Edward Bulwer-Lytton: The Last Days of Pompeii

BOOK THE FIFTH 4. Chapter IV (continued)

'What!' cried Calenus, turning round to the people, 'shall Isis be thus contemned? Shall the blood of Apaecides yet cry for vengeance? Shall justice be delayed now, that it may be frustrated hereafter? Shall the lion be cheated of his lawful prey? A god! a god!--I feel the god rush to my lips! To the lion--to the lion with Arbaces!'

His exhausted frame could support no longer the ferocious malice of the priest; he sank on the ground in strong convulsions--the foam gathered to his mouth--he was as a man, indeed, whom a supernatural power had entered! The people saw and shuddered.

'It is a god that inspires the holy man! To the lion with the Egyptian!'

With that cry up sprang--on moved--thousands upon thousands! They rushed from the heights--they poured down in the direction of the Egyptian. In vain did the aedile command--in vain did the praetor lift his voice and proclaim the law. The people had been already rendered savage by the exhibition of blood--they thirsted for more--their superstition was aided by their ferocity. Aroused--inflamed by the spectacle of their victims, they forgot the authority of their rulers. It was one of those dread popular convulsions common to crowds wholly ignorant, half free and half servile; and which the peculiar constitution of the Roman provinces so frequently exhibited. The power of the praetor was as a reed beneath the whirlwind; still, at his word the guards had drawn themselves along the lower benches, on which the upper classes sat separate from the vulgar. They made but a feeble barrier--the waves of the human sea halted for a moment, to enable Arbaces to count the exact moment of his doom! In despair, and in a terror which beat down even pride, he glanced his eyes over the rolling and rushing crowd--when, right above them, through the wide chasm which had been left in the velaria, he beheld a strange and awful apparition--he beheld--and his craft restored his courage!

He stretched his hand on high; over his lofty brow and royal features there came an expression of unutterable solemnity and command.

'Behold!' he shouted with a voice of thunder, which stilled the roar of the crowd; 'behold how the gods protect the guiltless! The fires of the avenging Orcus burst forth against the false witness of my accusers!'