Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Nemesis: A Tale Of The Days Of Trajan.
THE NEMESIS : A TALE OF THE DAYS OF TRAJAN .
By BRO . A . OXEAL HATE , Author of " The History of the Knights Templars ; " Poet Laureate of tlie Gcmongate , Kilwinning ; P . 3 I . St . Stephens ; PJ ? , Z . of St . Andrews R . A . Chap . ; Sfc . ; § -c . AN objection may be taken to the folloAving tale —that it is sensational . That objection is one
which may apply to every historical episode , * Life is sensational , and the raw head and bloody bones appear in every family closet . The following tale Avas Avritten many years ago , and took at first the shape of a drama . NOAV
scenes were added , and at last the MS . Avas cast aside and , in time , forgotten . At the beginning of 1863 it turned up , and then from a drama was throAvn into its present shape , at the same time receiving considerable additions to its plot .
My intention Avas to depict the imperfect knowledge of a future state , as found in the heathen philosophy of the commencement of the second century , to paint the manners of the Romans during the reign of Trajan , and to bring in the secret sects which flourished at that time in the Imperial City .
The persecution of the Stoics and of the Christians , and the pernicious doctrines of the Bacchanals , are matters of history . The other sensational portions of the tale are borne out by the satirists and annalists of the time .
I have not attempted to moralise over the sins and SOITOAVS of my puppets , but as they are all of age , I expect they can speak for themselves . While adorning a tale , I leave them to point the moral .
CHAPTER I . A ROMAN TRIUMPH m THE DAYS OF TEAJAN . " Many a time and oft Have you climb'd up to walls and battlements , To towers ancl windows , yea , to chimney tops ,
Your infants in your arms ; and there have sate The live-long day with patient expectation . . . . And Avhen you saw his chariot but appear , Have you-not made an universal shout , That Tyber trembled underneath his banks To hear the replication of your sounds ,
Ulacle in his concave shores ?"—Shalcespeare . THE Romans , in the year 105 , poured forth in crowds from their houses to greet the Emperor Trajan on his return to Rome , from his campaig-n against the Dacians , in which he had subjugated that powerful people , killed their bravest leaders , and after defeating with an
immense slaughter their King Decebalus and his immense and powerful army , had driven him to his last stronghold ; Avhen , rather than suffer an ignominious surrender , the barbarian monarch put an end to his life , and thereby to the hopes
of his people of continuing a successful resistance to the imperial arms . The success of the Roman arms Avas complete . From the rise of the river Theiss to the Black Sea , from the Dneister to the Lower Danube , the whole country Avas reduced , and the insurgent chiefs who still refused to
submit to the Roman eagle were forced to retire to the fastnesses of the Carpathian mountains , where they subsequently waged a guerilla Avarfare against the colonists of the imperial city . In triumph the great Emperor entered . No
simple ovation was decreed him by the Senate no simple sheep for the lordly ox , but the grand ceremony , which , since the clays of Paulus Emilius ^ had never . been celebrated with such pomp and slendour . For three days did the triumph last ,
and the people reared scaffolds in the Forum , and other parts of the city , where the tide of the pomp should sAveep past and best be seen . The citizens to do honour to the Roman arms , and to him who had so gloriously led on the troops to victory , had
donned , the richer ones , neAV g-OAvns of the vh-gin white ; while the meaner citiaens , Avho could not afford the expense , spent the previous night in chalking theirs . The priests , AVIIO scented from afar , offerings to their shrines , opened their
several temples , decking the walls Avith garlands of the choicest flowers , ancl burning on the altars the most precious perfumes . The streets and roads along Avhich the procession had to pass Avere kept clear by mounted officers and the
meaner herd of lictores , viatores , and the public scourgers and headsmen , Avho Avere greeted Avith the like attention that a Billingsgate mob pays to the police in the present day ; for while the mounted men were treated with the respect due
to their horse's hoofs , the populace failed not to recompense themselves for this sacrifice , in the clue abuse levelled against the simple tipstaves and truncheon-bearers . The only thing that never changes is human nature , and the mob of
Rome vented upon the wonld-be keepers of the public peace the same indignities that a London crowd does upon the present blue-coated guardians of our streets . But there was this difference in the crowd of Rome , —the officers dared make no arrests . If they had , AVOG betide the hapless
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
The Nemesis: A Tale Of The Days Of Trajan.
THE NEMESIS : A TALE OF THE DAYS OF TRAJAN .
By BRO . A . OXEAL HATE , Author of " The History of the Knights Templars ; " Poet Laureate of tlie Gcmongate , Kilwinning ; P . 3 I . St . Stephens ; PJ ? , Z . of St . Andrews R . A . Chap . ; Sfc . ; § -c . AN objection may be taken to the folloAving tale —that it is sensational . That objection is one
which may apply to every historical episode , * Life is sensational , and the raw head and bloody bones appear in every family closet . The following tale Avas Avritten many years ago , and took at first the shape of a drama . NOAV
scenes were added , and at last the MS . Avas cast aside and , in time , forgotten . At the beginning of 1863 it turned up , and then from a drama was throAvn into its present shape , at the same time receiving considerable additions to its plot .
My intention Avas to depict the imperfect knowledge of a future state , as found in the heathen philosophy of the commencement of the second century , to paint the manners of the Romans during the reign of Trajan , and to bring in the secret sects which flourished at that time in the Imperial City .
The persecution of the Stoics and of the Christians , and the pernicious doctrines of the Bacchanals , are matters of history . The other sensational portions of the tale are borne out by the satirists and annalists of the time .
I have not attempted to moralise over the sins and SOITOAVS of my puppets , but as they are all of age , I expect they can speak for themselves . While adorning a tale , I leave them to point the moral .
CHAPTER I . A ROMAN TRIUMPH m THE DAYS OF TEAJAN . " Many a time and oft Have you climb'd up to walls and battlements , To towers ancl windows , yea , to chimney tops ,
Your infants in your arms ; and there have sate The live-long day with patient expectation . . . . And Avhen you saw his chariot but appear , Have you-not made an universal shout , That Tyber trembled underneath his banks To hear the replication of your sounds ,
Ulacle in his concave shores ?"—Shalcespeare . THE Romans , in the year 105 , poured forth in crowds from their houses to greet the Emperor Trajan on his return to Rome , from his campaig-n against the Dacians , in which he had subjugated that powerful people , killed their bravest leaders , and after defeating with an
immense slaughter their King Decebalus and his immense and powerful army , had driven him to his last stronghold ; Avhen , rather than suffer an ignominious surrender , the barbarian monarch put an end to his life , and thereby to the hopes
of his people of continuing a successful resistance to the imperial arms . The success of the Roman arms Avas complete . From the rise of the river Theiss to the Black Sea , from the Dneister to the Lower Danube , the whole country Avas reduced , and the insurgent chiefs who still refused to
submit to the Roman eagle were forced to retire to the fastnesses of the Carpathian mountains , where they subsequently waged a guerilla Avarfare against the colonists of the imperial city . In triumph the great Emperor entered . No
simple ovation was decreed him by the Senate no simple sheep for the lordly ox , but the grand ceremony , which , since the clays of Paulus Emilius ^ had never . been celebrated with such pomp and slendour . For three days did the triumph last ,
and the people reared scaffolds in the Forum , and other parts of the city , where the tide of the pomp should sAveep past and best be seen . The citizens to do honour to the Roman arms , and to him who had so gloriously led on the troops to victory , had
donned , the richer ones , neAV g-OAvns of the vh-gin white ; while the meaner citiaens , Avho could not afford the expense , spent the previous night in chalking theirs . The priests , AVIIO scented from afar , offerings to their shrines , opened their
several temples , decking the walls Avith garlands of the choicest flowers , ancl burning on the altars the most precious perfumes . The streets and roads along Avhich the procession had to pass Avere kept clear by mounted officers and the
meaner herd of lictores , viatores , and the public scourgers and headsmen , Avho Avere greeted Avith the like attention that a Billingsgate mob pays to the police in the present day ; for while the mounted men were treated with the respect due
to their horse's hoofs , the populace failed not to recompense themselves for this sacrifice , in the clue abuse levelled against the simple tipstaves and truncheon-bearers . The only thing that never changes is human nature , and the mob of
Rome vented upon the wonld-be keepers of the public peace the same indignities that a London crowd does upon the present blue-coated guardians of our streets . But there was this difference in the crowd of Rome , —the officers dared make no arrests . If they had , AVOG betide the hapless