I think the crowd was on the whole satisfied with what had been shown. Simon the magician’s death-leap and the lion-tamer’s sudden death were both considered the best events, the only complaint being that they had been carried out much too quickly. The senators and knights who had been forced to appear as hunters were pleased to have escaped without mishap. Only the most old-fashioned spectators complained that no human blood had flowed in honor of the Roman gods, and they recalled the cruel days of Claudius with a tinge of melancholy.
The majority bravely hid their disappointment, for Nero had generously had expensive gifts distributed during the intervals. The withdrawal of the Praetorians had also appealed to the people’s natural sense of freedom and less than a hundred spectators had been seriously injured in the fights over the ivory lots.
Octavia, the Emperor’s wife, had borne in silence the insult of Nero permitting Acte to watch the show from the Imperial box, even if only through a peephole in a special wall. Agrippina had not been allocated a place, and Nero had let it be known that his mother was not well. Someone in the crowd was said to have shouted out that perhaps she had been eating mushrooms. I myself did not hear this, but Nero was said to have been pleased that the people fearlessly used this opportunity to air their freedom of speech in his presence.
My menagerie had suffered saddening losses, but some basic stock remained of course, which I intended to use as the foundation by which the menagerie could be replenished with wild animals from all corners of the earth. In this way displays in the future would not be dependent on chance, but could be put on whenever Nero felt it necessary to entertain the people. Knowing Nero’s whims, I thought there was good reason to be prepared beforehand for political events which demantled entertainment organized to lull the people into forgetting unpleasant things.
The day before, the dead rhinos’ matrices had stiffened into a clear, trembling mass in their African cooking- trenches, where they had been simmering all night. I prepared to take this rare delicacy, which as far as I know had never been seen before in Rome, to the Emperor’s table. Sadly I looked at the empty cages, at the slaves back at their everyday work and at the modest house in which Sabina and I had lived a strenuous but, as I now thought, happy phase of our life.
“Sabina,” I cried gratefully, “without your experience of animals and your indefatigable energy, I should never have accomplished this task with honor. We’re sure to miss these days sometimes, in spite of the setbacks and surprises, when we return to ordinary life.”
“Return?” my wife said briskly, her face stiffening. “What do you mean by that, Minutus?”
“I’ve accomplished my mission to your father’s and the Emperor’s satisfaction, I hope,” I replied. “Now I’m taking a new dish to Nero and our Procurator is settling the finances with the Imperial treasury. Nero has no head for figures and to be honest, neither can I understand such involved bookkeeping, except in round figures. But I think everything is in order and I don’t mind about the money I have lost. Perhaps Nero will reward me in some way, but the best reward to me has been the applause of the people. More than that I do not demand, and anyhow, I could not endure this uninterrupted excitement much longer.”
“Which of us has had most to endure?” said Sabina. “I can hardly believe my ears. You’ve only taken the first step. Do you mean to say you are prepared to abandon the lion which now has no trainer, or those almost human giant apes, one of which is coughing horribly and needs care, not to mention the other animals? No, Minutus, you must be tired or in a bad mood. Father has promised that you can keep your present position under my supervision. It saves him a great deal of trouble since he doesn’t have to squabble over the miserly grants from the State.”
Now it was my turn to refuse to believe my ears.
“Flavia Sabina,” I said, “I’m not going to spend the rest of my life as a keeper, however valuable and beautiful the animals are. On my father’s side I am descended from the Etruscan kings of Caere, just as much as Otho or anyone else is.”
“Your origins are doubtful, to say the least,” snapped Sabina angrily. “And we’ll not even mention your Greek mother. The wax masks in your father’s house were inherited by Tullia. In the Flavius family there have at least been consuls. We are living in different times. Don’t you see that the superintendent of the menagerie is a political position anyone might envy, even if it is not generally recognized yet?”
“I’ve no desire to compete with horsemen and cittern players,” I protested stiffly. “I can name two elderly senators who already put their togas to their noses when they meet me, as if to protect themselves from the stench of the menagerie. Five hundred years ago the most noble of patricians would boast of smelling of manure, but we no longer live in those times. And I must say, I’m tired of lion cubs in our bed. You’ve more affection for them than you have for me, your husband.”
Sabina’s face turned yellow with fury.
“I haven’t wanted to hurt you by mentioning your capabilities as a husband,” she said, controlling herself with difficulty. “A more intelligent and tactful man would have drawn his own conclusions long ago. We are not carved from the same wood, Minutus. But a marriage is a marriage and bed is not the most important part of it. In your place, I’d be pleased to see my wife finding other interests with which to fill her empty life. But I’ve decided on your behalf that we shall stay at the menagerie. Father thinks the same.”
“My father may also have his views on the matter,” I threatened rather feebly. “His money won’t go on paying for the menagerie forever.”
But that was irrelevant. What hurt most was Sabina’s unexpected reproaches for my failure as a husband.
I had to see to getting the rhino-matrice jelly to Palatine while it was still hot, so our quarrel was interrupted. It was not our first quarrel by any means, but it was certainly the worst one we had had so far, and much the most hurtful.
Nero asked me to join him for the meal, which was quite natural, and to show his favor he ordered half a million sesterces given to me for the work done; which indicated that he had not the slightest idea of the cost of running the menagerie. In fact, I was never paid that sum, but I did not feel it necessary to ask for it as my father was not short of ready cash.
I remarked a little sourly that it would be of greater importance to me if the post of superintendent of the menagerie became a State appointment, so that when I left it could be put in my roll of merit. My suggestion gave rise to a jocular discussion which my father-in-law swiftly put an end to by saying that such an important office could not be left for a capricious Senate to hand over to an unsuitable applicant. According to him this was legally an Imperial appointment, like that of kitchen superintendent or superintendent of the clothing store or stable- master, and could be lost only by falling from the Emperor’s grace.
“From our ruler’s pleased countenance, I presume you still have his confidence,” my father-in-law said finally. “You are the superintendent as far as it concerns me as City Prefect, so don’t spoil an important discussion with any more remarks of that kind.”
Nero began eagerly expounding his plans for games which would take place every five years, on the Greek pattern, to raise the level of the people’s education and taste.
“We can proclaim that the aim is to ensure the State’s continued existence,” he said thoughtfully. “I myself will see to it that they will be looked on as the greatest games of all times. At first they can be quite simply called Nero’s feast games, so that the people get used to them. We’ll divide them up into musical games, athletic games and the customary races. I am thinking of inviting the Vestal Virgins as spectators to the athletics since I have heard that the Ceres priestesses have the same right at the Olympic Games. The most important features of all noble sports will be located in Rome. This is politically suitable, for it is, after all, we who administer our inheritance from Hellas. Let us show ourselves worthy of it.”
I could not enthuse over his great plans, for reason told me that this Knd of Greek games would only lower the reputation of animal shows and make my own office less worthy. Naturally the crowd would always prefer the pleasures of the amphitheater to songs, music and athletics. I knew the people of Rome well enough for that. But Nero’s high-flown interest in art seemed to be transforming the amphitheater into a rather doubtful kind of pleasure.
As I returned to our house at the menagerie, I was not in the best of moods and then, to my despair, Aunt Laelia and Sabina were quarreling fiercely when I arrived. Aunt Laelia had come to fetch the body of Simon the magician, which she wished to bury without cremation in the Jewish way, since Simon had no other friends to perform this last service for him. The Jews and their kind had underground caves outside the city where they kept the bodies of their dead. Aunt Laelia had wasted a great deal of time before she found out about these half-secret burial grounds.
