Volume Iii Part 52 (2/2)
He expected an outbreak of wild grief, such as it had been so difficult even for him to repress. But, to his astonishment, Gotho remained unshaken.
”I have foreseen this long ago, my Adalgoth! It is no misfortune; to lose what we love, and still live, that alone is a misfortune. I have attained to the highest earthly bliss, I am thy wife. Whether I shall have been so for ten years or for twenty, or for scarcely half a year, alters nothing. At least we shall die together on the same day, possibly at the same hour. For King Teja will not forbid thee--when thou hast done thy part in the last battle, and, perhaps wounded, canst fight no longer--he will not forbid thee to come and take me in thine arms--how often hast thou carried me on the Iffinger!--and leap with me into the abyss. Oh, Adalgoth!” she cried, pa.s.sionately embracing him, ”how happy we have been! We will show that we were worthy of such bliss, by dying bravely, without cowardly lament. The scion of the Balthe,” and she smiled, ”shall not say that the shepherd's daughter could not keep pace with his n.o.bility. There arises in my soul a vision of the grandeur of our mountains! My grandfather, Iffa, admonished me, when I left him, to call to mind the fresh and free air of our mountains, and the strict and n.o.ble severity of the proud heights, should ever life in the narrow, small, gilded chambers here below seem too paltry for our souls. We have not been menaced with that, but now, when it is necessary to raise our minds from timid, tender sorrow--which almost crept over me--and to gain strength for a n.o.ble resolve, the remembrance of my native mountains has made me strong.
'Shame on thee,' I said to myself, 'shame on thee, daughter of the mountains! What would the Iffinger, and the Wolfshead, and all the stony giants say, if they saw the shepherdess despair? Be worthy of thy mountains and of thy hero husband.'”
Adalgoth pressed his young wife to his bosom, with mingled pride and joy.
Behind the tent of the Duke lay the low hut, made of dried branches, where dwelt Wachis and Liuta. Liuta, who had heard from Gotho what fate menaced them, had been obliged to use all her powers of persuasion upon her husband (who sat shaking his head and hammering and patching his s.h.i.+eld, which had been sadly defaced, by Longobardian arrows in the last watch he had held at the mouth of the pa.s.s, and who now began to whistle to hide his suppressed sobs) before she could raise him to a like enthusiasm of renunciation.
”I do not think,” said the honest man, ”that the Lord of heaven can see it done. I am one of those who never like to say, 'All is over!' The proud ones, those who hold their heads high, like King Teja and Duke Adalgoth, certainly run constantly against the beams of fate. But we small people, who can stoop and bend, easily find a mouse-hole or a c.h.i.n.k in the wall by which to escape. It is too vile! miserable! cruel!
rascally!”--and each word was accompanied by a sounding stroke with his hammer. ”I will not believe it! I cannot believe that hundreds of good women, pretty girls, lisping children, and stammering old men, must jump into the h.e.l.lish fire of this accursed mountain! As if it were but a merry bonfire! As if they would come out at the other side safe and sound! I might just as well have let thee burn in the house at Faesulae.
And not only thou must burn, but also our expected child, whom I have already named Witichis.”
”Or Rauthgundis,” said Liuta, blus.h.i.+ng, as she bent over her husband's shoulder and stopped his hammering. ”Let this name admonish thee, Wachis! Think of our beloved mistress. Was she not a thousand times better than Liuta, the poor maid-servant? And would she have hesitated or refused to die on the same day with all her people?”
”Thou art right, wife!” exclaimed Wachis, with a last furious stroke of his hammer. ”Thou knowest I am a peasant, and peasants do not at all like to die. But if the heavens fall, they strike down peasants as well as others; and before it happens--ha-ha!--I will deal many a famous stroke! That would please Sir Witichis and Mistress Rauthgundis right well also. In honour of them--yes, thou art right, Liuta--we will live bravely--and, if it cannot be otherwise, bravely die!”
CHAPTER IX.
It was with most joyful surprise that the two tribunes, Licinius and Julia.n.u.s, entered the tent of the Prefect after their interview with Na.r.s.es.
”Once again you have conquered, O Cethegus!” cried Licinius.
”You have got the upper hand, Prefect of Rome,” said Salvius Julia.n.u.s.
”I do not understand it, but Na.r.s.es really abandons Rome to you.”
”Ha!” cried Piso, who had entered with the others, ”that is your old Caesarian luck, Cethegus! Your star, which has seemed to wane since this famous cripple's arrival, s.h.i.+nes anew. It seems to me that sometimes his _mind_ suffers from attacks of epilepsy. For, with a sound mind, how could he quietly let you enter Rome? No! Quem deus vult perdere dementat! Now will Quintus Piso again wander through the Forum, and look into the book-stalls to see if the Goths have a.s.siduously bought his 'Epistolas ad amabilissimum, carissimum pastorem Adalgothum et ejus pedum'--(Letters to the very amiable and greatly beloved shepherd-boy, Adalgoth, and his bludgeon).”
”So you have composed in exile, like Ovidius?” asked Cethegus, smiling.
”Yes,” answered Piso. ”The six-footed verses come more readily, since they no longer need to fear the Goths, who are a foot longer. And amid the noise of Gothic banquetings it would not be easy to compose, even in time of peace.”
”He has composed some merry verses, intermixed with Gothic words, on that subject too,” said Salvius Julia.n.u.s. ”How does it begin, 'Inter hails Gothic.u.m skapja'----”
”Do not wrong my words! It is not permitted to quote falsely what is immortal.”
”Well, how go the verses?” asked Cethegus.
”Thus,” said Piso:
”De conviviis barbarorum.
Inter: 'Hails Gothic.u.m! skapja matjan jah drinkan!'
Non audet quisquam dignos educere versus: Calliope madido trepidat se jungere Baccho, Ne pedibus non stet ebria Musa suis.”
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