Ben Hur by Lew Wallace Read Free Book Online

laughed at the irate
doctors in Jerusalem. Time brought no assuagement of the hate.
Under Herod, conversion to the faith was open to all the world
except the Samaritans; they alone were absolutely and forever
shut out from communion with Jews.
    As the Samaritan goes in under the arch of the gate, out come three
men so unlike all whom we have yet seen that they fix our gaze,
whether we will or not. They are of unusual stature and immense
brawn; their eyes are blue, and so fair is their complexion that
the blood shines through the skin like blue pencilling; their hair is
light and short; their heads, small and round, rest squarely upon necks
columnar as the trunks of trees. Woollen tunics, open at the breast,
sleeveless and loosely girt, drape their bodies, leaving bare arms
and legs of such development that they at once suggest the arena;
and when thereto we add their careless, confident, insolent manner,
we cease to wonder that the people give them way, and stop after they
have passed to look at them again. They are gladiators—wrestlers,
runners, boxers, swordsmen; professionals unknown in Judea before
the coming of the Roman; fellows who, what time they are not
in training, may be seen strolling through the king's gardens
or sitting with the guards at the palace gates; or possibly they
are visitors from Caesarea, Sebaste, or Jericho; in which Herod,
more Greek than Jew, and with all a Roman's love of games and
bloody spectacles, has built vast theaters, and now keeps schools
of fighting-men, drawn, as is the custom, from the Gallic provinces
or the Slavic tribes on the Danube.
    "By Bacchus!" says one of them, drawing his clenched hand to
his shoulder, "their skulls are not thicker than eggshells."
    The brutal look which goes with the gesture disgusts us, and we
turn happily to something more pleasant.
    Opposite us is a fruit-stand. The proprietor has a bald head,
a long face, and a nose like the beak of a hawk. He sits
upon a carpet spread upon the dust; the wall is at his back;
overhead hangs a scant curtain, around him, within hand's reach
and arranged upon little stools, lie osier boxes full of almonds,
grapes, figs, and pomegranates. To him now comes one at whom we
cannot help looking, though for another reason than that which
fixed our eyes upon the gladiators; he is really beautiful—a
beautiful Greek. Around his temples, holding the waving hair,
is a crown of myrtle, to which still cling the pale flowers and
half ripe berries. His tunic, scarlet in color, is of the softest
woollen fabric; below the girdle of buff leather, which is clasped
in front by a fantastic device of shining gold, the skirt drops to
the knee in folds heavy with embroidery of the same royal metal;
a scarf, also woollen, and of mixed white and yellow, crosses
his throat and falls trailing at his back; his arms and legs,
where exposed, are white as ivory, and of the polish impossible
except by perfect treatment with bath, oil, brushes, and pincers.
    The dealer, keeping his seat, bends forward, and throws his hands
up until they meet in front of him, palm downwards and fingers
extended.
    "What hast thou, this morning, O son of Paphos?" says the young
Greek, looking at the boxes rather than at the Cypriote. "I am
hungry. What hast thou for breakfast?"
    "Fruits from the Pedius—genuine—such as the singers of Antioch
take of mornings to restore the waste of their voices," the dealer
answers, in a querulous nasal tone.
    "A fig, but not one of thy best, for the singers of Antioch!" says
the Greek. "Thou art a worshiper of Aphrodite, and so am I, as the
myrtle I wear proves; therefore I tell thee their voices have the
chill of a Caspian wind. Seest thou this girdle?—a gift of the
mighty Salome—"
    "The king's sister!" exclaims the Cypriote, with another salaam.
    "And of royal taste and divine judgment. And why not? She is more
Greek than the king. But—my breakfast! Here is thy money—red
coppers of Cyprus. Give me grapes, and—"
    "Wilt thou not