A Book of Golden Deeds

C >> Charlotte M. Yonge >> A Book of Golden Deeds

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'Tell me, thou daughter of a blind old man,
Antigone, to what land are we come,
Or to what city? Who the inhabitants
Who with a slender pittance will relieve
Even for a day the wandering Oedipus?'
POTTER.

The place to which they had come was in Attica, hear the city of
Colonus. It was a lovely grove--

'All the haunts of Attic ground,
Where the matchless coursers bound,
Boast not, through their realms of bliss,
Other spot so fair as this.
Frequent down this greenwood dale
Mourns the warbling nightingale,
Nestling 'mid the thickest screen
Of the ivy's darksome green,
Or where each empurpled shoot
Drooping with its myriad fruit,
Curl'd in many a mazy twine,
Droops the never-trodden vine.'
ANSTICE.

This beautiful grove was sacred to the Eumenides, or avenging goddesses,
and it was therefore a sanctuary where no foot might tread; but near it
the exiled king was allowed to take up his abode, and was protected by
the great Athenian King, Theseus. There his other daughter, Ismene,
joined him, and, after a time, his elder son Polynices, arrived.

Polynices had been expelled from Thebes by his brother Eteocles, and had
been wandering through Greece seeking aid to recover his rights. He had
collected an army, and was come to take leave of his father and sisters;
and at the same time to entreat his sisters to take care that, if he
should fall in the battle, they would prevent his corpse from being left
unburied; for the Greeks believed that till the funeral rites were
performed, the spirit went wandering restlessly up and down upon the
banks of a dark stream, unable to enter the home of the dead. Antigone
solemnly promised to him that he should not be left without these last
rites. Before long, old Oedipus was killed by lightning, and the two
sisters returned to Thebes.

The united armies of the seven chiefs against Thebes came on, led by
Polynices. Eteocles sallied out to meet them, and there was a terrible
battle, ending in all the seven chiefs being slain, and the two
brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, were killed by one another in single
combat. Creon, the uncle, who thus became king, had always been on the
side of Eteocles, and therefore commanded that whilst this younger
brother was entombed with all due solemnities, the body of the elder
should be left upon the battlefield to be torn by dogs and vultures, and
that whosoever durst bury it should be treated as a rebel and a traitor
to the state.

This was the time for the sister to remember her oath to her dead
brother. The more timid Ismene would have dissuaded her, but she
answered,

'To me no sufferings have that hideous form
Which can affright me from a glorious death'.

And she crept forth by night, amid all the horrors of the deserted field
of battles, and herself covered with loose earth the corpse of
Polynices. The barbarous uncle caused it to be taken up and again
exposed, and a watch was set at some little distance. Again Antigone

'Was seen, lamenting shrill with plaintive notes,
Like the poor bird that sees her lonely nest
Spoil'd of her young'.

Again she heaped dry dust with her own hands over the body, and poured
forth the libations of wine that formed an essential part of the
ceremony. She was seized by the guard, and led before Creon. She boldly
avowed her deed, and, in spite of the supplications of Ismene, she was
put to death, a sufferer for her noble and pious deeds; and with this
only comfort:

'Glowing at my heart
I feel this hope, that to my father, dear
And dear to thee, my mother, dear to thee,
My brother, I shall go.'
POTTER.

Dim and beautiful indeed was the hope that upbore the grave and
beautiful Theban maiden; and we shall see her resolution equaled, though
hardly surpassed, by Christian Antigones of equal love and surer faith.

THE CUP OF WATER

No touch in the history of the minstrel king David gives us a more warm
and personal feeling towards him than his longing for the water of the
well of Bethlehem. Standing as the incident does in the summary of the
characters of his mighty men, it is apt to appear to us as if it had
taken place in his latter days; but such is not the case, it befell
while he was still under thirty, in the time of his persecution by Saul.

It was when the last attempt at reconciliation with the king had been
made, when the affectionate parting with the generous and faithful
Jonathan had taken place, when Saul was hunting him like a partridge on
the mountains on the one side, and the Philistines had nearly taken his
life on the other, that David, outlawed, yet loyal at the heart, sent
his aged parents to the land of Moab for refuge, and himself took up his
abode in the caves of the wild limestone hills that had become familiar
to him when he was a shepherd. Brave captain and Heaven-destined king as
he was, his name attracted around him a motley group of those that were
in distress, or in debt, or discontented, and among them were the
'mighty men' whose brave deeds won them the foremost parts in that army
with which David was to fulfill the ancient promises to his people.
There were his three nephews, Joab, the ferocious and imperious, the
chivalrous Abishai, and Asahel the fleet of foot; there was the warlike
Levite Benaiah, who slew lions and lionlike men, and others who, like
David himself, had done battle with the gigantic sons of Anak. Yet even
these valiant men, so wild and lawless, could be kept in check by the
voice of their young captain; and, outlaws as they were, they spoiled no
peaceful villages, they lifted not their hands against the persecuting
monarch, and the neighboring farms lost not one lamb through their
violence. Some at least listened to the song of their warlike minstrel:

'Come, ye children, and hearken to me,
I will teach you the fear of the Lord.
What man is he that lusteth to live,
And would fain see good days?
Let him refrain his tongue from evil
And his lips that they speak no guile,
Let him eschew evil and do good,
Let him seek peace and ensue it.'

With such strains as these, sung to his harp, the warrior gained the
hearts of his men to enthusiastic love, and gathered followers on all
sides, among them eleven fierce men of Gad, with faces like lions and
feet swift as roes, who swam the Jordan in time of flood, and fought
their way to him, putting all enemies in the valleys to flight.

But the Eastern sun burnt on the bare rocks. A huge fissure, opening in
the mountain ridge, encumbered at the bottom with broken rocks, with
precipitous banks, scarcely affording a foothold for the wild goats---
such is the spot where, upon a cleft on the steep precipice, still
remain the foundations of the 'hold', or tower, believed to have been
the David's retreat, and near at hand is the low-browed entrance of the
galleried cave alternating between narrow passages and spacious halls,
but all oppressively hot and close. Waste and wild, without a bush or a
tree, in the feverish atmosphere of Palestine, it was a desolate region,
and at length the wanderer's heart fainted in him, as he thought of his
own home, with its rich and lovely terraced slopes, green with wheat,
trellised with vines, and clouded with grey olive, and of the cool
cisterns of living water by the gate of which he loved to sing--

'He shall feed me in a green pasture,
And lead me forth beside the waters of comfort'.

His parched longing lips gave utterance to the sigh, 'Oh that one would
give me to drink of the water of the well of Bethlehem that is by the
gate?'

Three of his brave men, apparently Abishai, Benaiah, and Eleazar, heard
the wish. Between their mountain fastness and the dearly loved spring
lay the host of the Philistines; but their love for their leader feared
no enemies. It was not only water that he longed for, but the water from
the fountain which he had loved in his childhood. They descended from
their chasm, broke through the midst of the enemy's army, and drew the
water from the favorite spring, bearing it back, once again through the
foe, to the tower upon the rock! Deeply moved was their chief at this
act of self-devotion--so much moved that the water seemed to him to be
too sacred to be put to his own use. 'May God forbid it me that I should
do this thing. Shall I drink the blood of these men that have put their
lives in jeopardy, for with the jeopardy of their lives they brought
it?' And as a hallowed and precious gift, he poured out unto the Lord
the water obtained at the price of such peril to his followers.

In later times we meet with another hero, who by his personal qualities
inspired something of the same enthusiastic attachment as did David, and
who met with an adventure somewhat similar, showing the like nobleness
of mind on the part of both leader and followers.

It was Alexander of Macedon, whose character as a man, with all its dark
shades of violence, rage, and profanity, has a nobleness and sweetness
that win our hearts, while his greatness rests on a far broader basis
than that of his conquests, though they are unrivalled. No one else so
gained the love of the conquered, had such wide and comprehensive views
for the amelioration of the world, or rose so superior to the prejudice
of race; nor have any ten years left so lasting a trace upon the history
of the world as those of his career.

It is not, however, of his victories that we are here to speak, but of
his return march from the banks of the Indus, in BC 326, when he had
newly recovered from the severe wound which he had received under the
fig tree, within the mud wall of the city of the Malli. This expedition
was as much the expedition of a discoverer as the journey of a
conqueror: and, at the mouth of the Indus, he sent his ships to survey
the coasts of the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf, while he himself
marched along the shore of the province, then called Gedrosia, and now
Mekhran. It was a most dismal tract. Above towered mountains of reddish-
brown bare stone, treeless and without verdure, the scanty grass
produced in the summer being burnt up long before September, the month
of his march; and all the slope below was equally desolate slopes of
gravel. The few inhabitants were called by the Greeks fish-eaters and
turtle-eaters, because there was apparently, nothing else to eat; and
their huts were built of turtle shells.

The recollections connected with the region were dismal. Semiramis and
Cyrus were each said to have lost an army there through hunger and
thirst; and these foes, the most fatal foes of the invader, began to
attack the Greek host. Nothing but the discipline and all-pervading
influence of Alexander could have borne his army through. Speed was
their sole chance; and through the burning sun, over the arid rock, he
stimulated their steps with his own high spirit of unshrinking
endurance, till he had dragged them through one of the most rapid and
extraordinary marches of his wonderful career. His own share in their
privations was fully and freely taken; and once when, like the rest, he
was faint with heat and deadly thirst, a small quantity of water, won
with great fatigue and difficulty, was brought to him, he esteemed it
too precious to be applied to his own refreshment, but poured it forth
as a libation, lest, he said, his warriors should thirst the more when
they saw him drink alone; and, no doubt, too, because he felt the
exceeding value of that which was purchased by loyal love.
A like story is told of Rodolf of Hapsburgh, the founder of the
greatness of Austria, and one of the most open-hearted of men. A flagon
of water was brought to him when his army was suffering from severe
drought. 'I cannot,' he said, 'drink alone, nor can all share so small a
quantity. I do not thirst for myself, but for my whole army.'

Yet there have been thirsty lips that have made a still more trying
renunciation. Our own Sir Philip Sidney, riding back, with the mortal
hurt in his broken thigh, from the fight at Zutphen, and giving the
draught from his own lips to the dying man whose necessities were
greater than his own, has long been our proverb for the giver of that
self-denying cup of water that shall by no means lose its reward.

A tradition of an act of somewhat the same character survived in a
Slesvig family, now extinct. It was during the wars that ranged from
1652 to 1660, between Frederick III of Denmark and Charles Gustavus of
Sweden, that, after a battle, in which the victory had remained with the
Danes, a stout burgher of Flensborg was about to refresh himself, ere
retiring to have his wounds dressed, with a draught of beer from a
wooden bottle, when an imploring cry from a wounded Swede, lying on the
field, made him turn, and, with the very words of Sidney, 'Thy need is
greater than mine,' he knelt down by the fallen enemy, to pour the
liquor into his mouth. His requital was a pistol shot in the shoulder
from the treacherous Swede. 'Rascal,' he cried, 'I would have befriended
you, and you would murder me in return! Now I will punish you. I would
have given you the whole bottle; but now you shall have only half.' And
drinking off half himself, he gave the rest to the Swede. The king,
hearing the story, sent for the burgher, and asked him how he came to
spare the life of such a rascal.

'Sire,' said the honest burgher, 'I could never kill a wounded enemy.'

'Thou meritest to be a noble,' the king said, and created him one
immediately, giving him as armorial bearings a wooden bottle pierced
with an arrow! The family only lately became extinct in the person of an
old maiden lady.

HOW ONE MAN HAS SAVED A HOST

B.C. 507

There have been times when the devotion of one man has been the saving
of an army. Such, according to old Roman story, was the feat of Horatius
Cocles. It was in the year B.C. 507, not long after the kings had been
expelled from Rome, when they were endeavoring to return by the aid of
the Etruscans. Lars Porsena, one of the great Etruscan chieftains, had
taken up the cause of the banished Tarquinius Superbus and his son
Sextus, and gathered all his forces together, to advance upon the city
of Rome. The great walls, of old Etrurian architecture, had probably
already risen round the growing town, and all the people came flocking
in from the country for shelter there; but the Tiber was the best
defense, and it was only crossed by one wooden bridge, and the farther
side of that was guarded by a fort, called the Janiculum. But the
vanguards of the overwhelming Etruscan army soon took the fort, and
then, in the gallant words of Lord Macaulay's ballad,--

'Thus in all the Senate
There was no heart so bold
But sore it ached, and fast it beat,
When that ill news was told.
Forthwith uprose the Consul,
Up rose the Fathers all,
In haste they girded up their gowns,
And hied them to the wall.

'They held a council standing
Before the River Gate:
Short time was there, ye well may guess,
For musing or debate.
Out spoke the Consul roundly,
'The bridge must straight go down,
For, since Janiculum is lost,
Nought else can save the town.'

'Just then a scout came flying,
All wild with haste and fear:
'To arms! To arms! Sir Consul,
Lars Porsena is here.'
On the low hills to westward
The Consul fixed his eye,
And saw the swarthy storm of dust
Rise fast along the sky.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

'But the Consul's brow was sad,
And the Consul's speech was low,
And darkly looked he at the wall,
And darkly at the foe.
'Their van will be upon us
Before the bridge goes down;
And if they once may win the bridge
What hope to save the town?'

'Then out spoke brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate,
'To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late;
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his gods?

'And for the tender mother
Who dandled him to rest,
And for the wife who nurses
His baby at her breast?
And for the holy maidens
Who feed the eternal flame,
To save them from false Sextus,
That wrought the deed of shame?

'Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul,
With all the speed ye may,
I, with two more to help me,
Will hold the foe in play.
In yon strait path a thousand
May well be stopp'd by three:
Now who will stand on either hand,
And keep the bridge with me?'

'Then out spake Spurius Lartius,
A Ramnian proud was he,
'Lo, I will stand at thy right hand,
And keep the bridge with thee.'
And out spake strong Herminius,
Of Titian blood was he,
'I will abide on thy left side,
And keep the bridge with thee.'

So forth went these three brave men, Horatius, the Consul's nephew,
Spurius Lartius, and Titus Herminius, to guard the bridge at the farther
end, while all the rest of the warriors were breaking down the timbers
behind them.

'And Fathers mixed with commons,
Seized hatchet, bar, and crow,
And smote upon the planks above,
And loosen'd them below.
'Meanwhile the Tuscan army,
Right glorious to behold,
Came flashing back the noonday light,
Rank behind rank, like surges bright,
Of a broad sea of gold.
Four hundred trumpets sounded
A peal of warlike glee,
As that great host, with measured tread,
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread,
Roll'd slowly towards the bridge's head,
Where stood the dauntless three.

'The three stood calm and silent,
And look'd upon the foes,
And a great shout of laughter
From all the vanguard rose.'

They laughed to see three men standing to meet the whole army; but it
was so narrow a space, that no more than three enemies could attack them
at once, and it was not easy to match them. Foe after foe came forth
against them, and went down before their swords and spears, till at
last--

'Was none that would be foremost
To lead such dire attack;
But those behind cried 'Forward!'
And those before cried 'Back!'

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

However, the supports of the bridge had been destroyed.

'But meanwhile axe and lever
Have manfully been plied,
And now the bridge hangs tottering
Above the boiling tide.
'Come back, come back, Horatius!'
Loud cried the Fathers all;
'Back, Lartius! Back, Herminius!
Back, ere the ruin fall!'

'Back darted Spurius Lartius,
Herminius darted back;
And as they passed, beneath their feet
They felt the timbers crack;
But when they turn'd their faces,
And on the farther shore
Saw brave Horatius stand alone,
They would have cross'd once more.

'But with a crash like thunder
Fell every loosen'd beam,
And, like a dam, the mighty wreck
Lay right athwart the stream;
And a long shout of triumph
Rose from the walls of Rome,
As to the highest turret-tops
Was splashed the yellow foam.'

The one last champion, behind a rampart of dead enemies, remained till
the destruction was complete.

'Alone stood brave Horatius,
But constant still in mind,
Thrice thirty thousand foes before
And the broad flood behind.'

A dart had put out one eye, he was wounded in the thigh, and his work
was done. He turned round, and--

'Saw on Palatinus,
The white porch of his home,
And he spake to the noble river
That rolls by the walls of Rome:
'O Tiber! father Tiber!
To whom the Romans pray,
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms
Take thou in charge this day.'

And with this brief prayer he leapt into the foaming stream. Polybius
was told that he was there drowned; but Livy gives the version which the
ballad follows:--

'But fiercely ran the current,
Swollen high by months of rain,
And fast his blood was flowing,
And he was sore in pain,
And heavy with his armor,
And spent with changing blows,
And oft they thought him sinking,
But still again he rose.

'Never, I ween, did swimmer,
In such an evil case,
Struggle through such a raging flood
Safe to the landing place.
But his limbs were borne up bravely
By the brave heart within,
And our good father Tiber
Bare bravely up his chin.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

'And now he feels the bottom,
Now on dry earth he stands,
Now round him throng the Fathers,
To press his gory hands.
And now with shouts and clapping,
And noise of weeping loud,
He enters through the River Gate,
Borne by the joyous crowd.

'They gave him of the corn land,
That was of public right,
As much as two strong oxen
Could plough from morn to night.
And they made a molten image,
And set it up on high,
And there it stands unto this day,
To witness if I lie.

'It stands in the Comitium,
Plain for all folk to see,
Horatius in his harness,
Halting upon his knee:
And underneath is written,
In letters all of gold,
How valiantly he kept the bridge
In the brave days of old.'

Never was more honorable surname than his, of Cocles, or the one-eyed;
and though his lameness prevented him from ever being a Consul, or
leading an army, he was so much beloved and honored by his fellow
citizens, that in the time of a famine each Roman, to the number of
300,000, brought him a day's food, lest he should suffer want. The
statue was shown even in the time of Pliny, 600 years afterwards, and
was probably only destroyed when Rome was sacked by the barbarians.

Nor was the Roman bridge the only one that has been defended by one man
against a host. In our own country, Stamford Bridge was, in like manner,
guarded by a single brave Northman, after the battle fought A.D. 1066,
when Earl Tostig, the son of Godwin, had persuaded the gallant sea king,
Harald Hardrada, to come and invade England. The chosen English king,
Harold, had marched at full speed from Sussex to Yorkshire, and met the
invaders marching at their ease, without expecting any enemy, and
wearing no defensive armor, as they went forth to receive the keys of
the city of York. The battle was fought by the Norsemen in the full
certainty that it must be lost. The banner, 'Landwaster', was planted in
the midst; and the king, chanting his last song, like the minstrel
warrior he had always been, stood, with his bravest men, in a death ring
around it. There he died, and his choicest warriors with him; but many
more fled back towards the ships, rushing over the few planks that were
the only way across the River Ouse. And here stood their defender, alone
upon the bridge, keeping back the whole pursuing English army, who could
only attack him one at a time; until, with shame be it spoken, he died
by a cowardly blow by an enemy, who had crept down the bank of the
river, and under the bridge, through the openings between the timbers of
which he thrust up his spear, and thus was able to hurl the brave
Northman into the river, mortally wounded, but not till great numbers of
his countrymen had reached their ships, their lives saved by his
gallantry.

In like manner, Robert Bruce, in the time of his wanderings, during the
year 1306, saved his whole band by his sole exertions. He had been
defeated by the forces of Edward I. at Methven, and had lost many of his
friends. His little army went wandering among the hills, sometimes
encamping in the woods, sometimes crossing the lakes in small boats.
Many ladies were among them, and their summer life had some wild charms
of romance; as the knightly huntsmen brought in the salmon, the roe, and
the deer that formed their food, and the ladies gathered the flowering
heather, over which soft skins were laid for their bedding. Sir James
Douglas was the most courtly and graceful knight of all the party, and
ever kept them enlivened by his gay temper and ready wit; and the king
himself cherished a few precious romances, which he used to read aloud
to his followers as they rested in their mountain home.

But their bitter foe, the Lord of Lorn, was always in pursuit of them,
and, near the head of the Tay, he came upon the small army of 300 men
with 1000 Highlanders, armed with Lochaber axes, at a place which is
still called Dalry, or the King's Field. Many of the horses were killed
by the axes; and James Douglas and Gilbert de la Haye were both wounded.
All would have been slain or fallen into the hand of the enemy, if
Robert Bruce had not sent them all on before him, up a narrow, steep
path, and placed himself, with his armor and heavy horse, full in the
path, protecting the retreat with his single arm. It was true, that so
tall and powerful a man, sheathed in armor and on horseback, had a great
advantage against the wild Highlanders, who only wore a shirt and a
plaid, with a round target upon the arm; but they were lithe, active,
light-footed men, able to climb like goats on the crags around him, and
holding their lives as cheaply as he did.

Lorn, watching him from a distance, was struck with amazement, and
exclaimed, 'Methinks, Marthokson, he resembles Gol Mak Morn protecting
his followers from Fingal;' thus comparing him to one the most brilliant
champions a Highland imagination could conceive. At last, three men,
named M'Androsser, rushed forward, resolved to free their chief from
this formidable enemy. There was a lake on one side, and a precipice on
the other, and the king had hardly space to manage his horse, when all
three sprang on him at once. One snatched his bridle, one caught him by
the stirrup and leg, and a third leaped from a rising ground and seated
himself behind him on his horse. The first lost his arm by one sweep of
the king's sword; the second was overthrown and trampled on; and the
last, by a desperate struggle, was dashed down, and his skull cleft by
the king's sword; but his dying grasp was so tight upon the plaid that
Bruce was forced to unclasp the brooch that secured it, and leave both
in the dead man's hold. It was long preserved by the Macdougals of Lorn,
as a trophy of the narrow escape of their enemy.

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