith gave a son. Almost every family in all the country round had a son or daughter or at least a near relative who was going. Some of the young people were married before the day came for them to go; in fact, there were a great many brides and grooms in the party. The parents had given their children plenty of seed grain and roots and plants, cuttings of shrubs and trees and vines, animals and fowls to stock their farms, provision for the journey, and whatever clothing and other goods they could carry without the risk of being delayed or tempting plunderers to kill them for their riches. Everything that could be done was done to make their great undertaking successful.

At daybreak on the day that had been decided upon, the farewell ceremonies began. Hymns were sung and a feast was held, prayers and sacrifices were made; there were all sorts of farewell wishes and loving hopes and instructions. Nothing, however, could make it anything but a very solemn occasion. The young people must go beyond the mountains, for on this side they could have no hope of finding any place to live. No one knew what awaited them. But whatever happened, no one would have dreamed of breaking the promise made to the G.o.ds. A pledge is a pledge, and not the shrewdest cheat can deceive the G.o.ds, for they know men's hearts.

[Ill.u.s.tration: All the young voices took up the song]

Flam'na, the wife of young Mauros the maker of swords, looked back just once as they lost sight of the village. Then she led in the singing of the last of the farewell songs. She had a beautiful voice, clear and strong and sweet; her husband's deeper tones joined hers, and then all the young voices took up the song as streams run into a river. The fathers and mothers heard the wild music of their singing floating down from the mountain forest as they climbed the narrow trail. They were following a path which the young men knew from their hunting expeditions, which led around the shoulder of the mountain to a pa.s.s through which they could cross and go down the other side. Now that they were fairly on their way, the care of the young animals they were driving, all of them full of life and not at all used to keeping together in strange woods, took up most of the attention of the whole party.

On the western slopes, as far as the hunters had ever gone, there were no people living in villages-only scattered woodcutters and hunters, and here and there a poor ignorant family in a little clearing. If they went far enough down to reach the upper valleys of streams or rivers, they might find just the sort of place they wanted for their new home. Others must have done this in the past, or there would never have been the custom of the sacred spring, for the emigrant parties would have been all killed off or starved to death. The young men said that what others had done they could do, and they went valiantly on, chanting a marching song.

In these spring days, as time pa.s.sed, the mornings were earlier and the twilights later. They lived well while their provisions lasted, and there was game in the forest and fish in the little streams. They always carried coals from their camp fires to light the next fires, and in the cool evenings the leaping flames were pleasant. They also kept wild beasts from coming too near.

There were three groups of the young people, from three different villages. At night they gathered in three camps; each "company" which ate bread together was made up of relatives and friends. After they had crossed the mountain pa.s.s and before they had gone very far on the other side, they halted for a day to talk matters over and decide what to do next. It was very important now to take the right course.

The youths gathered under a huge oak to hold a council while their wives and sisters and cousins busied themselves with affairs of their own. The men would have to do the fighting, and the girls were quite willing to leave the general plans to them. They were a sober and serious group of young fellows as they sat there in the dappling suns.h.i.+ne. It was enough to make any man serious. Mars had brought them so far without any serious mishap, and he might go on protecting them all the rest of the way; but the question was, how to discover what was best to do. All the ways down the mountain looked very much alike, and yet one might lead into a country inhabited by fierce and cruel enemies, and another into a barren rocky waste, and another to a fertile valley.

Mauros was their leader, so far as they had one, but he called on each man in turn to say what he thought. There seemed to be a good deal of doubt about the wisdom of so large a party traveling together. The chances were against their finding a valley large enough for all to live in. They were not likely to find so much cleared land or good pasture in any one place.

If they were to separate, and each party took a different direction, one or another certainly ought to be able to find the right sort of place.

Perhaps all of them would. Even one of the camps was strong enough to defend itself against any ordinary enemy. They were all young and strong, active and full of courage, and as time went on they would be traveling lighter and lighter, for the provisions would be eaten up and the spare animals killed for food. They decided to do this, to offer a sacrifice to Mars and pray to him to direct them. The next morning all were ready to go on and waited only for a sign.

Each of the G.o.ds had certain favorite animals, birds and plants. Mars had plenty of servants he could send to do his will, and surely he would show them what to do.

Flam'na stood with her cousins, watching Mauros as he stood in the center of the silent group under the great oak tree. The fires were flickering slowly down to red coals, and a little wind blew from the west. Suddenly their lead-ox, the wisest of the team, lifted his head and sniffed the breeze, pawed the earth, bellowed, and plunged down a gra.s.sy glade, followed more slowly by the other oxen and the whole party in that camp.

The ox was one of the beasts of Mars. Nothing could be clearer than this.

Mauros turned and waved a laughing farewell to the other camps, and raced on to make sure that the ox did not get out of sight. Before they had gone very far they came to a tiny brook, which went chuckling on as if it knew something interesting. They followed it downward and began to find more and more gra.s.s as the valley widened and the trees grew less thick.

Finally they found a place where the water was good and the soil rich, and there was room for all their beasts to graze. They called the town they built there Bovianum, after the ox of Mars. They were sometimes called by their neighbors the Bovii, the cattlemen, for herds of cattle were not very common in that part of the country.

In the camp to the right of this, not long after the departure of the ox, one of the girls saw something red moving high up on the trunk of a tree, and pointed it out to her brother. His eyes followed hers, and soon all the company gathered in the edge of the woodlands, watching that scarlet dot among the thick leaves. Then, with a sudden rush of little wings, a green woodp.e.c.k.e.r flew down from the tree top and perched on a bough just over their heads. He looked down knowingly into the upturned, eager faces, and with a cheery call flew away down a ravine, and alighted again.

Breathless, wide-eyed and silent, they ventured nearer. He beat his tiny tattoo on the bark as if he were sounding a drum, and flew on. Now scarlet was the color of Mars, the drum was his favorite instrument of music, and Picus the woodp.e.c.k.e.r was his own bird. Following their little feathered guide, they went farther and farther north until they found a home among the spurs of the Apennines. They called themselves the Picentes, the Woodp.e.c.k.e.r People, and their children all knew the story of the sacred spring and the bird of Mars.

The third company had no time to watch the others, for some wolves had winded their sheep, and the young men had to run to fight them off. Some of them chased the skulking gray thieves for some distance and came back with the news that the wolves had led them southward to a rocky height, where they could look over the tops of the trees below and see an uncommonly fine place for the colony. This was as plain a sign as one could ask for, and the whole party, in great satisfaction and relief, went on to the home that the wolves had found for them. The wolf was another of the beasts of Mars. This settlement took the name of the Herpini, the Wolf People.

All three of the Sabine colonies prospered and grew strong, and although they had little to do with each other they lived in peace with relatives and neighbors. There came to be many villages on the slopes of the Apennines in which the Sabine language was spoken. This was the last time that they were forced to keep a Sacred Year, for the Umbrian war parties left them alone, and perhaps did not even know where they were; and the mountain land was pleasant and fertile, out of the way of floods. There was no reason in the world why the brave young couples who founded their homes here, and worked and played and kept holiday, and loved the green earth as all their forefathers had loved it, should not be prosperous and happy, and they were, for many a long year.

IV

THE BANDITTI

When the Sabines came to the western side of the mountain range, they did not try to plow much land at first. They had to find out what the land was like.

People who lived by pasturing their cattle and sheep wherever it was convenient hardly ever settled in the same place for good, because the pasture differs from year to year even in the same neighborhood. A hillside which is rich and green in a wet year may be barren and dry when there are long months with no rain. A valley that is rich in long juicy gra.s.s in spring may be under water later in the summer. Herdsmen need to range over a wide country, and especially they need this if they keep sheep. The sheep nibble the gra.s.s down to the roots, and when they have finished with a field there is nothing on it for any other animal that year. But the true farmer, who uses his land for a great many different purposes, can s.h.i.+ft his crops and his pasturage around so that he can have a home, and this was what the Sabines wished to do.

For a farm of this kind, a place between mountain and plain is best, with a variety of soil and good water supply. In such a mountain valley as the Herpini chose, with wooded heights above it, the roots of the trees bind the earth together and keep the wet of the winter rains from drying up, so that there is not often either flood or drought, and almost always good gra.s.s is found somewhere in the neighborhood. The people began by raising beans and peas to dry for winter, and herbs for flavoring, and in the summer they had kale and other fresh vegetables. Now and then, for a holiday, they killed a sheep or a young goat or a calf and had a feast.

The heart and inner organs were burned on the altar for an offering to the G.o.ds; the flesh was served out to the people, cooked with certain herbs used according to old rules. For vineyards and grain fields, which needed a certain kind of soil, they chose, after awhile, exactly the ground which suited them, and plowed their common land, and sowed their corn and planted their vines.

Most of the farm land was worked by all the people in common. This was a very old custom. There were good reasons for it. In farming, the work has to be done when the weather is suitable. The planting or haying or harvesting cannot be put off. By working in company the men saved time and labor, and if one happened to be ill the land was taken care of all the same, and nothing was lost. Also, in this way all of the land suitable for a certain crop was used for that crop. n.o.body was wasting time and strength trying to make rocky or barren soil feed his family, while his strength and skill were needed on good ground. The third and perhaps the best reason was, that in this way the houses were not scattered, but close together, so that no enemy could attack any one in the village without fighting all. The village was clean and wholesome, because no animals were kept there except as pets. The flocks and herds were taken care of by men and boys trained to that work. Each man had for his own the land around his own house, and every year he was allowed a part of the common land for his especial use, but he did not own it as he owned his house and lot,-the _heredium_, as it was called.

Everything connected with the cultivation of the land was in the hands of twelve men chosen for it, called the Arval Brethren, or the Brethren of the Field. It was their work to see that all was done according to the well-proved rules and customs, that the G.o.ds received due respect, and that the festivals in their honor were held in proper form.

In a society where people have to depend upon each other in this way, there is no room for a person who will not fit in, and who expects to be taken care of without doing his share of the work. Here and there, in one village and another, a boy grew up who s.h.i.+rked his work, took more good things than his share and made trouble generally. Sometimes he got over it as he grew older, but sometimes he did not; and if he could not live peaceably at home, he had to be driven out to get his living where he could. There was no place in a village ruled by the G.o.ds for any one who did not respect and obey the laws.

These outlaws did not starve, for they could get a kind of living by fis.h.i.+ng and hunting, and they stole from the ignorant country people and from travelers. They were known after awhile as _banditti_, the banished men, the men who had been driven out of civilized society. Some of them left their own country altogether and went down to the seash.o.r.e, or into the strange land across the yellow river. The people in the villages did not know much about them. They were very busy with their own concerns.

There were two great festivals in the year, to do honor to the G.o.ds of the land. One was in the shortest days of the year, early in winter. This was the feast of Saturn. He was the G.o.d who filled the storehouses, who sent water to drench the earth and feed the crops, who looked after the silent world of the roots and underground growing things generally. When his feast was held, the harvest was all in, the wine was made, and it was time to choose the animals to be killed for food and not kept through the winter. For four or five days there was a general jollification. No work was done except what was necessary. There was feasting and singing and story telling, and some of the wilder youths usually dressed up in fantastic costumes like earth spirits, and wound up the holiday with dancing and songs and shouting and all sorts of antics. Sometimes a clever singer made new songs to the old tunes, with jokes and puns about well-known people of the place. These songs were always done in a certain style, and this style of verse came to be known later as Saturnian poetry, and the sly personal fun in them was called satirical. It was part of the joke that the singer should keep a perfectly grave face.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The people gathered in the public square]

The other festival came in the spring, when the gra.s.s was green and the leaves were fresh and bright, and flowers were wreathing shrubs and hillsides like dropped garlands. It was in honor of the beautiful open-handed G.o.ddess called Dea Dia, or sometimes Maia. One spring morning the children of the village could hear the blowing of the horn in the public square, and then they all understood that the priest was about to give out the announcement of the festival of Maia. They crowded up to hear, even more excited and joyous than the older people.

There were no books or written records; not even a written language was known to the villagers. The priest of the village, who kept account of the days when ceremonies were due, and the changes of the moon, gave out the news, each month, of the things which were to happen. The months were not all the same length, and no two villages had just the same calendar. The year was counted from the founding of the city, whenever that was, and naturally it was not the same in different places. The people gathered in the public square, waiting to hear what Emilius the priest had to tell them.

He was a tall and n.o.ble-looking man, generally beloved because he always tried to deal justly and kindly with his neighbors, and was so wise that he usually succeeded. The person who paid him the deepest and most reverent attention was little Emilia, his daughter, who believed him to be the wisest and best of men. She stood with her mother in a little group directly in front of him, looking up at him with her deep, serious blue eyes, in happy pride.

Emilia was six and a half years old. This would be her first May festival, to remember, for she had been ill the year before when it came, and one's memory is not very good before one is five years old. Her bright gold-brown hair curled a little and looked like waves of suns.h.i.+ne all over her graceful small head. It was tied with a white fillet to keep it out of her eyes, and in the fillet, like a great purple jewel, was thrust an anemone from a wreath her mother had been making. Her mother dressed her in the finest and softest of undyed wool, bleached white as snow. She wore a little tunic with a braided girdle, and over her shoulders a square of the same soft cloth as a mantle; it looked like the wings of a white bird as it shone in the morning sun. On her feet were sandals of kidskin, and around her neck was a necklace of red beads that had come from far away. A trader brought them from the place by the seash.o.r.e where such things were made. From this necklace hung a round ball of hammered copper, made to open in two halves, and inside it was a little charm to keep off bad spirits. The charm was made of the same red stone and looked like the head of a little goat.

Emilia had never in her life known what it was to be afraid of any one, or to see any one's eyes rest upon her unkindly. The world was very interesting to her. It was filled with wonderful and beautiful things, especially just now. Each day she saw some new flower or bird or plant or animal she had never seen before. Spring in those mountains was very lovely. It hardly seemed as if it could be the real world.

The people were all rather fine-looking and strong and active. They worked and played in the open air and led healthy lives, and being well and full of spirits, there was really no reason why they should be ugly.

Emilius told them when the feast of Maia would take place. The moon, which was called the measurer, was all they had to go by in reckoning the year.

The feast was to be the day after it changed. Emilius repeated the names of the Brethren of the Field, and mentioned things that should be done to prepare for the feast, and that was all.

Far up on the heights of the mountain above, in among the rocks where nothing grew except wind-stunted trees and patches of moss and fern, there was another settlement of which the village people knew nothing. Two of its men happened to be farther down the mountain than usual, hunting, when this announcement was made. They got up on a rock overgrown with bushes, where they could look down into the village, and lay watching what went on. They were not beautiful or happy. They looked as they lay on the rock, spying over the edge with their hard, greedy eyes under s.h.a.ggy unkempt locks, rather like wild beasts.

One was a runaway from this very place, and he knew it was nearly time for the May festival. His name was Gubbo, and he had been cast out of the village because he was cruel. He liked to torment animals and children; he liked to compel others to give him what he wanted. When finally he had been caught slas.h.i.+ng at the favorite ox of a man he had had a quarrel with, he had been beaten and kicked out and told never to come back. He had wandered about for some years, and then joined the banditti on the mountain.