Part 7 (1/2)
Externally it presents two stages of sixty arcades, between the arches are engaged Doric pillars in the lower storey, those above are Corinthian, but only about six of the capitals of these latter remain. There are, within, three stages of seats, those for the senators, those for the knights, and the upper range for the common people, now much mutilated, and turned into a promenade. Fortunately the acc.u.mulation of earth over which the houses were built within the arena was so great, that when that was cleared away, the marble casing of the _podium_ was disclosed in very tolerable perfection.
When I visited the amphitheatre, Les Arenes they are called, it was to see a _Course aux Taureaux_. The Provencals are pa.s.sionately fond of these bull-baits, which take place weekly through the summer, beginning at Easter, but it is only at Arles and Nimes that they are carried out in the ancient Roman amphitheatres.
These _courses_ are quite distinct from the Spanish bull-fights. There is no brutality, no torturing of the beast with arrows and crackers, no goring of horses. The bull is uninjured, and, though he gets furious, clearly relishes the fight, and in some cases cannot be induced to abandon it. The old proconsular seat was draped, and occupied by the _prefet_ and madame, and the _sous-prefet_. The spectators went where they liked, men paid fourpence, women threepence for admission. The arena was enclosed within a screen of strong timber boards.
Five wild bulls from the Camargue were advertised to be baited. One, a strong black fellow, Nero, was clearly a favourite--his name was announced in very large letters. Every bull is given a rosette of coloured ribbons, fastened between his horns, and the sport consists in plucking away this rosette, and bearing it in safety beyond the barricades. Should a rosette fall to the ground, it does not count. A prize is given to whoever recovers a rosette. The blood-red rosette of Nero ent.i.tled the s.n.a.t.c.her of it to one hundred francs. Another characteristic feature of the Provencal _courses_ is that there are no professional toreadors. Any man or boy who likes enters the lists against the bull. Usually there are from a dozen to a score and a half in the arena, all endeavouring to pluck the bunch of ribbons from the brow of the enraged bull.
From practice, and acquaintance with the habits of bulls, the young men become very skilful, and fatal accidents are rare. The amateur runs up alongside of the bull, swings himself round in front of it, and makes his s.n.a.t.c.h. The bull at once goes at him, and he takes to his heels. When he is flying a second invariably runs across his path at right angles, and the bull can never resist the temptation of turning upon this second. If he also is hard pressed, a third crosses between him and the bull, and again diverts the angry beast. In one case a man's foot slipped as he was flying, and he fell. Then the bull was on him before another could intervene, but the brute rolled over the prostrate man, who got up, shook himself, and cleared the barricade.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Back of a house at Arles.]
One very nimble young fellow in a grey s.h.i.+rt had attracted general attention by his dexterity. He was resolved to have Nero's rosette. He managed to wrench it from between the bull's horns, but not completely to disengage it. The bull drove after him so close that it was impossible for another man to run between, the grey s.h.i.+rt reached the barrier and swung over, but the horns caught his nether garment and rent it, fortunately without really injuring the man, who, however, was not able to enter the arena again that day.
When a _course_ has been run the doors are opened, and one or two young bulls are sent into the arena; they run round, and the bull who has been baited adjoins them, and they all run out together. Nero, however, would not go. He was f.a.gged, but his blood was up. Five bulls were sent in to lure him away, but he was resolved to gore his man before he left. His rosette he had dangling on his brow, uncaptured.
Then the keepers entered with a species of halbert, with half-moon shaped steels at the head, and one small spike in the midst. With this they caught the horns of Nero, and he was forced to retreat before the men, for if he resisted the spike entered his head and hurt him. Thus finally, by sheer force, he was driven, snorting, pawing the ground, and with arched tail from off the place of contest.
The sport is good. It is not cruel. It draws out the courage, provokes dexterity and nimbleness, and takes the place in Provence that cricket does in England and golf in Scotland.
The Romans loved the brutal and demoralising games of the amphitheatre.
Wherever they went they erected these huge places for entertaining themselves with the spectacle of suffering. There never was an amphitheatre at Ma.r.s.eilles, for Ma.r.s.eilles was Greek and not Roman, and to the Greek such spectacles were abhorrent.
At Arles there are the equally interesting remains of a theatre. The stage is fairly perfect, with its customary scenery of Corinthian pillars grouped so as to form two doors for entrance and exit between them. The pillars of this permanent scene are not all in place. Two are standing, and the bases of others remain. At the proscenium may be noticed the grooves into which the beams fitted for the wooden small stage that stood forward in front of the curtain.
The ancient Greek theatre was composed, like that of our days, of a hemicycle for the spectators, and a rectangular portion that formed the place for dramatic performance. The pit was a semicircle, and was not fitted with seats, but const.i.tuted the orchestra. This orchestra among the Greeks formed an inferior stage, and, as its name implies, was reserved for the ballet. It was not till Roman times that specially privileged spectators were admitted into it, but it never had the musicians installed in it. These latter were placed in front of the stage, much where is our modern proscenium. The actors performed, as nowadays, on the boarded anterior portion, which was called the _pulpitum_. Finally, to facilitate communication between the stage and the orchestra, a pair of flights of steps descended laterally from the proscenium. In the centre of the pit or orchestra was usually placed an altar to Bacchus, around which the choirs executed their evolutions; and against this little altar sat the prompter, hidden by it, whilst some flute-players stood beside the altar, in flowing robes, acting as ballet masters, and giving the measure with the shrill notes of their pipes.
The Greek tragedy, therefore, had a double action, one on the stage proper and the other below, and all was graceful and refined. The purest taste, the most elevated sentiments, were the characteristics of the Greek drama, and the most beautiful and stirring effects were produced by means of the utmost simplicity. Thus, when the Tragedy of the Persae of aeschylus was being performed, the depth of the stage opened, to show in the distance the blue sea on which a recent victory had taken place, with the rocky isle of Salamis bathed in the tints of the Eastern setting sun. A thrill of the most lively emotion ran instantly through the whole crowd of spectators.
But with the Romans the theatre lost its dignity, and was degraded to low buffoonery, indecencies the most repulsive, and to gaudy spectacles. So bad was the moral result produced by the theatre, that the first Christian bishops who were able to do so, stirred their adherents to the destruction of this breeding-place of moral pestilence. The MS. chronicles of the church of Arles have preserved the name of the man who destroyed the theatre. He was a deacon, Cyril; acting under a strong moral impulse, filled with righteous indignation at the obscenities perpetrated on the boards, he roused the Christian populace of Arles to attack and wreck the theatre and expel the actors. The mob burst in--tore the marble from the proscenium, smashed the statues of admirable Greek sculpture, overthrew the altar and ground it to powder, upset the columns, and reduced it to a state of ruin very little better than that in which it is at present. Heads of statues were knocked off, bas-reliefs broken in half, cornices, capitals, were thrown into the pit and choked it to the level of the stage.
In 1651 the pick was set to work to clear out this orchestra, and almost the first stroke revealed one of the most admirable works of Greek sculpture that has descended to us, the Venus of Arles, an imitation or reproduction of the celebrated Venus of Praxiteles, now, unhappily, lost.
This statue lay before the columns of the proscenium and had been saved from destruction by the ruins that had buried it. Head and body are almost intact, only the arms were gone.
The G.o.ddess is half naked, like the Venus of Milo. The bust is slightly turned. Head and coiffure are of the n.o.blest and purest execution.
It was evening when I visited the theatre, a balmy spring evening, where shelter could be obtained from a cold wind. The pink Judas trees were in full flower. The syringas scented the air. The golden sunlight filled the theatre with light and warmth. But two persons were present, except myself.
Seated on one of the white marble steps for the audience, was an Arles mother with a royal face, in the quaintly beautiful costume the women of all cla.s.ses still affect, and she had spread her mantle over the shoulders of a girl of fourteen, sick, with face of the purest alabaster, and of features as fine as were ever traced for Venus Anadyomene, with large, solemn, dreamy eyes, watching a robin that was perched on the proscenium and was twittering.
The pity, love, and sorrow of that mother's heart were not to be read in her calm disciplined countenance, but I could see the emotions flow in short wavelets from her heart, through the arm that encircled the sick girl, into the hand that rhythmically contracted and expanded on the sharp little shoulder, rocking the child in the warm sun, against her own heart, and with her dark eyes looking into the future, in which she would have no more the child at her side to sway. In that theatre!--the ebbing tide of a white and limpid life taking its last sunning, where the crowds had laughed and roared their applause at sights and songs of unspeakable foulness.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A boat with two rudders at Arles.]
In the museum may be seen some of the treasures from the theatre, a head of Augustus, a so-called Livia, a bust of the young Marcellus, bas-reliefs, dancing women, a few inscriptions, and the seal of a Roman dentist, which I suppose he lost there one day when watching a play, and which has recently been found there.
It is worth the visitor's while to walk by the broad muddy Rhone, and observe the clumsy picturesque vessels moored there, or gliding down the turgid stream. So clumsy is the construction that some are provided with two rudders, one being found insufficient to direct the course of these tubs.
At Arles, near the river, is a palace of Constantine the Great, now turned into cottages and sheds, and in a very ruinous condition, but sufficient of it is preserved to show what a falling off in architecture had ensued through the anarchy of rising and sinking emperors, and the destruction of the great families of the Patriciate. Employment for architects and sculptors was gone in times of proscription and military revolts, and apparently all at once the arts that had reached the utmost perfection fell into a condition of the most abject degradation.
CHAPTER VIII.