This command roused applause and general delight. The malcontents restrained themselves, to show that they were worthy of the Emperor’s confidence. A duel with nets and tridents between two fat and breathless senators was so comical that the crowd let out a giant roar of laughter, and both gentlemen in fact became so angry with each other that they would certainly have been hurt had the tridents been sharpened or if the nets had had the usual lead weights on them.
Three men displaying giant snakes caused considerable horror when they allowed the snakes to crawl all over them, but Nero was not pleased when no one realized they were supposed to represent Laocoon and his sons. The lion, tiger and bison hunts ran their course without mishap, much to the disappointment of the crowd, for which the young knights representing the huntsmen had me to thank as I had had protective towers built for them here and there in the arena. I myself disliked this display because I had already become so fond of my animals that I did not like to see them killed.
There was gigantic applause for a young lion-tamer, a supple young woman who came rushing out of a dark entrance, straight across the arena, with three apparently raging lions at her heels. A great hum went through the crowd, but the woman halted the lions with her whip in the middle of the sand and made them sit down obediently like dogs, and jump through hoops at her commands.
The noise and applause must have upset the lions, for when the woman did her boldest act, forcing the great male lion to open his mouth and placing her own head inside it, the lion quite unexpectedly closed his jaws again and bit into her head. This surprise caused such jubilation and such a storm of applause that I had time to rescue the lions.
A chain of slaves equipped with burning torches and red-hot bars hastily surrounded them and drove them back into their cages. Otherwise the mounted archers would have been forced to kill them. To tell the truth, I was so anxious about my valuable lions that I jumped unarmed into the arena to issue orders to the slaves.
I was, however, so incensed that I gave the male lion a kick under the jaw with my iron-shod boot to make him loosen his grip on his mistress’ head. The lion growled angrily but was probably so upset by the accident that he did not attack me.
After a troupe of painted Negroes had baited a rhino, a wooden cow was carried into the arena and the clown Paris performed the story of Daedalus and Pasiphae, while a giant bull so eagerly mounted the hollow wooden cow that most of the crowd believed that Pasiphae really had hidden herself inside it.
251
Simon the magician with his huge golden wings was a spectacle which surprised everyone. With gesticulations Paris tried to induce him to do some dance steps, but Simon rejected the attempt with the swirl of his magnificent wings. Two sailors hoisted him up to a platform at the top of the immensely high mast. In the upper galleries, several Jews began to shout curses, but the crowd silenced them and Simon turned in all direc- tions to greet the people as he stood up on the mast on this, the most solemn moment of his life. I think that right up to lie very last moment, he was convinced he would conquer and crush his rivals.
So he swung his wings once more and leaped out into the air in the direction of the Imperial box, only to fall immediately, so close to Nero that several drops of blood splashed on the Emperor. He died instantly, of course, and afterwards it was discussed whether he really had flown or not. Some people maintained they had seen his left wing damaged as he was being hoisted up in the basket. Others thought the Jews’ terrible curses had made him fall. Perhaps he would have succeeded if he had been allowed to retain his beard.
Anyhow, the performances had to continue. The sailors now fastened a thick rope between the first gallery and the foot of the mast. To the great surprise of the crowd, an elephant then carefully walked along the rope from the gallery to the arena, a knight known all over Rome for his foolhardiness seated on its neck. He had not taught the elephant tightrope-walking, of course, for it was used to doing this without a rider. But he received the final applause for a display of skills and daring never before seen in any amphitheater.
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.
252
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270