Part 4

The brothers of Eudocia obeyed the imperial summons with some anxiety; but as she could easily forgive their fortunate unkindness, she indulged the tenderness, or perhaps the vanity, of a sister, by promoting them to the rank of consuls and prefects. In the luxury of the palace, she still cultivated those ingenious arts which had contributed to her greatness, and wisely dedicated her talents to the honour of religion and of her husband. Eudocia composed a poetical paraphrase of the first eight books of the Old Testament, and of the prophecies of Daniel and Zechariah; a cento of the verses of Homer, applied to the life and miracles of Christ; the legend of St Cyprian, and a panegyric on the Persian victories of Theodosius; and her writings, which were applauded by a servile and superstitious age, have not been disdained by the candour of impartial criticism.

The fondness of the emperor was not abated by time and possession; and Eudocia, after the marriage of her daughter, was permitted to discharge her grateful vows by a solemn pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Her ostentatious progress through the East may seem inconsistent with the spirit of Christian humility. She pronounced, from a throne of gold and gems, an eloquent oration to the senate of Antioch, declared her royal intention of enlarging the walls of the city, bestowed a donation of two hundred pounds of gold to restore the public baths, and accepted the statues which were decreed by the gratitude of Antioch. In the Holy Land, her alms and pious foundations exceeded the munificence of the great Helena; and though the public treasure might be impoverished by this excessive liberality, she enjoyed the conscious satisfaction of returning to Constantinople with the chains of St Peter, the right arm of St Stephen, and an undoubted picture of the Virgin, painted by St Luke. But this pilgrimage was the fatal term of the glories of Eudocia. Satiated with the empty pomp, and unmindful, perhaps, of her obligations to Pulcheria, she ambitiously aspired to the government of the Eastern empire; the palace was distracted by female discord; but the victory was at last decided by the superior ascendant of the sister of Theodosius.

The execution of Paulinus, master of the offices, and the disgrace of Cyrus, praetorian prefect of the East, convinced the public that the favour of Eudocia was insufficient to protect her most faithful friends; and the uncommon beauty of Paulinus encouraged the secret rumour, that his guilt was that of a successful lover. As soon as Eudocia perceived that the affection of Theodosius was irretrievably lost, she requested the permission of retiring to the distant solitude of Jerusalem. She obtained her request; but the jealousy of Theodosius pursued her in her last retreat; and Saturninus, count of the domestics, was directed to punish with death two ecclesiastics, her most favoured servants. Eudocia instantly revenged them by the assassination of the count. The furious passions which she indulged on this suspicious occasion seemed to justify the severity of Theodosius; and the empress, ignominiously stripped of the honours of her rank, was disgraced, perhaps unjustly, in the eyes of the world. The remainder of the life of Eudocia, about sixteen years, was spent in exile and devotion. The approach of age, the death of Theodosius, the misfortunes of her only daughter, who was led a captive from Rome to Carthage, and the society of the holy monks of Palestine, insensibly confirmed the religious temper of her mind. After a full experience of the vicissitudes of human life, the daughter of the philosopher Leontius expired at Jerusalem in the sixty-seventh year of her age, protesting, with her dying breath, that she had never transgressed the bounds of innocence and friendship.

HYPATIA.

[415.]

BRUCKER.

To the list of Alexandrian philosophers must be added the celebrated Hypatia, whose extensive learning, elegant manners, and tragical end, have rendered her name immortal. Hypatia was the daughter of Theon, a celebrated mathematician of Alexandria. She possessed an acute and penetrating judgment, and great sublimity and fertility of genius; and her talents were cultivated with assiduity by her father and other preceptors. After she had made herself mistress of polite learning, and of the sciences of geometry and astronomy, as far as they were then understood, she entered upon the study of philosophy. She prosecuted this study with such uncommon success, that she was importuned to become a public preceptress in the school where Plotinus and his successors had taught; and her love of science enabled her so far to subdue the natural diffidence of her sex, that she yielded to the public voice, and exchanged her female decorations for the philosopher's cloak. In the schools, and other places of public resort, she discoursed upon philosophical topics, explaining, and endeavouring to reconcile, the systems of Plato, Aristotle, and other masters. A ready elocution and graceful address, united with rich erudition and sound judgment, procured her numerous followers and admirers. But that which reflects the highest honour upon her memory is, that although she excelled most of the philosophers of her age in mathematical and philosophical science, she discovered no pride of learning; and though she was in person exceedingly beautiful, she never yielded to the impulse of female vanity, or gave occasion to the slightest suspicion against her chastity.

The extraordinary combination of accomplishments and virtues which adorned the character of Hypatia, rendered her house the general resort of persons of learning and distinction. But it was impossible that so much merit should not excite envy. The qualifications and attainments to which she was indebted for her celebrity, proved in the issue the occasion of her destruction. It happened that at this time the patriarchal chair was occupied by Cyril, a bishop of great authority, but of great haughtiness and violence of temper. In the vehemence of his bigoted zeal, he had treated the Jews with severity, and at last banished them out of Alexandria. Orestes, the prefect of the city, a man of a liberal spirit, highly resented this expulsion, as an unpardonable stretch of ecclesiastical power, and a cruel act of oppression and injustice against a people who had inhabited Alexandria from the time of its founder. He reported the affair to the emperor. The bishop, on his part, complained to the prince of the seditious temper of the Jews, and attempted to justify his proceedings. The emperor declined to interpose his authority, and the affair rapidly advanced to the utmost extremity. A body of about five hundred monks, who espoused the cause of Cyril, came into the city with a determination to support him by force. Meeting the prefect as he was passing through the street in his carriage, they stopped him, and loaded him with reproaches, and one of them threw a stone at his head and wounded him. The populace, who were by this time assembled on the part of the prefect, routed the monks, and seized one of their leaders. Orestes ordered him to be put to death. Cyril buried his body in the church, and gave instructions that his name should be registered among the sacred martyrs. Hypatia, who had always been highly respected by the prefect, and who had at this time frequent conferences with him, was supposed by the partisans of the bishop to have been deeply engaged in the interest of Orestes. Their resentment at length arose to such a height, that they formed a design against her life. As she was one day returning home from the schools, the mob seized her, forced her from her chair, and carried her to the Caesarian church, where, stripping off her garments, they put her to death with extreme barbarity, and, having torn her body limb from limb, committed it to the flames. Cyril himself has, by some writers, been suspected of secretly prompting this horrid act of violence; and if the haughtiness and severity of his temper, his persecution of the Jews, his oppressive and iniquitous treatment of the Novatian sect of Christians and their bishop, the vehemence of his present indignation against Orestes and his party, and, above all, the protection which he is said to have afforded to the immediate perpetrator of the murder of Hypatia, be duly considered, it will perhaps appear that this suspicion is not wholly without foundation. Hypatia was murdered under the reign of the Emperor Theodosius II., in the year 415.

THE WIFE OF MAXIMUS.

[454.]

GIBBON.

In the time of the emperor Valentinian [454], Petronius Maximus, a wealthy senator of the Anician family, who had been twice consul, was possessed of a beautiful wife; her obstinate resistance served only to irritate the desires of Valentinian, and he resolved to accomplish them either by stratagem or force. Deep gaming was one of the vices of the court; the emperor, who by chance or contrivance had gained from Maximus a considerable sum, uncourteously exacted his ring as a security for the debt, and sent it by a trusty messenger to his wife, with an order, in her husband's name, that she should immediately attend the empress Eudoxia. The unsuspecting wife of Maximus was conveyed in her litter to the imperial palace; the emissaries of her impatient lover conducted her to a remote and private bed-chamber; and Valentinian violated without remorse the laws of hospitality.

Her tears when she returned home, her deep affliction, and her bitter reproaches against her husband, whom she considered as an accomplice of his own shame, excited Maximus to a just revenge; the desire of revenge was stimulated by ambition; and he might reasonably aspire, by the free suffrage of the Roman senate, to the throne of a detested and despicable rival. Valentinian, who supposed that every human breast was devoid, like his own, of friendship and gratitude, had imprudently admitted among his guards several domestics and followers of AEtius. Two of these, of barbarian race, were persuaded to execute a sacred and honourable duty by punishing with death the assassin of their patron; and their intrepid courage did not long expect a favourable moment. Whilst Valentinian amused himself in the Field of Mars, with the spectacle of some military sports, they suddenly rushed upon him with drawn weapons, despatched the guilty Heraclius, and stabbed the emperor to the heart, without the least opposition from his numerous train, who seemed to rejoice in the tyrant's death.

The injury which Maximus had received from the emperor Valentinian appears to excuse the most bloody revenge. Yet a philosopher might have reflected that, if the resistance of his wife had been sincere, her chastity was still inviolate, and that it could never be restored if she had consented to the will of the adulterer. A patriot would have hesitated before he plunged himself and his country into the inevitable calamities which must follow the extinction of the royal house of Theodosius. The imprudent Maximus disregarded these salutary considerations; he gratified his resentment and ambition; he saw the bleeding corpse of Valentinian at his feet, and heard himself saluted emperor by the unanimous voice of the senate and the people. But the day of his inauguration was the last day of his happiness. He was imprisoned in the palace; and after passing a sleepless night, he sighed that he had attained the summit of his wishes, and aspired only to descend from the dangerous elevation.

The reign of Maximus continued about three months. Meanwhile his wife, the cause of these tragic events, had been seasonably removed by death; and the widow of Valentinian was compelled to violate her decent mourning, perhaps her real grief, and to submit to the embraces of a presumptuous usurper, whom she suspected as the assassin of her deceased husband.

THE LADY ROWENA.

[450.]

VERSTEGAN.

With this troop of German people, there came over to England [400-500] the most fair Lady Rowena, whom some Saxon authors call Ronixa, who, as our chronicles say, was the daughter of Hengist; but I find in some of that country-writers, from whence she came, that she was his niece, which is the likelier of both, considering that Hengist is not likely at that time to have been old enough to have had such a daughter, and that he was as young, when he came into Britain, as before has been said, may appear by the many years which he lived after his coming hither.

As this lady was very beautiful, so was she of a very comely deportment; and Hengist, having invited King Vortiger to a supper at his new-builded castle in Kent, caused that after supper she came forth of her chamber in the king's presence with a cup of gold, filled with wine, in her hand, and, making in very seemly manner a low reverence unto the king, said, with a pleasing grace and countenance, in our ancient language, "_Wacs heal hlaford kining_," which is, being rightly expounded, according to our present speech, "Be of health, Lord King." For as _was_ is our verb of the preterimperfect tense or preterperfect tense, signifying _have been_, so _wacs_, being the same verb in the imperative mood, and now pronounced _wax_, is as much as to say _grow_, _be_ or _become_, and _wacs-heal_, by corruption of pronunciation, afterwards became to be _wassaile_. The king, not understanding what she said, demanded it of his chamberlain, who was her interpreter; and when he knew what it was, he asked him how he might again answer her in her own language. Whereof being informed, he said unto her, _Drink heal_, that is to say, _drink health_.

Of the beauty of this lady, the king took so great liking that he became exceedingly enamoured with her, and desired to have her in marriage; which Hengist agreed unto, upon condition that the king should give unto him the whole county of Kent; whereunto he willingly condescended, and, divorcing himself from his former married wife, he married with the Saxon Lady Rowena. She was the first Saxon queen of England.

OLGA.

[500.]

GIBBON.

A female, perhaps of the basest origin, who could avenge the death and assume the sceptre of her husband Igor, must have been endowed with those active virtues which command the fear and obedience of barbarians. In a moment of foreign and domestic peace, she sailed from Kiow to Constantinople; and the emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus has described with minute diligence the ceremonial of her reception in his capital and palace. The steps, the titles, the salutations, the banquet, the presents, were exquisitely adjusted, to gratify the vanity of the stranger, with due reverence to the superior majesty of the purple. In the sacrament of baptism she received the venerable name of the empress Helena, and her conversion might be preceded or followed by her uncle, two interpreters, sixteen damsels of a higher, and eighteen of a lower rank, twenty-two domestics or ministers, and forty-four Russian merchants, who composed the retinue of the great princess Olga.

After her return to Kiow and Novogorod, she firmly persisted in her new religion; but her labours in the propagation of the gospel were not crowned with success, and both her family and nation adhered with obstinacy or indifference to the gods of their fathers. Her son Swatoslaus was apprehensive of the scorn and ridicule of his companions; and her grandson Wolodomir devoted his youthful zeal to multiply and decorate the monuments of ancient worship. The savage deities of the north were still propitiated with human sacrifices: in the choice of the victim, a citizen was preferred to a stranger, a Christian to an idolater, and the father, who defended his son from the sacerdotal knife, was involved in the same doom by the rage of a fanatic tumult. Yet the lessons and example of the pious Olga had made a deep though secret impression on the minds of the prince and people; the Greek missionaries continued to preach, to dispute, and to baptise; and the ambassadors or merchants of Russia compared the idolatry of the woods with the elegant superstition of Constantinople. They had gazed with admiration on the domes of St Sophia, the lively pictures of saints and martyrs, the riches of the altar, the number and vestments of the priests, the pomp and order of the ceremonies; they were edified by the alternate succession of devout silence and harmonious song; nor was it difficult to dissuade them that a choir of angels descended each day from heaven to join in the devotion of the Christians.

But the conversion of Wolodomir was determined or hastened by his desire of a Roman bride. At the same time, and in the city of Cherson, the rites of baptism and marriage were celebrated by the Christian pontiff; the city he restored to the emperor Basil, the brother of his spouse; but the brazen gates were transported, as it is said, to Novogorod, and erected before the first church as a trophy of his victory and faith. At his despotic command, Peroun, the god of thunder, whom he had so long adored, was dragged through the streets of Kiow; and twelve sturdy barbarians battered with clubs the misshapen image, which was indignantly cast into the waters of the Borysthenes. The edict of Wolodomir had proclaimed that all who should refuse the rites of baptism should be treated as the enemies of God and their prince; and the rivers were instantly filled by many thousands of obedient Russians, who acquiesced in the truth and excellence of a doctrine which had been embraced by the great duke and his boyars. In the next generation, the relics of paganism were finally extirpated [and all this resulted from the baptism of Olga, which may be fixed as the era of Russian Christianity].

THE LADY ELFRIDA.

[950.]

HUME.

Was the daughter and heir of Olgar, Earl of Devonshire; and though she had been educated in the country, and had never appeared at court, she had filled all England with the reputation of her beauty. King Edgar himself, who was indifferent to no accounts of this nature, found his curiosity excited by the frequent panegyrics which he heard of Elfrida; and, reflecting on her noble birth, he resolved, if he found her charms answerable to their fame, to obtain possession of her on honourable terms. He communicated his intention to Earl Athelwold, his favourite; but used the precaution, before he made any advances to her parents, to order that nobleman, on some pretence, to pay them a visit, and to bring him a certain account of the beauty of their daughter.

Athelwold, when introduced to the lady, found general report to have fallen short of the truth; and being actuated by the most vehement love, he determined to sacrifice to this new passion his fidelity to his master, and to the trust reposed in him. He returned to Edgar, and told him that the riches alone and the high quality of Elfrida had been the ground of the admiration paid her, and that her charms far from being in any way extraordinary, would have been overlooked in a woman of inferior station. When he had by this deceit diverted the king from his purpose, he took an opportunity, after some interval, of turning again the conversation on Elfrida. He remarked that though the parentage and fortune of the lady had not produced on him, as on others, any illusion with regard to her beauty, he could not forbear reflecting that she would, on the whole, be an advantageous match for him (Athelwold), and might, by her birth and riches, make him sufficient compensation for the homeliness of her person. If the king, therefore, gave him his approbation, he was determined to make proposals in his own behalf to the Earl of Devonshire, and doubted not to obtain his, as well as the young lady's, consent to the marriage. Edgar, pleased with the expedient for establishing his favourite's fortune, not only exhorted him to execute his purpose, but forwarded his success by his recommendations to the parents of Elfrida; and Athelwold was soon made happy in the possession of his mistress. Dreading, however, the detection of the artifice, he employed every pretence for detaining Elfrida in the country, and for keeping her at a distance from Edgar.

The violent passion of Athelwold had rendered him blind to the necessary consequences which must attend his conduct, and the advantages which the numerous enemies that always pursue a royal favourite would, by its means, be able to make against him. Edgar was soon informed of the truth; but before he would execute vengeance on Athelwold's treachery, he resolved to satisfy himself with his own eyes of the certainty and full extent of his guilt. He told him that he intended to pay him a visit in his castle, and be introduced to the acquaintance of his new married wife; and Athelwold, as he could not refuse the honour, only craved leave to go before him a few hours, that he might the better prepare everything for his reception. He then discovered the whole matter to Elfrida, and begged her, if she had any regard either to her own honour or his life, to conceal from Edgar, by every circumstance of dress and behaviour, that fatal beauty that had seduced him from fidelity to his friend, and had betrayed him into so many falsehoods.

Elfrida promised compliance, though nothing was further from her intentions. She deemed herself little beholden to Athelwold for a passion which had deprived her of a crown; and, knowing the force of her own charms, she did not despair even yet of reaching that dignity of which her husband's artifice had bereaved her. She appeared before the king with all the advantages which the richest attire and the most engaging airs could bestow upon her, and she excited at once in his bosom the highest love towards herself, and the most furious desire of revenge against her husband. He, however, had to dissemble these passions; and, seducing Athelwold into a forest on pretence of hunting, he stabbed him with his own hand, and soon after publicly espoused Elfrida.

THE COUNTESS OF TRIPOLI.

[1150.]

SISMONDI.

The knights who had returned from the Holy Land spoke with enthusiasm of a countess of Tripoli, who had extended to them the most generous hospitality, and whose grace and beauty equalled her virtue. Geoffrey Rudel, a gentleman of Blieux, in Provence, and one of those who were presented to Frederick Barbarossa in 1154, hearing this account, fell deeply in love with her without having seen her, and prevailed upon one of his friends, Bertrand d'Allaman, a troubadour like himself, to accompany him to the Levant. In 1162 he quitted the court of England, whither he had been conducted by Geoffrey, the brother of Richard I., and embarked for the Holy Land. On his voyage he was attacked by a severe illness, and had lost the power of speech when he arrived at the port of Tripoli. The countess, being informed that a celebrated poet was dying of love for her on board a vessel which was entering the roads, visited him on shipboard, took him by the hand, and attempted to cheer his spirits. Rudel, we are assured, recovered his speech sufficiently to thank the countess for her humanity, and to declare his passion, when his expressions of gratitude were silenced by the convulsions of death. He was buried at Tripoli, beneath a tomb of porphyry, which the countess raised to his memory, with an Arabic inscription.

I have transcribed his verses, "On Distant Love," which he composed previous to his voyage. They began thus:--

"Angry and sad shall be my way, If I behold not her afar; And yet I know not when that day Shall rise, for still she dwells afar. God, who has formed this fair array Of worlds, and placed my love afar, Strengthen my heart with hope, I pray, Of seeing her I love afar."

JANE, COUNTESS OF MOUNTFORT.

[1350.]

HUME.