"Tis Hackett of Dungarvan-he who steered the Al gerine! He fell amid a sullen shout, with scarce a passing prayer, For he hath slain the kith and kin of many a hundred there. Some muttered of Mac Murchadh, who brought the Norman o'er Some cursed him with Iscariot, that day in Baltimore. LV THE TAMING OF THE HORSE MILES GERALD KEON PART I The day when the singular struggle was to occur rose bright, breezeless, and sultry, and so continued till long past noon. But the sun was now sinking toward the Tyrrhenian Sea; and a cool, soft air had begun to blow as the hour approached when the nephew of the triumvir was to mount the horse Sejanus, in the presence of such a multitude as the fields of Formiae had never before beheld, whether in times of peace or times of war. At the distance of a few miles on every side, the fair vales and slopes of Italy presented the appearance of a deserted land. No sound was heard save the drowsy Tyrrhenian Sea: part of Mediterranean Sea, southwest of Italy. hum of insects, the occasional sough of the rising breeze in the tops of the woods, and predominant over all, far and near, the piercing ring of the grasshopper, with its musical rise and fall and its measured intervals. The fire of the wayside forge lay under its ashes; all its anger taking rest, its hoarse roar asleep, till the breath of the bellows should once more awaken it to resistance and torment it to fury. All the labors of tillage were suspended: the plow wearied no team of oxen; little girls were watching the flocks and herds, their fathers and mothers and brothers had all gone away since early morning, and would not return till nightfall. The seats of the temporary amphitheater were filled. Within and beneath them, standing, but standing on three several elevations, contrived by means of planks, were six ranks of soldiers from the camp; the two inner (the rearmost being the highest) ranks consisting exclusively of Ælius Sejanus's praetorians. A grove of tall and shady trees offered in their branches an accommodation for a miscellaneous multitude, chiefly youths and boys, but amongst them soldiers who had received a holiday, and had found no room for themselves in the amphitheater. In the center of the amphitheater, upon a strongly-built, lofty, and somewhat projecting wooden platform, canopied from the glare, sat Augustus with his court. On each side of the platform of the emperor were praetorians: soldiers of the imperial guard. several seats of honor, lined with purple and scarlet cloths, and connected with the platform in question by continuous pavilion roofs. Here sat many ladies and some boys and girls. It is in one of these that we ourselves are going to take post. On the seat immediately in front of ours, and of course a little below it, is a group of three persons, attended by a slave. One of these persons the doctors had forbidden to go forth, but he had come. He is a mere child. His pretty face is shockingly disfigured: both his eyes are closed and blackened; all the flesh round them is a discolored and contused mass, and his head is bandaged. Every nerve in his countenance is twitching with the furious eagerness and curiosity of one who, if he could only see, would ravenously devour the spectacle which all the rest of that mighty multitude were to enjoy, and from which he alone was debarred. Amid the immense murmur of so many human voices it is hard to catch distinctly what the child says in his shrill treble tones. "Now mark you, good Cneius Piso, and you, Herod Agrippa, I am as blind as a stone; and I have brought you here in no other character than as my eyes, my left and my right eye. If a single iota of what passes escapes me, may all the gods destroy you both worse. than any Roman or Jew was ever destroyed! Has that beast of a horse (if it were mine, I'd tether it by all child: this child was the future Emperor Caligula, notorious for his cruelty. In this story it is related that he had been injured by a splinter kicked from the stable door by the horse-hence his temporary blindness. On account of his glib tongue, he was called the orator. four legs to the ground and make a squadron of cavalry back their horses against it, and kick it into shreds and little bits) has that beast of a horse come forth yet?" "Not yet, orator," answered Piso. "I see that your father, the illustrious Germanicus, has not taken his place in the emperor's pavilion; he is riding about yonder in the arena, and so is Tiberius Caesar. I dare say they will prefer to remain on horseback; for they can thus see quite as well while the scene continues to be enacted in this place. If the Sejan horse should break away through the opening in the amphitheater opposite to us, they could follow and still assist at the issue, whereas we could not.” "But I want to see; I must see; I'll get on my pony, too! Ah, my sight! I could not ride blind! O that horse!" 66 "Then," said Piso, " do you wish the youth to conquer the horse, or the horse his rider?" The child yelled and struck his forehead furiously with his fists. "Oh! if I could only see! I ought not to have come! It is worse to be here, knowing what is to happen, and having it all close under my eyes, and not to see it, than if I were far away from it. I cannot, cannot bear it." After a pause of impotent rage, he asked Piso, was the crowd of spectators very large? "It is the largest I ever beheld," answered Piso;" it would be impossible to count it." "I wish every one present were stone blind at this very moment," said the dear child, "Thanks, orator, on the part of all here present," answered Piso. " Or "Understand me-only for the moment," hastily returned Caligula; "I would give them their sight again when I recovered my own." A pause. even when to-day's show was over, perhaps!" While yet he spoke the hum and murmur had died away. "What is it?" asked Caligula. "The Sejan horse is being led into the arena; two men, as usual, hold two cavassons on opposite sides. He is muzzled. Two other grooms are slackening the muzzle to get the bit well back between his teeth, when he opens his mouth. They have the bit properly placed now, and have quitted his head. "Oh! what a spring! It has jerked the farther cavasson-holder clean off his feet. O gods! he has lost the thong, and the other man must be destroyed. No, bravo! the fellow has regained the loop of his rein, or thong, and hauls the beast handsomely back!" "How can one man on either side," asked Caligula, "hold him? I have seen two on each side." "I understand," answered Piso; but, before he could finish, an impressive silence fell upon that vast assembly, and Piso stopped short. "What has happened now?" whispered the child. "The rider has come forth," answered Piso, " and is walking toward the horse from the open space in cavassons: leather thongs or ropes, |