CHAPTER LII

_The Prophecy of Evil_

[Sidenote: The Roman Embassy Grows Indignant]

The Roman embassy had hitherto remained in stern composure. The visitations of nature they were accustomed to sustain; the perturbations of a Jewish mob were beneath the notice of the universal conquerors. But the sight of the havoc among their countrymen shook their stoicism, and the cavalry that formed the escort burst into indignant murmurs at the exultation of the multitude, until the commander of the troop, whose arms and bearing showed him to be of the highest rank, unable to restrain his feelings, spurred to the front of the embarrassed mission.

“How long, senators,” exclaimed he, “shall we stand here to be scoffed at by these wretches? The imperial guard feels itself disgraced by such a service. Will you have the squadron openly mutiny? If they should ride away and leave us to ourselves, who could blame them? What will the noble Titus say, when we return to tell him that we stood by and listened to the taunts of those cooped-up slaves, on him, the army, and Rome? But how long shall we be suffered even to listen? Linger here, and before the day is out your lives will be at the mercy of those assassins. And by the immortal gods, richly shall we all deserve our fate, for having come into this den but as masters riding over the necks of those lost and lowest of mankind.”

It was fortunate for the speaker that he spoke in a language but little known to our bold peasantry. The senators held their peace, and waited for the subsiding of the popular effervescence.

“Noble Æmilius!” exclaimed the fiery youth, to a grave and lofty-countenanced man at the head of the mission, “to remain here is only to risk your safety and the honor of the Emperor. Treaty with this people is out of the question. Give me the order to disperse this rabble, and a single charge will decide the affair.”

He threw himself forward on his horse’s neck, and fixed his look eagerly on the senator’s countenance. But the old Roman was immovable. The man of prophecy, who had stood with his robe wrapped round his arms in an attitude of contemptuous ease, awaiting the result of the demand, burst into loud laughter. The young soldier’s indignation was roused by this new object. He turned to the scorner, and crying out, “Ho! is it you, miscreant? You at least shall not escape me,” flung his lance full against his bosom. I saw the weapon strike with prodigious force, but it might as well have struck a rock. It flew into splinters.

The Roman rushed at him with his drawn falchion. His strange antagonist stood without moving a limb, and only raised his cold, large eye. The charger, in his fiercest bound, instantly swerved, and had nearly unseated his rider. Nothing could bring him forward again. Spur and voice were useless. The animal, a magnificent jet black, of the largest Arab breed, strong as a bull and bold as a lion, could not abide that stern eye. He galloped madly round and round, but the attempt to force him against the stranger stopped him as if he were stabbed. Then with every muscle in his frame palpitating, his broad chest heaving, his nostrils breathing out vapor, and the foam flying over his front like snow, he would plunge and rear until, mastering his powerful rider, he wheeled round and darted away.

[Sidenote: A Marvel of Marvels]

The shouts of scorn that rose from the populace at every fresh failure, doubly enraged the young Roman. He made a final effort, and grasping the bridle in both hands, and dashing in the spur, at length succeeded in forcing the wearied charger on. The noble creature, at one immense leap, reached the fatal spot. But there he was fixed as if some power had transformed him into stone. He no longer staggered nor swerved, but crouching down, with his feet thrust forward, his crest stooped, his nostrils on the ground, and his bright eye strained and filmy, as if he were growing blind, stood gazing with a look of almost human horror. The furious rider struck him on the head with the flat of his falchion. The charger gathered up his limbs at the blow, reared straight as a column, and bellowing, plunged upon his head. There was a general cry of terror, even among the multitude, and they rushed forward to help him to rise. But he rose no more. He rolled over and over his rider, and, stretching out his limbs in a convulsion, died.

The tumult was on the point of being renewed, for the soldiery pushed forward to bear away their officer, who lay like a corpse; but the crowd had already covered the ground, and blows were given on both sides. Indignant at the interruption of the armistice, and the injury that threatened the sacred person of ambassadors, I forced my way through the crowd; by exerting a strength with which few could cope, rescued the young Roman, and delivering him to the mission, protested against their construing the casual violence of rioters into the determination of the people.

[Sidenote: Salathiel Calms Resentment]

I had partially succeeded in calming their resentment, and in restraining the bloodthirsty weapons that were already glittering in numberless hands, when a sound like that of a trumpet, distant but blown with tremendous force, struck every ear at once.

I looked involuntarily to the man who had already been our disturber. He pointed to the heavens. A fragment of cloud, that seemed to have escaped from the mass of the tempest, was floating along the zenith. He took up his parable:

“Have I not covered the heavens with a cloud? saith the Mighty One. Have I not said to the sun, Be dark; and to the moon and stars, Be ashamed? Have I not hidden Mine enemies in the shroud, and said to the whirlwind, Go forth and slay?”

His gesture turned all eyes to the wrecks of the Roman camp, where the whirlwind continued to ravage and the thunders still roared. Then throwing himself forward with a look full of wild grandeur, and in a voice hollow and appalling as the storm, he exclaimed:

“Behold! this day shall a wonder be wrought among you—this day shall a mighty thing be brought to pass. Kings shall see it and tremble; yea, the heathen shall melt before thee. Their strength shall be as water and their hearts as the burning flax. Sorrow shall be on them, as the locust on the green field, and they shall flee as from a lion. Behold! in a cloud shall a sword be brandished before thee; in smoke and in fire shalt thou conquer. For His angel shall come, and the sword and the flame shall at this hour be a sign unto Israel!”

Whether by the proverbial sagacity of the wanderers of the desert, by one of those coincidences which so curiously come to sustain the credit of daring conjecture, or by knowledge from some darker sources, the little orbed vapor began to lengthen and rapidly assumed the shape of a sword.

Dreading the popular power of imposture, and the uses to which it would inevitably be applied, I was glad that this extraordinary being had thus put himself upon his trial; and I stood gazing in eager expectation that some passing gust would dissipate at once the cloud and the reputation of the prophet. Yet utterly scorning the common pretensions of the rambling practisers of forbidden arts, I knew that awful things had been done; that most of all, in these latter days of our country, strange influences were let loose, perhaps to plunge into deeper ruin a people guiltily prone to take refuge in delusions. I had heard prophecies, hideous and unholy, which were never taught by man; I had seen a command of the elements that utterly defied philosophy to account for it; if in the last vengeance of Heaven, evil spirits were ever suffered to go forth and give their power to evil men, for the purpose of binding in the faster chains of falsehood a race who loved a lie, it was in those hours of signs and wonders which might, if possible, deceive the very elect.

[Sidenote: The Flaming Sword]

To my astonishment, the cloud suddenly changed its color; from white it became intensely red; and in a few moments more it burst into a flame that threw a broad reflection upon the whole atmosphere. It was a vast falchion of fire. And from that hour to the last of the glorious and unhappy city of David, that flaming sword—the sign of a wrath predicted a thousand years before—blazed day and night over Jerusalem!

Its instant effect was terrible. The multitude, already indignant against the Romans, and restrained only by my desperate efforts, were now roused to the highest pitch of presumption. To doubt of the help of Heaven was impiety, after this open wonder; to spare an hour between this divine command and the extermination of the idolater was sacrilege. They poured round the unfortunate troop and instantly overwhelmed them, as an earthquake would have overwhelmed them. A mass of human life, dense as the ground it trod upon, broke over them. The Romans struggled heroically; I saw their charges often make fearful way, and their swords and lances dripping with blood every time they were whirled round their heads. But the conflict was too unequal; one by one those brave men were torn down; I saw them swept along by the torrent, fewer and fewer, still above the living wave; gradually separated more widely from each other; each man faintly struggling for himself, flinging his feeble arms to the right and left, till, dizzy with fatigue and despair, at last he went down, and the roaring tide closed over him.

[Sidenote: Superstition and Inexpiable Murder]

All perished, and a day of hope was closed in superstition, treachery, and inexpiable murder.

The dreadful uproar sank as suddenly as it had risen. The Roman troop lay a heap of dead. I turned away from the sight, but at the instant of turning I saw the prophet of evil, whether impostor or magician, whether man or demon, spring into their midst with a roar of laughter. I shrank away. But I heard that terrible laugh ringing through all the streets of Jerusalem!