He is about it. The doors are open.
MACBETH.

The morning had scarcely dawned, after that dismal and tempestuous night, when three men were observed by some of the earlier citizens, passing up the Sacred Way, toward the Cerolian Place.

It was not so much that the earliness of the hour attracted the notice of these spectators for the Romans were a matutinal people, even in their most effeminate and luxurious ages, and the sun found few loiterers in their chambers, when he came forth from his oriental gates as that the manner and expression of these men themselves were singular, and such as might well excite suspicion.

They all walked abreast, two clad in the full garb of Senators, and one in the distinctive dress of Roman knighthood. No one had heard them speak aloud, nor seen them whisper, one to the other. They moved straight onward, steadily indeed and rather slowly, but with something of consciousness in their manner, glancing furtively around them from beneath their bent brows, and sometimes even casting their eyes over their shoulders, as if to see whether they were followed.

At about a hundred paces after these three, not however accompanying them, or attached to their party, so far at least as appearances are considered, two large-framed fellows, clothed in the dark gray frocks worn by slaves and gladiators, came strolling in the same direction.

These men had the auburn hair, blue eyes, and massive, if not stolid cast of features peculiar to northern races, at that time the conquered slaves, though destined soon to be the victors, of Rome's gigantic power.

When the first three reached the corner of the next block of buildings, to the corner of that magnificent street called the Carinœ, they paused for a few moments; and, after looking carefully about them, to mark whether they were observed or not, held a short whispered conversation, which their stern faces, and impassioned gestures seemed to denote momentous.

While they were thus engaged, the other two came sauntering along, and passed them by, apparently unheeded, and without speaking, or saluting them.

Those three men were the knight Caius Cornelius, a friend and distant kinsman of Cethegus, who was the second of the number, and Lucius Vargunteius, a Senator, whose name has descended only to posterity, through the black infamy of the deed, which he was even at that moment meditating.

Spurred into action by the menaces and violence of Catiline, who had now resolved to go forth and commence open warfare from the entrenched camp prepared in the Appenines, by Caius Manlius, these men had volunteered, on the previous night, at a second meeting held in the house of Laeca, to murder Cicero, with their own hands, during his morning levee.

To this end, they had now come forth thus early, hoping so to anticipate the visit of his numerous clients, and take him at advantage, unprepared and defenceless.

Three stout men were they, as ever went forth armed and determined for premeditated crime; stout in frame, stout of heart, invulnerable by any physical apprehension, unassailable by any touch of conscience, pitiless, fearless, utterly depraved.

Yet there was something in their present enterprise, that half daunted them. Something in the character of the man, whom they were preparing to assassinate something of undefined feeling, suggesting to them the certainty of the whole world's reproach and scorn through everlasting ages, however present success “might trammel up the consequence.”

Though they would not have confessed it to their own hearts, they were reluctant toward their task; and this unadmitted reluctance it was, which led them to pause and parley, under the show of arranging their schemes, which had in truth been fully organized on the preceding night.

They were too far committed, however, to recede; and it is probable that no one of them, although their hearts were full almost to suffocation, as they neared the good Consul's door, had gone so far as to think of withdrawing his hand from the deed of blood.

The outer door of the vestibule was open; and but one slave was stationed in the porch; an old man quite unarmed, not having so much even as a porter's staff, who was sitting on a stone bench, in the morning sunshine.

As the conspirators ascended the marble steps, which gave access to the vestibule, and entered the beautiful Tuscan colonnade, the two Germans, who had stopped and looked back for a moment, seeing them pass in, set off as hard as they could run, through an adjoining street toward the house of Catiline, which was not very far distant.

It was not long ere they reached it, and entered without question or hindrance, as men familiar and permitted.

In a small room, adjoining the inner peristyle, the master of the house was striding to and fro across the tesselated floor, in a state of perturbation, extreme even for him; whose historian has described him with bloodless face, and evil eyes, irregular and restless motions, and the impress of frantic guilt, ever plain to be seen in his agitated features.

Aurelia Orestilla sat near him, on a low cushioned stool, with her superb Italian face livid and sicklied by unusual dread. Her hands lay tightly clasped upon her knee her lips were as white as ashes. Her large lustrous eyes, burning and preternaturally distended, were fixed on the haggard face of her husband, and followed him, as he strode up and down the room in impotent anxiety and expectation.

Yet she, privy as she was to all his blackest councils, the instigator and rewarder of his most hideous crime, knowing the hell of impotent agony that was consuming his heart, she dared not address him with any words of hope or consolation.

At such a crisis all ordinary phrases of comfort or cheering love, seem but a mockery to the spirit, which can find no rest, until the doubts that harass it are ended; and this she felt to be the case, and, had her own torturing expectation allowed her to frame any speech to soothe him, she would not have ventured on its utterance, certain that it would call forth a torrent of imprecation on her head, perhaps a burst of violence against her person.

The very affections of the wicked, are strangely mixed at times, with more discordant elements; and it would have been a hard question to solve, whether that horrible pair most loved, or hated one another.

The woman's passions, strange to relate, had been kindled at times, by the very cruelty and fury, which at other moments made her almost detest him. There was a species of sublimity in the very atrocity of Catiline's wickedness, which fascinated her morbid and polluted fancy; and she almost admired the ferocity which tortured her, and from which, alone of mortal ills, she shrank appalled and unresisting.

And Catiline loved her, as well as he could love anything, loved her the more because she too, in some sort, had elicited his admiration; for she had crossed him many times, and once braved him, and, alone of human beings, he had not crushed her.

They were liker to mated tigers, which even in their raptures of affection, rend with the fang, and clutch with the unsheathed talon, until the blood and anguish testify the fury of their passion, than to beings of human mould and nature.

Suddenly the traitor stopped short in his wild and agitated walk, and seemed to listen intently, although no sound came to the ears of the woman, who was no less on the alert than he, for any stir or rumor.

“It is he said at length, clasping his hands above his head it is the step of Arminius, the trusty gladiator do you not hear it, Orestilla?”

“No,” she replied, shaking her head doubtfully. “There is no sound at all. My ear is quicker of hearing, too, than yours, Catiline, and if there were any step, I should be first to mark it.”

“Tush! woman!” he made answer, glaring upon her fiercely. “It is my heart that hears it.”

“You have a heart, then!” she replied bitterly, unable even at that time to refrain from taunting him.

“And a hand also, and a dagger! and, by Hell and all its furies! I know not why I do not flesh it in you. I will one day.”

“No, you will not,” she answered very quietly.

“And wherefore not? I have done many a worse deed in my day. The Gods would scarce punish me for that slaughter; and men might well call it justice. Wherefore not, I say? Do you think I so doat on your beauty, that I cannot right gladly spare you?”

“Because,” answered the woman, meeting his fixed glare, with a glance as meaning and as fiery, “because, when I find that you meditate it, I will act quickest. I know a drug or two, and an unguent of very sovereign virtue.”

“Ha! ha!” The reckless profligate burst into a wild ringing laugh of triumphant approbation. “Ha! ha! thou mightst have given me a better reason. Where else should I find such a tigress? By all the Gods! it is your clutch and claws that I prize, more than your softest and most rapturous caress! But hist! hist! now do you not hear that step?”

“I do I do, she replied, clasping her hands again, which she had unclinched in her anger and it is Arminius' step! I was wrong to cross thee, Catiline; and thou so anxious! we shall hear now we shall hear all.”

Almost as she spoke, the German gladiator rushed into the room, heated and panting from his swift race; and, without any sign of reverence or any salutation, exclaimed abruptly,

“Catiline, it is over, ere this time! I saw them enter his house!”

The woman uttered a low choking shriek, her face flushed crimson, and then again turned paler than before, and she fell back on her cushioned seat, swooning with joy at the welcome tidings.

But Catiline flung both his arms abroad toward heaven, and cried aloud Ye Gods, for once I thank ye! if there be Gods indeed! he added, with a sneer thou sawest them enter, ha? thou art not lying? By all the furies! If you deceive me, I will take care that you see nothing more in this world.”

“Catiline, these eyes saw them!”

“At length! at length!” he exclaimed, his eye flashing, and his whole countenance glowing with fiendish animation, “and yet curses upon it! that I could not slay him that I should owe to any other hand my vengeance on my victim. Thou hast done well ha! here is gold, Arminius! the last gold I own but what of that, to-morrow to-morrow, I will have millions! Away! away! bold heart, arouse your friends and followers to arms, to arms, cry havoc through the streets, and liberty and vengeance!”

While he was speaking yet, the door was again opened, and Cethegus entered with the others, dull, gloomy, and crest-fallen; but Catiline was in a state of excitement so tremendous, that he saw nothing but the men.

At one bound he reached Cethegus, and catching him by both hands How! he exclaimed How was it? quick, tell me, quick! Did he die hard? Did he die, conscious, in despair, in anguish? Tell me, tell me, you tortured him in the slaying tell me, he died a coward, howling and cursing fate, and knowing that I, I slew him, and speak Cethegus? speak, man! By the Gods! you are pale! silent! these are not faces fit for triumph! speak, man, I say, how died he? show me his blood, Cethegus! you have not wiped it from your dagger, give me the blade, that I may kiss away the precious death-drops.”

So rapidly and impetuously had he spoken, heaping query on query, that Cethegus could not have answered, if he would. But, to say the truth, he was in little haste to do so. When Catiline ceased, however, which he did at length, from actual want of breath to enquire farther, he answered in a low smothered voice.

“He is not dead at all he refused

Not dead! shrieked Catiline, for it was a shriek, though articulate, and one so piercing that it roused Aurelia from her swoon of joy Not dead! Yon villain swore that he saw you enter not dead! he repeated, half incredulously By heaven and hell! I believe you are jesting with me! Tell me that you have lied, and I I I will worship you, Cethegus.”

“His porter refused us entrance, and, as the door was opened, we saw in the Atrium the slaves of his household, and half a hundred of his clients, all armed from head to foot, with casque and corslet, pilum, broad-sword, and buckler. And, to complete the tale, as we returned into the street baffled and desperate, a window was thrown open in the banquet-hall above, and we might see the Consul, with Cato, and Marcellus, and Scipio, and a score of Consulars beside, gazing upon us in all the triumph of security, in all the confidence of success. We are betrayed, that is plain our plans are all known as soon as they are taken, all frustrated ere acted! All is lost, Catiline, for what remains to do?”

To dare! answered the villain, all undaunted even by this reverse and, if need be, to die but to despair, never!”

“But who can be the traitor? where shall we look to find him?”

“Look there,” exclaimed Catiline, pointing to the German gladiator, who stood all confounded and chap-fallen. “Look there, and you shall see one; and see him punished too! What ho! without there, ho! a dozen of you, if you would shun the lash!”

And, at the summons, ten or twelve slaves and freedmen rushed into the room in trepidation, almost in terror, so savage was the temper of the lord whom they served, and so merciless his wrath, at the most trivial fault or error.

“Drag that brute, hence!” he said, waving his hand toward the unhappy gladiator, “put out his eyes, fetter him foot and hand, and cast him to the congers in the fish-pond.”

Without a moment's pause or hesitation, they cast themselves upon their miserable comrade; and, though he struggled furiously, and struck down two or three of the foremost, and shouted himself hoarse, in fruitless efforts to explain, he was secured, and bound and gagged, within a shorter time than is required to describe it.

This done, one of the freedmen looked toward his dreaded master, and asked, with pale lips, and a faltering voice,

“Alive, Catiline?”

“Alive and hark you, Sirrah, fasten his head above the water, that he die not too speedily. Those biggest congers will lug him manfully, Cethegus; we will go see the sport, anon. It will serve to amuse us, after this disappointment. There! away with him, begone!”

The miserable creature struggled desperately in his bonds, but in vain; and strove so terribly to speak, in despite his gag, that his face turned almost black, from the blood which rushed to every pore; but no sound could he utter, as he was dragged away, save a deep-mouthed groan, which was drowned by the laughter of the remorseless wretches, who gazed on his anguish with fiendish merriment; among which, hideous to relate, the thrilling sounds of Aurelia's silvery and contagious mirth were distinctly audible.

“He will take care to see more truly in Hades!” said Catiline, with his sardonic smile, as he was dragged out of the room, by his appalled and trembling fellows. “But now to business. Tell me, did you display any weapon? or do aught, that can be proved, to show your intent on the Consul?”

“Nothing, my Catiline,” replied Cethegus, firmly.

“Nothing, indeed, Cethegus? By all our hopes! deceive me not!”

“By your head! nothing, Catiline.”

“Then I care nothing for the failure!” answered the other. “Keep good hearts, and wear smiling faces! I will kill him myself to-morrow, if, like the scorpion, I must die in the deed.”

“Try it not, Catiline. You will but fail and

“Fail! who ever knew me fail, in vengeance?”

No one! said Orestilla and no one can hinder you of it. No! not the Gods!”

“There are no Gods!” exclaimed the Traitor, “and if there be, it were all one I defy them!”

Cicero says there is ONE, they tell me, said Cethegus, half mocking, half in earnest and he is very wise.”

Very! replied the other, with his accustomed sneer Therefore that ONE may save him if he can!”

“The thing is settled,” cried Aurelia Orestilla, “I told him yesterday he ought to do it, himself I should not be content, unless Catiline's hand dealt him the death blow, Catiline's eye gloated upon him in the death-struggle, Catiline's tongue jeered him in the death-pang!”

“You love him dearly, Orestilla,” said Cethegus.

“And clearly he has earned it,” she replied.

“By Venus! I would give half my hopes, to see him kiss you.”

“And I, if my lips had the hydra's venom. But come,” she added, with a wreathed smile and a beaming eye, “Let us go see the fishes eat yon varlet; else shall we be too late for the sport.”

“Rare sport!” said Cethegus, “I have not seen a man eaten, by a tiger even, these six months past; and by a fish, I think, never!”

The fish do it better, replied Catiline Better, and cleaner they leave the prettiest skeleton you can imagine they are longer about it, you will say True; but I do not grudge the time.”

No! no! the longer, the merrier! said Aurelia, laughing melodiously The last fellow I saw given to the tigers, had his head crushed like a nut-shell, by a single blow. He had not time to shriek even once. There was no fun in that, you know.”

None indeed, said Cethegus but I warrant you this German will howl gloriously, when the fish are at him.” “Yes! yes!” exclaimed the lovely woman, clapping her hands joyously. “We must have the gag removed, to give free vent to his music. Come, come, I am dying to see him.”

“Some one must die, since Cicero did not.”

“Happy fellow this, if he only knew it, to give his friends so much pleasure!”

“One of them such a fair lady too!”

“Will there be more pleasure, think you, in seeing the congers eat the gladiator, or in eating the congers afterward?”

“Oh! no comparison! one can eat fat congers always.”

“We have the advantage of them truly, for they cannot always eat fat gladiators.”

And they walked away with as much glee and expectation, to the scene of agony and fiendish torture, vitiated by the frightful exhibitions of the circus and the arena, as men in modern days would feel, in going to enjoy the fictitious sorrows of some grand tragedian.

Can it be that the contemplation of human wo, in some form or other, is in all ages grateful to poor corrupt humanity?