Chapter XXIII: The March on Antioch

The dawn had not appeared when the peace of Byzantium was roused by a sudden commotion. The reveille was sounding from all the barracks of the guards. Citizens rushed from their houses to the wider streets and forum to hear the news. The beacon fire across the Bosphorus, on the heights above Chrysopolis, was blazing in the sky. And the palace and its precincts were bright with lamps and torches, as messengers, troops, and attendants hastened through the corridors and courts.

The young guardsman, Eric, hurrying to headquarters, chanced in the crowd to meet his friend, Symmachos the silentiary, attended by Leo the historian that was to be, then a young student at college. "What does it mean?" he asked. "What does it mean?"--"Can you ask?" said Symmachos. "Do you not see the blaze of the beacon across the Bosphorus there? Do you not know that this is the signal from Cæsarea in Cappadocia that the great army of the east is ready to march, and awaits the coming of the Basileus?"

"I knew the signal was expected, but I did not understand it had arrived."

"Yes!" said Symmachos, "it has come--just an hour ago, having started from the banks of the Halys about this very midnight. I have just been sent to summon General Bardas to the palace."

"You have never seen our telegraphs at work before?" said Leo, the scholar, who was already well versed in all the machinery of the empire. "Mount Argæus, whence this signal started, is full thirty days' march from the city. In a few hours the beacon-fire has leaped across that space."

"Yes," said Symmachos, "the palace pharos communicates with that of Chrysopolis; thence it flashes to Nicomedia, Nicæa, Dorylæum, Laodicea, till it reaches Mount Taurus, and from Taurus the concerted signals are returned."

"Does it not remind you of the famous scene of the beacon-fire from Troy, in the 'Agamemnon' of our Æschylus?" said Leo, with all the conceit of a young student. "You know those glorious lines, my lord?" he asked.

"Not I, my boy," said Colonel Eric, with a laugh, "Greek prose is too much for me as yet, and as for your Æschylus, I would rather wrestle with a Russian bear than struggle through his break-jaw lines."

"May Apollo and the Nine Muses forgive you, most terrible son of Thor and Odin. Oh, listen to these majestic verses that the poet puts in the mouth of Clytemnestra:

'From Ida's top, Hephæstus, Lord of Fire,
Sent forth his sign; and on, and ever on,
Beacon to beacon sped the courier-flame.
From Ida to the crag, that Hermes loves,
On Lemnos; thence, unto the steep sublime
Of Athos, throne of Zeus, the broad blaze flared
Thence, raised aloft to shoot across the sea,
The moving light, rejoicing in its strength,
Sped from the pyre of pine, and urged its way,
In golden glory, like some strange new sun,
Onward, and reached Macistus's watching heights.'"

As the young student, all aflame with his tragic enthusiasm, rolled out these lines to the bewilderment of Eric, the courtier Symmachos watched him sharply.

"Beware how you talk of Clytemnestra within sight of our palace, my young friend, or you may be a Cassandra yourself," said he.

"Ah," said Leo, "how every line of the tragedy haunts one; of a truth, there never was, there never will be again on this earth, such a tragedy as that! But our Agamemnon, king of men, is going forth to Asia to a triumph; he is not returning home after long absence. And yet how the weird cries of the chorus ring in my ears:

"'Wherefore, forever, on the wings of Fear
Hovers a vision drear
Before my boding heart? a strain,
Unbidden and unwelcome, thrills mine ear
Oracular of pain.'"

"Keep your visions in your heart, as we do," said the silentiary, sharply, "and do not let them pass your lips, or they will prove oracular of pain, indeed, and you will have no eyes to see visions at all. But come, enough of this; our friend the colonel here is not listening to you. He is staring at the crowd before the Gate of Bronze."

They pushed their way through the by-standers, who stood watching an unwonted and stirring sight. On either side of the bronze door of the palace stood two huge Varangian battle-axemen on guard, motionless as statues. Above them, high on the face of the closed doors, hung the gilded corselet of the emperor's armor of state, with the sword and the shield. The crowd below came and went, gazing on it with murmurs.

"And what means that?" Eric asked his guides.

"It is the ceremonial notice to his people," said Symmachos, "that the emperor is about to march and take command of his army in person."

"An ancient custom?" asked Eric.

"From time immemorial--at least, since Theophilus the Magnificent marched forth against the children of Hagar. The rite is all exactly prescribed in the appendix to the first _Book of Ceremonies_ of our ever-revered Constantine Porphyrogennetus," said Symmachos, with an air of authority, as if that had settled the matter.

The day had now begun to break, and the streets were crowded with long lines of guards hastening to the points of embarkation. The forums were filled with eager sightseers, with caravans of beasts of burden, orderlies flying in every direction with orders, and endless processions of priests and acolytes to the shrines and miraculous oratories and temples. The main army was already gathered round Cæsarea. The intermediate camps were crowded with troops, stores, ammunition, beasts, corn, and sheep, for food. Nothing remained to be moved from Byzantium across the water except the strong body-guard of the emperor, and the vast train and baggage apparatus, tents, and servitors ordained in the _Book of Ceremonies_, when a Basileus takes the field in person.

To carry all these across the straits to the Asian coast, there were gathered a fleet of transports, barges, and galleys, which crowded round the ports adjoining the palace, and again covered the Golden Horn with their many-colored sails and long banks of oars.

In the mean time stormy scenes had been taking place within the Sacred Palace, and, indeed, in the privy chambers of the emperor and the empress themselves.

To explain the situation, it is necessary to go back somewhat in time to the moment described at the close of the twentieth chapter, when Nicephorus so unexpectedly burst out against the envoys from the king of Bulgaria, and his sudden attack upon that kingdom.

The emperor judged it unsafe to start on his far eastern campaign while leaving the Bulgarian kingdom, with all its resources and possible allies, planted within a few days' march of his capital. He silently resolved to strike down the power of so dangerous a neighbor by a sudden onslaught, of which none but two or three of his intimate council had any warning. His unexpected rush had utterly paralyzed the unwar-like Czar Peter, who had lived all these years in a fool's contentment. Forts, towns, and stores fell into the hands of the Romans, who seemed to be making a military promenade on the Bulgarian capital. But it was no part of the policy of Nicephorus to occupy himself in the Balkans a single day after the completion of his eastern preparations. Accordingly, he sent a mission to the young Czar of the Russ, son of the great Czarina Olga, and induced him, by promises and enormous bribes, to fall upon Bulgaria from the north across the Danube. Sviatoslav forced his way on. Crushed thus between Romans on the south, and Russians on the north, Bulgaria lay helpless and prostrate. Thereupon, Nicephorus had dashed back to Constantinople in advance of his men, as suddenly and as unexpectedly as he had begun the attack. He was now free to give himself entirely to the great campaign beyond the Taurus the moment the fire-signal should warn him that all was ready to march.

Theophano succeeded in throwing on the privy council the responsibility for the arrest of Digenes, and for the opposition to his marriage with Agatha. The unfortunate warden, tossing on a bed of sickness, and quite delirious with fever, was unable to give any explanations whatever. Agatha, who was occupied intently with superintending the nursing him to life, was still ignorant of the monstrous advances that the empress had made to Digenes. And the persecuted princess, in her agonies of anxiety and excitement, was no match for the daring brain of Theophano. Nicephorus peremptorily cancelled the imperial order to marry Agatha to Sisinnios, who narrowly escaped condign punishment for allowing himself to be made a party to the scheme. The formal authority was given to the suffering warden of the marches to marry the princess as soon as he could be restored to health. On her part, the noble-minded Agatha, overjoyed at her deliverance from the palace plot, and absorbed in saving her beloved Digenes from death, forbore to torture the mind of the emperor, at the moment of setting forth on his great campaign, with all that she knew and more that she suspected of the designs and intrigues of Theophano. And in this magnanimous resolve she was confirmed by the sudden decision of Nicephorus as to the regency, which struck the whole palace and its inmates with surprise, fear, or hope, according to the party each supported.

"My beloved lord and ever-victorious hero," broke out the Basilissa, when at last they two were alone and the immediate orders had been given, "well wert thou named Nicephorus, thou who bringest victory ever in thy hand! Thou returnest from a new triumph over another enemy, who treacherously professed to be our friend. But to me, thy wife, thy servant, thy lover, thou bringest back that which is to her more dear than victory. Thou hast brought life and light and joy--thou bringest back thyself!"

Nicephorus listened in silence with a clouded brow. At last he spoke.

"I do not know if my coming brings joy to this palace. I purpose that it shall bring peace. I will do my best that it bring life at least to one who is more dear to me than any soldier in my empire. But, you will remember, that I do not come to stay. I hurried back from the Balkan on news that all was on the eve of readiness on the Taurus. Hour by hour I expect the beacon-fire to flame. And twelve hours after that light I shall be in Asia."

"Oh, my Lord, my life, say not so soon! Am I to be widowed again in so short an interval? Have you thought of all the anxieties I have suffered while filling your seat at the council? Do you care nothing for all the toils that a regent has to bear--and that regent a weak, inexperienced woman? Cannot you imagine, dear my lord and master, all the loneliness that a widowed wife has to suffer in her silent chamber, in her deserted couch?"

"You will have no longer all these toils."

"What say you?" she almost shrieked. "Who can sustain the regency in your absence, who but your wife who lifted you to this throne and who alone knows all its cares, its resources, and its perils?"

"One who knew all this before you yourself were born--one who, for two generations, has been a chief bulwark of Rome--one who is honored and beloved by every honest Roman," said Nicephorus, quietly, and with a tone of decision.

"Your father, Bardas?" she gasped; "but he is decrepit with age and infirmity."

"He is wise, brave, firm, and the idol of the people. But I have named as his colleague in the office of regency, my brother Leo, the curopalates. He has the youth, life, and force that years may have taken from my sire. They two, as joint regents, will form a government that all men can trust--such as I can trust when I leave for the far east."

"And cannot you trust your own wife?" she broke out.

Nicephorus uttered not a word, nor did he make a sign.

"It cannot be. Has it come to this? Have I not saved your life from Bringas? Have I not set you on this throne? Have I not imperilled my all, my own life and liberty, my very soul, for an Armenian soldier of fortune--I, the daughter of ancient kings and heroes, the wife, the mother of emperors of Rome?" She spoke with passion, seeking, if she might, to overwhelm him with her majestic presence.

Nicephorus spoke not a word; slowly he drew from his robe the diploma with its vermilion seal that created Bardas the Cæsar, and Leo the curopalates, joint regents of the empire, during his own absence from Europe.

She strove to snatch it from his hand, with fresh reproaches and remonstrances. "Let me tear it; listen to reason; will you show such cruelty to your wife? Nicephorus, remember all that you owe me!"

At length, having exhausted appeals, invectives, and threats, she returned to blandishments again, with a mind recurring to the large opportunities for ambition and intrigue which the palace would offer her in the absence of its imperial master.

"Cruel man, hard-hearted husband, faithless lover," she broke out with sobs, "you little know or care for all the wretchedness of a wife, deserted for years, it may be, abandoned to the evil arts of her rivals, her enemies--ay, maybe of her suitors and false friends." And she wept, with all the art and pathos of a consummate actress.

"Fear not," said Nicephorus, quietly; "you go with headquarters into Asia yourself. All fitting preparations for your journey are already being made."

"What?" she screamed. "Am I to be dragged across Asia in the rear of an army, in this terrible campaign into Syria? Am I to be a follower of the camp, a hostage, a prisoner, an exile?"

"You go with all the honors, the state, and fit appliances of an empress of Rome. Does a Basilissa dread to face a campaign against the enemies of Christ, when the Basileus in person leads his armies to war?"

"Do you take me with you, do you mean?"

"The Basilissa will be at headquarters, I say, though the commander-in-chief may not know from hour to hour whither he may be called in the field."

"And are my poor children, the infant Basileis, to be torn from their mother, to be left here exposed to all the machinations of their rivals--to the humiliations and the plots that your brother may contrive, to all the contaminations of this place--when the love and care of their mother is far away?" And she sobbed and wept tears of mingled wrath and fear, tears not wholly feigned. "They will imprison them, they will mutilate them, they will murder them--my babes, my hope, my pride, my sons of Constantines, Basils, of Leonidas, and of Lycurgus! The Armenian conspirators will slay them and seize their inheritance."

"Fear nothing, madam," at last said Nicephorus, coldly. "The Basileis go with you, with ample imperial state and retinues. Your terrors are as needless as they are unjust. Your sons shall have all a mother's care, all a mother's love you can give them. Nor will you suffer any loss of dignity if you cease to be regent. You are empress in title and in act, and will be honored as reigning empress, whether in Europe or in Asia; you and your sons will be in the eyes of all men the true sovereigns of this empire. It is time that these boys, who are to inherit this throne, should see with their eyes the kingdom they will have to rule, and to hear the shouts of a Roman army as it marches to battle against the infidel. For me, while this war endures, so long as the caliph holds the Holy Land where Christ the Saviour lived, taught, and died for men, it is enough for me to be commander of the armies of Rome, of the soldiers of our crucified Redeemer."

Long did the wily sorceress try all her arts in turn--entreaties, invectives, tears, threats, blandishments, and pathetic reproaches. Nicephorus remained immovable. Bewildered as he was by the incoherent and contradictory tales he heard as to what had passed in his absence, grieved at the long illness of his friend, overwhelmed with cares of state and the duties of the campaign, he resolved to postpone further inquiry into the conduct and schemes of his wife. He insisted on carrying her with him, to be near him, and under his watch and guard, but no longer to be at his side or to be treated with any show of affection. Henceforth she ceased to be his wife, though to the world she remained his empress. To passionate love and devotion there had succeeded deep distrust and even dread. But even distrust and dread were not strong enough to stifle love. He was no longer her slave. He could not cease to be her lover. He could not cease to be her lover in the silent recesses of his heart, hard as he might strive to tear up by the roots the memory of his fatal passion.

Soon after noon that very day vast crowds collected in the Middle Street, in the forum of Constantine, and in the Augustaion, and all round the walls of the Sacred Palace. The whole city was wild with excitement, and the streets were decorated with banners and emblems. Hour after hour since dawn the guards had been paraded and mustered on barges. Long caravans of sumpter-mules, laden with the tents, furniture, baggage, and robes of the empress, of her two sons, and of Nicephorus, passed through the imperial gate down to the port, where they embarked for the Asiatic shore. But the densest crowd of all was gathered round the harbor of Boucoleon, where the imperial cortège was to take ship. At length, amid the clang of trumpets and cymbals, the procession was formed. Magistroi, patricians, and prefects, selected by the emperor to form his court, among whom were our friends Bardas Skleros, attended by young Eric, Bourtzes, and Balantes, and other generals, chamberlains, and ushers, accompanied Nicephorus to the imperial galley. It was gently rowed out from the port to a short distance, where all could be easily seen, and spoken word could be heard on shore. The walls, banks, towers, terraces, and every available spot were crowded, while the patriarch, his priests and acolytes, with their crosses and pictures, waited at the point of the quay. The emperor ascended the steps to the raised platform on the quarter-deck of the state dromon. He was in full panoply, over which fell, in long folds, the imperial scaramangion of his office. He turned towards the east, and, reverently raising his right hand aloft, he thrice waved over the city the sign of the Cross. Profound hush fell on the vast multitude. Then he clasped his hands in the attitude of adoration, and, in a ringing voice across the waters, poured forth the prayer prescribed in the book of rites:

"O Lord Jesus Christ, my God, into thy hands I commend this city of Thine. Guard her against all enemies, all disasters, that may seek to come against her; guard her against civil war, and against invaders from the Gentiles. Keep her safe from capture and safe from pillage: for in Thee we place all our hopes, inasmuch as Thou art the Lord of all mercy, the Father of all pity, the God from whom alone cometh all consolation. Thine is all mercy, all salvation, deliverance out of all temptations and all perils, now and forever and evermore. Amen."

At these words the choir responded from the shore with long chants of "Amen! Amen! Holy, Holy, Holy, One Triune God!" And the vast crowds on the walls and terraces sent up to the sky resounding shouts of "Amen! Amen! Long live our ever-victorious Basileus!"

The imperial fleet set forth at once with sails and oars across the Propontis, and, amid crowds of boats, caiques, and light galleys, passed over that lovely inland lake between the Princes Islands and the Asian coast, marked with endless headlands, bays, woods, and towers. It sailed on eastward into the landlocked bay of Nicomedia, and disembarked at Pylæ (the Gates of Asia), a little north of the famous city of Nicæa in Bithynia. This was now practically the head of the great military road which led from the Propontis into Syria, the road which so many armies, proconsuls, and officials of the Roman empire had traversed for ages--along which the advancing flood of Islam came, step by step, for seven hundred years--the road traversed by the vast and motley host of the First Frank Crusade, one hundred and thirty years later, on their way to Antioch and Jerusalem.

Here the imperial host was attended and watched by two young and observant spirits, both of whom were deeply stirred by the character and exploits of Nicephorus Phocas, both of whom have left us records of his achievements. One of these was the young student, Leo, long afterwards destined to become a deacon of the Church, and to transmit to us, after a thousand years, the only contemporary history in prose of these events. Though still but an undergraduate at college, his historical zeal had caused him to obtain permission to follow the imperial train, at least as far as Cæsarea; and he was already taking ample notes of everything he saw, and was diligently inquiring into every detail of the armament and its equipment. His companion was one Joannes, called Kyriotes, and usually known as "the Geometer," from his mathematical learning. He, too, ultimately took priests' orders, and became, late in life, Bishop of Melitene, in Cappadocia. We still have verses of his in the form of epitaphs on Nicephorus, his uncle Malemos the Hermit, and the Patriarch Polyeuctus. At the date of this journey he was a young courtier--a protospathaire, in fact, unattached--and his father, Theodore, a great official, had procured for his son, John, and his young friend, Leo, permission to join the imperial suite and to follow all the movements of the host. It is by the keen eyes and active brains of these two literary enthusiasts that we propose now to follow the crusade of the tenth century.

As soon as the immense convoy of baggage and camp furniture was fully landed on the main-land, the emperor in person held a review of the train of sumpter beasts, their drivers, and their packs, under the superintendence of the prefect of the stables. Leo and Joannes followed in the emperor's staff, John as the elder, and already an experienced official, pointing out and explaining each section of the equipment.

"The first inspection is to register the proper number of the sumpter beasts sent in to the rendezvous," said John. "The prefect of the stables and his lieutenants and subalterns are responsible. Every official, from the captain of a theme to the lowest grade of the vestiaries, is charged to produce so many horses, so many mules. The counts of the guard, scholares, excubitors, immortals, and the obsequians, are all assessed, and so on throughout."

"Is the number of each requisition fixed by law, and always the same?"

"Certainly, it is all noted in the appendix to our first _Book of Ceremonies_."

"There are no imperial sumpter animals then?" asked Leo.

"Certainly there are. The emperor is now inspecting the contingent. Two hundred horses and two hundred mules from the imperial stables of Asia and Phrygia. The great stables and paddocks are over there at Malagina, under Mount Olympus. The bishops and archbishops have to send another hundred, and the great monasteries another hundred. Altogether we have here nearly one thousand beasts."

"That is not enough for the army?" asked Leo.

"Oh no! the army is already well on its march, or in the intermediate camps along the line, ready to fall in. Their baggage animals are by this time well ahead towards Cæsarea. These we see are for the imperial retinue, staff, and service. The whole have been mustered at the state paddocks, where they have been gelded, branded with the state cipher, and passed by the surgeons. They must be above five and under seven years, shod, bitted, and furnished with saddles or packs, halters, and tethers. Those that are sick or sorry have been rejected, and are left in the paddocks in the veterinary hospital."

"What is the emperor stopping for now in that group?" asked Leo.

"He notices, perhaps, that the beast is short of proper clothing, or has a sore back, and that his harness has not been properly stamped. No! I see now, he has noticed a mule with a load too heavy. See, he has it taken off and weighed!"

"Why so?" asked the curious Leo.

"No horse or mule can have laid on his back a weight exceeding eighty measures of corn. Yes! They find it is exceeded. The Basileus has called for the driver's check, which is forfeited, and he is ordering the fellow two dozen lashes."

"He is rather more tender to his mules than to his men," said Leo.

"Not he," said John. "Nicephorus is a man of iron to himself first and to others next. To himself, his soldiers, his beasts, he is the same. In discipline he is as sharp and as severe in punishing as any emir of the Hagarenes or czar of the Bulgars."

"Inexorable as Rhadamanthus or Achilles," said Leo, whose mind ran on his Hellenic classics.

"Well, do you not see," said John, "it is not a matter of tenderness at all. Tender is a word not known in the vocabulary of the Sacred Palace nor of the Roman army. But a mule with a sore back, a cracked heel, or with an excessive load, will soon drop. With it goes its pack, and when this failure spreads, the expedition is delayed or weakened. Hence our administration for centuries had prescribed the exact harness, clothes, condition, age, of every baggage-beast, and the weight he has to carry, and provides good stables, clothes, drugs, and veterinary surgeons. And Nicephorus Phocas, let me tell you, is the man in all this service the most keen to mark any case of default, and the most inexorable to have it exposed and punished. I have heard him say that the feet of a soldier are just as essential as his hands, and the legs of his mount may decide a battle quite as much as his lance or bow."

The huge caravan passed on with sure and rapid steps from one camp to another, the troops in each camp joining up on the march, through the plain round Nicasa, to the station at Dorylæum, a district the scene of so many desperate combats--and after a hundred and thirty years the scene of the triumphs of a Godfrey and a Tancred. The empress and her sons were conveyed with speed and without fatigue in horse litters, and they had their tents, guards, and retinue distinct from that of the emperor.

It was at Dorylæum, after a severe day's march, that Leo and Joannes were permitted to visit the tents of the emperor himself. Two were pitched and ready furnished at each station, awaiting his arrival--one for his meals, the other for the night. They were of purple, lined with silk, and supported on stout tent-poles with gilded knobs. Within they were already filled with couches, folding-tables, cushions, rugs, and furs, with all the utensils needed for the table and service--stamped with the imperial cipher--baths, books, maps, almanacs, prayer-books, reliquaries, even cases of medicines, and surgical instruments. Nor was there wanting immense chests of robes, of state armor, silk and linen garments, even unguents and pastils, lamps, parchment, writing-materials, seals, and stamps. All this vast apparatus was strictly required by the laws and custom of the Sacred Palace. Nicephorus, who despised it, and rejected its use, suffered it to be taken as far as Cæsarea. When the campaign began in earnest, he left it behind him, and fared as simply as any regimental officer in his army.

Just as they had been admitted to view the imperial tents and fittings, the guard for the night was being posted. The commander of the vigils, or watch, ordered out a detachment of one hundred guards, who patrolled the external circuit of the imperial tents. The inner circuit, from the cords of the tent-poles, was guarded by a hundred men from the corps of the hetæri, or body-guard. From the moment when the emperor had withdrawn within, no man could pass the barrier, which was indicated by the shields hung outside the tents.

"From the day that the Basileus enters the enemies' ground," said Joannes, "these guards are doubled, and a more rigid surveillance is enforced. An emperor of Rome is not to be caught napping in his tent like a madcap king of the Franks, or a rough-and-ready czar of the Russ."

And now the Basileus approached, passing through the lines of men already halted round their quarters. The brigadiers, colonels, and officers dismounted and joined his staff. The infantry fell on their knees and prostrated themselves before their august autocrator; the cavalry sat motionless on their chargers at the salute. Nicephorus would halt and address each detachment. "Soldiers, I trust all goes well with you! How fare ye, my sons? How fares it with your wives, my daughters-in-law, how fares it with your children?"

And the men answered in the appointed words, "In the light of thy majesty, if all goes well with thee, all goes well with us, thy servants." And the Basileus replied, "Thanks be to God Almighty, who preserves you in health!"

With these words he passed into his tent. The captain of the watch asked him for the password. That night it was "St. Michael the Archangel."

At night he summoned his principal officers and staff to sup with him. The young Joannes and Leo were even admitted to attend at the repast. Nicephorus was now hastening to take command of a great army, which he knew was worthy of its task--to make head against the swarms of Islam which now reached from the Indus and the Caspian to the Taurus, and from Morocco to the Holy Land. He had thrown off all the cares and vexations of the capital, all the miserable ceremony of the Sacred Palace. He was again a soldier, about to complete the mission of his life; and the young students rejoiced to observe in all his words and his looks a spirit of hope and confidence that for two years had never lighted up the countenance of the hermit sovereign.

As the two students left the tents of the Basileus, they passed over to those of the Basilissa, who had just arrived in her litter from the day's march with a long train of guards, pack-horses, attendants, and baggage servants, and her two sons, with a like retinue. As she was in the act of descending from her litter to pass into her tent, a strange, wild figure pressed forward against the guards with loud outcries and appeals to the empress to suffer him to approach and address her. It was an old man, gaunt and haggard, with long white hair, the upper part of his body was almost bare, and showed emaciated and torn limbs, while he was girt with a coarse and ragged garment from the waist downward; but his legs and feet, like his arms, were naked, and presented the look of a skeleton exposed to the winds of heaven. His cries and wild appearance, much like that of an India fakir, caused Theophano to halt and ask who he was and what did he seek. He was said to be the famous eremite, Daniel, of Mount Olympus, who had lived in solitary caves or huts for forty-three years, had once had a great reputation for sanctity, but was now believed to have been driven crazy by his austerities. He had lived in a desecrated tomb by the side of the road, and was afflicted with dreadful fits of epilepsy. He claimed to possess the gift of prophecy, which was vouchsafed to him by the Jewish prophet whose name he bore.

The promise of hearing prophecy caused Theophano to order that the venerable hermit should be permitted to approach her. He advanced towards the royal seat, and, standing on a rock and throwing up to heaven his shrunken arms, he began with loud cries, "Hear the word of the Lord God, which He spake by the mouth of Daniel, prophet of the Most High. I have seen in a vision the things that shall come upon this land, for its abominations and all its sorceries. Thus saith the Lord: 'There shall come up against this land a king of kings from the rising sun, with horses and with horsemen, and he shall set engines of war against thy walls, and with his axes he shall break down thy towers. The walls shall shake at the noise of his horsemen when he shall enter into thy gates. With the hoofs of his horses shall he tread down all thy streets. He shall slay thy people with the sword. They shall make a spoil of thy riches, and make a prey of thy merchandise. They shall break down thy walls and destroy thy pleasant houses. I will make thee a terror, and thou shalt be no more.'"

The prophet foamed at the mouth, and paused from sheer exhaustion. The attendants attempted to seize him. But the empress motioned them to suffer him to speak. Again he screamed out:

"Thus saith the Lord. I have seen in a vision a great host of men and horses coming from the setting sun, and I hear the crash of battle and of fierce slaughter; and all the ground whereon thou now standest shall be a lake of blood. And the bones of the slain shall cumber this valley, and its end shall be a land of desolation."

Again he shouted, as his long arm pointed at Theophano:

"Thus saith the Lord. Thou art covered with silk and bedecked with ornaments. Bracelets are on thy hands and chains on thy neck, jewels are on thy forehead and ear-rings in thy ears and a beautiful crown upon thy head. Thou wast exceedingly beautiful, and thou didst prosper into thy kingdom. But thou didst trust in thy own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pourest out thy fornications on every one that passed by."

The courtiers groaned out their indignation, but Theophano sat motionless like a statue of Clytemnestra.

"Wherefore, O harlot, hear the word of the Lord. Because thy filthiness was poured out, and with all the idols of thy abominations--I will judge thee as women that break wedlock and shed blood are judged; and I will give thee blood in fury and jealousy. And they shall strip thee of thy clothes, and shall take thy fair jewels, and leave thee naked and bare. And they shall stone thee with stones, and thrust thee through with their swords.

"Thus saith the Lord. Hast thou killed and also taken possession? In the place where dogs shall lick the blood of him thou shalt slay, shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine."

These dreadful fragments of biblical imprecation were shrieked forth by the fanatic in piercing tones, while his weird, inhuman look and voice thrilled those who heard them, so that they were afraid to move. Theophano listened in seeming patience, with a look of disdainful mockery in her face--somewhat distracted within by her own contempt for the wretched maniac, and lingering desire to hear what she might of inspired or diabolic presage. But as the violence of passion had disordered the brain and nerves of the ascetic, he foamed at the mouth in a fit, and, with violent shrieks and struggles, he was borne away by the terrified attendants. To the eye of those around, and even to the searching glances of Leo and Joannes, Theophano herself was the one person present at this scene who had borne it throughout with indifference and contempt.