STILICHO.
(DIED A.D. 408.)
ARGUMENT.
Stilicho, though a Vandal, had fought from his youth under
the Emperor Theodosius the Great, and conceived for Rome a
veneration heightened by compassion for her fallen estate.
That Emperor's sons having been left in his guardianship, he
devoted all his energies and genius to their defence and that of
the Empire, and had conceived a scheme for its complete regeneration.
When on the point of executing that scheme, he was
put to death through the jealousy of the Roman nobles, and the
treachery of the Emperor Honorius.
A Gothic Chief appears suddenly at a banquet of the Roman
nobles. He upbraids them with their falsehood, enumerates
the successive occasions on which Stilicho had saved the
Empire from destruction, and announces that Alaric is within
two days' march of Rome which he has vowed to destroy, and
that he himself is issuing forth to Alaric's camp. He departs,
no man daring to bar his way.
Nobles of Rome—I scorn to call you Romans—
Ye bade me to your banquet; I have come,
Not therefore trencher-guest. I come to strike
A dagger-worded edge of just revenge
Far on through treason's heart. My sword—you see it—
Too long, like Stilicho's, it served your State—
Is snapt in twain. I brake it as I passed
Upon the stone neck of that idol Jove
Which, ten years prostrate, shames your Capitol.
That Capitol whose gates Stilicho shattered,
Burning your Sybil's books. I come to tell you
That which was writ within that Sybil's books
In its last page, unless that Sybil lied.
There sit two hundred of you: ye can slay me
If my discourse—I think it will—molests you.
What then? I shall have told the truth and died.
Lords, would ye learn who taught me those two lessons?
The man a week since murdered, Stilicho.
Lords, let me tell you somewhat of that man
By you perchance—a week is long—forgotten:
I knew him well and owed him my advancement.
Stilicho was my friend: behoves it, sirs,
Ye learn his history from first to last;
So shall the dead man be his own avenger.
That man was Vandal. In late years your Rome
Has condescended oft to aid Barbaric:
Great Theodosius never marched without him;
His counsel on the battle-field was law,
His presence inspiration. Victory
Dawned on the face of every Roman soldier
When came the tidings, ‘Stilicho is near:’
I heard the Emperor say, ‘This Vandal Chief
Is Roman of the Romans.’ As he passed
A shout rang out, ‘Fabricius,’ or ‘Camillus:’
Never they named him with your later names!
In every province he had held command
Yet no man taxed him with an ‘itching palm.’
The Emperor linked him with the Imperial House
By marriage; dying, placed him o'er his sons,
Regent of East and West.
Attend and learn:
I but record plain facts: these stab the deepest:
That Emperor's son, Arcadius, was a lack-wit:
Rufinus ruled his realm, the East: this aim
Was his, to bring to naught the Western Empire
Where reigned Honorius, not through hate of him
But hate of Stilicho, the youth's protector.
Rufinus was a Gaul, astute and pliant:
Rufinus was a traitor. From afar
He beckoned to the Hunnish tribes that roamed
The Caspian coasts: with Alaric next he trafficked:
He placed, in secret, Greece within his grasp:
By open pact he throned him in Illyria
And pointed thence to Rome. What help was hers?
Nobles of Rome, reply!
A Man—one Man!
Stilicho crossed the Alps alone: alone
His hand he lifted upon Rhenus' banks,
A hand that raised a standard. Round it flocked
The wrecks of ancient Roman legionaries
The Gauls, the German tribes late linked with Rome
By treaties, first-fruits of his rule sagacious.
With these, as with an army from the clouds,
He dropp'd on Greece astonished. Alaric fled
To far Thessalian hills. He girt him round:
In one day more, but one, Alaric had perished:
That noon, the assault commanded, rode in sight
A horseman by the Eastern Emperor sped,
The bearer of a missive: ‘Leave this land:
War not on Alaric: Alaric and I are friends.
Send back mine Eastern Legions.’
He obeyed:
Nobles, ye know his act, but not its sanction:
He called to him a Goth, by name Gainus;
He gave command; all heard it: none forgot:
Stilicho was a man who scorned concealment.
‘Lead thou those legions to the Bosphorus;
There slay Rufinus! Slay him with thy hand
In the Emperor's sight: in sight of all his people:
Rufinus is a traitor prov'n.’ Ere long
That Traitor's plot was ripe. That self-same day
Which saw the legions of the East return
Was chosen to crown Rufinus Emperor.
Arcadius and the Upstart sat enthroned
With all the nobles of the court around:
The legions made advance; Rufinus rose;
With that well-known, but seldom trusted smile
Their standards he saluted: he began—
Gainus smote him through the heart, with shout,
‘From Stilicho! He sent it you for Treasons
Prov'n and avowed.’ An Eastern warrior cried,
‘Say not from Stilicho, but Theodosius!
The brave old Emperor smote him from the grave!’
Stilicho saved that day your Eastern Empire.
Feasters, attend: this matter touches you!
Six years went by: the Goths o'erflowed your land:
What course was theirs who boast their Rome? They fled!
Their roads were choked: their harbours crammed: their galleys
Took wing to Corsica and Sicily.
Where then was Stilicho? His voice went forth
From Rhetia's vales: his Name subdued the indwellers.
A Race barbaric saved you: some had served
Beneath his standard: some had felt his steel:
As though by magic moved they turned and joined him.
Your legions breathed again. A man—one man—
He stamped upon the earth, and raised two armies!
A sudden Apparition he appeared;
By miracle of strategy he conquered;
He freed Honorius then at Asta sieged:
He smote the invaders on Pollentia's field;
Later he broke them 'neath Verona's wall—
Stilicho saved that day your Western Empire!
That night was triumph loud, and mirth, and feast.
Yet Stilicho that day had learned a lesson.
At night that great one whispered in mine ear
‘Rome might have borne great losses, loss of realms—
This blow is Death. Rome fell without a fight!
The hand that saved her was the Hand Barbaric:
Dishonour means Destruction.’ Years went by;
Again he spake, ‘The East is false and hates us.
The Roman knows to boast, but not to fight,
The Race Barbaric fights no more for hire,
It fights, although he knows it not, for Empire.
That Western Empire willed not to be saved.’
The terror past, ‘What man is Stilicho?’
Your Pagans asked. ‘To him no God gave help
Who sees may learn thus much. His Wife, Serena,
Wears still that circlet snatched from Juno's brow!’
Your Christians next; ‘What! Stilicho a Christian!
Claudian, his poet, is a pagan vowed:
So are his sons' preceptors. If a Christian
Why breaks he not the statues of false Gods?
The victory was miraculous: 'twas not his!’
Thus raved the inept.
The man they scoffed replied not:
Lonely he mused on Rome's far destiny
By him since youth foreseen:
Foreseen it long he had, but not designed it;
Events to him unwelcome brought the crisis:
He met it prompt, not glad. ‘By Rome,’ he said,
‘Confugiendum ad Imperium est:
Till now she ne'er was more than half an Empire.’
But there was greatness in his scheme: and Rome
Could rise no more to greatness.
Again and yet again that shame recurred.
One hope remained. An honourable foe
Is better than false friend. Alaric had served
Like Stilicho in Theodosius' armies:
They knew each other's worth: to each the course
Steered by the other was intelligible.
The King of Goths, the Regent of the Empire,
Had proved—each knew it—faithful to his trust:
Rivals they were in youth: war followed war:
Stilicho twice drave back the Goths: that done
He spared the German blood: the noble foes
Changed to true friends. Some Eastern plot detected
Stilicho cried; ‘Would God, Alaric and I
Might march like brothers to the Bosphorus
And drown therein the traitors!’ One who heard
Whispered that word to Alaric.
Who is Alaric?
One swift in love—in hate! Freely he proffered
To join his warriors with the Roman force,
And to the Roman realm revindicate
Gaul and Iberia lost. That task achieved
His people were to hold, secure from wrong,
Some space unpeopled in the Western Empire
Thenceforth its friends. No secret pact was this.
When Stilicho discoursed with me thereon
Honorius titular Emperor of the West,
Praised it, loud-voiced. The youth had late espoused
The Regent's daughter, that domestic tie
Designed by Theodosius. Secret league!
Stilicho loved no secrets. He himself
Deliberately divulged it to the Senate:
Some loud ones in that Senate stormed and raved.
Placid as power no petulance can shake
Stilicho rose: at once the tumult ceased:
He might have said; ‘For centuries, Senators,
Phantoms were ye gibbering in cave and crypt,’
(Methinks I see among you such this hour)
‘'Twas I restored to Rome her buried Senate.
This day I give her more; I give her men.’
Not thus he spake: he forced the facts upon them,
The West o'errun; Rome powerless to redeem it;
The Race Barbaric taught at last their worth;
Ye, Romans, signed that league.
Rome's Witlings swore
‘That treaty soon must fling the Empire's gates
Open alike to Roman and to Goth.’
That was its chief of merits! Stilicho
Had faith in Rome her children feel no longer,
Faith in her destiny, faith avouched, proclaimed,
Her destiny to raise not some few nations
But earth itself to her imperial height;
Barbaric nerve with Rome's Traditions blent
Alone could work that work; alone sustain it.
This was the dream, not work, of Constantine:
Augustus, Trajan's self, not even in dream
Had grasped the thought. Rome ruled the East and West:
She might have won the North not less and held it:
Stilicho added thus: ‘Romans, that work
Is not the sword's alone. In Gaul, Iberia,
'Twas work ill done. Conquering, Rome civilized them,
But conquered first; and bondage means corruption;
The Germans she must civilize first; then rule;
Help them to fell their forests, fence their fields,
To bridge their floods, in every noble art
Ungrudgingly initiate them, invite
Their Chiefs to Rome; as princes there receive them;
By intermarriage fuse their race with hers;
Teach them her laws to venerate, share her greatness
And draw them thus, unvanquished, incorrupt,
To seek admission to that world-wide Empire
Raised for Man's weal. There lived a man Elect—
He loved the Race Barbaric—he was of it:
He loved your Rome—since youth he fought its battles;
The aim persistent of that man was this
Twofold to magnify your Roman Empire,
And make its rule perpetual. Fools! fools! fools!
The man ye hated was your last of friends:
The warrior whom ye dreaded was, in head
A politic Sage, in heart a man of peace.
Ye know the rest. The vilest of your vile ones,
Olympius, won your Emperor, made him dream
The Father of his Wife, his second father,
The saviour of his Empire—of his life—
Some vulgar huckster was, or politic knave
Trafficking in Empires as a merchant's wares,
The Goths, for Gaul designed were at Bologna,
Among them Stilicho. The Roman host,
Their brave compeers on many a well-fought field,
Camped at Pavia. There the Emperor joined them:
Three days irresolute he sat; the fourth,
Addressed them thus: ‘Legions of Rome, ye march
To Gaul, the host barbaric at your side;
No wish was this of mine.’ Drugged by Olympius,
Those legions rose in mutiny: they slew
The friends of Stilicho round Honorius ranged,
The chief ones of the army and the State;
The streets ran red with blood: the fires rushed up:
Honorius hid disguised in slave's attire:
Olympius sought him out: he bore a parchment:
‘The head of Stilicho:’—Honorius snatched it:
In mingled rage and fear your Murderer signed.
Bologna heard: then rose the cry of ‘Vengeance:’
Stilicho spake: ‘The Emperor is deceived:
I served his Father: never hand of mine
Shall war against his standard; never dash
Goth against Roman.’
Late that night the Goths
Assailed him in his tent: they slew his guards:
He rose not from his desk; those Goths departed.
Next morning Stilicho rode forth alone,
Rode to Ravenna 'twixt the pines and sea.
He slept that night in the Basilica,
Sanctuary inviolate. At earliest dawn
A royal herald at its portals stood
With soldiers girt. He held a Rescript high
Signed by your Emperor. Stilicho went forth:
In vain the old Bishop cried, ‘Keep sanctuary!’
The gates fell back: the heralds read that scroll,
‘To Stilicho, a rebel 'gainst the State,
Immediate death.’ Some few, that hour arrived,
Advanced to shield him. Haughtily he stood:
He waved us back: he willed to live no longer:
He faced the soldiers. In a moment more
He sank upon that fane's ensanguined step:
His strong white head propped on this breast he died.
His boy escaped to Rome; your Emperor slew him:
His daughter, to that Emperor wedded late,
That Emperor drave forth. His wife, Serena,
The stateliest offshoot of the imperial stem,
Saved by the savagery of Roman mercy,
Exiled in solitude laments her lord;
These things to you are nothing. Be it so.
He died: Rome lives: how long ye Roman nobles?
This matter touches you. Alaric draws nigh:
Alaric and Stilicho were veracious men:
Stilicho kept his word: Alaric will keep it.
Alaric stood pledged to march with Rome to Gaul
But found no Romans at the trysting-place.
Alaric has changed his name: the title sole
He claims to-day is this, ‘The Scourge of God.’
No death-cry from the lips of Stilicho
Made way to Alaric's ear. Not less thereon
A cry there rings, a cry of babes barbaric
And bleeding mothers on whose breasts they died:
These were your hostages: your legions slew them
Mad with their triumph o'er that great one dead.
That day full thirty thousand of the race
Barbaric, to the Roman service vowed
Their standards broke and marched to Alaric's camp:
I march to meet him by to-morrow's dawn:
I think that none of you will bar my way.
Sleep well to-night: In three days Alaric greets you:
Near him who harbours sleeps not well, men say.
