THIRD WONDER
THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES
One morning, several days later, Rachel received a long letter from her father, in answer to one she had written to him before making the acquaintance of Mr. Sheston. (Though, indeed, as she remembered, she had even then met him without knowing it!)
“You talk about the British Museum,” he wrote, “and that reminds me of a dear old friend of mine who works there. I don’t think I’ve ever told you about Mr. Sheston, have I? And now I come to think of it I don’t believe I’ve told anyone all he meant to me when I was a little boy, no older than you are now. I’ve never seen him since, but he was better to me then than a thousand beautiful mysterious books. He used to tell me the most wonderful stories, and I’ve never forgotten them. He must be a very old man now. (I thought him very old then, but, of course, he wasn’t really.) I believe he sometimes goes to see your Aunt Hester, and I want you to meet him. Perhaps he will tell you some of the strange things he told me. Perhaps even you will have ‘adventures’ when you’re with him! And perhaps not. Anyhow, if you do have ‘adventures,’ take my advice and don’t talk about them. People as a rule don’t understand Mr. Sheston, and some of them say all sorts of silly things about him, and even think he’s mad. He isn’t. He’s the oldest and the wisest man in the world.”
Rachel folded up the letter feeling very happy. She and “Daddy” were great friends, and she was as she said to herself “frightfully glad” that Dad had known Mr. Sheston when he was a little boy. That hint he gave about “adventures” pleased her very much, as also his remark about Mr. Sheston being the oldest man in the world! Oh, yes, certainly Dad had passed through the same sort of experiences as those she had enjoyed since her meeting with his old friend. That was a splendid thought. And all at once she remembered that Dad also was the seventh child in his family. “So he’s mixed up with sevens too,” was her next reflection. “He’s one of the lucky people—like me. He’ll be awfully interested when he gets my last letter to say I’ve met Mr. Sheston already!”
That very same morning, Aunt Hester had a note from the old man to ask if Miss Moore would be kind enough to bring Rachel to tea at his house the following day, at three o’clock. “I will bring her back again myself. Don’t trouble to answer this, because I shall rely upon seeing Rachel at the appointed time.”
Aunt Hester brought the note into the schoolroom, and, after reading it aloud, laughed a little and shrugged her shoulders.
“This is a command,” she said, addressing Miss Moore. “He always gets his own way. Will you see that the child arrives punctually?”
Rachel wanted to jump for joy.
“It’s exactly seven days since the last time I saw him,” she exclaimed. “How exciting!”
Mr. Sheston’s house was tucked away in a little quiet square, near the Museum. It had a narrow front-door with a brass knocker that shone with much polishing, and above it, in the shape of a crescent, panes of glass divided by a tracery in white plaster.
Within, the walls of hall and staircase were panelled with dark wood, and the room into which Rachel followed her host after Miss Moore had left her was, she thought, the nicest she had ever seen.
It had three windows, and was long and low, and like the hall, panelled right up to the ceiling. There were cushioned window-seats, and books everywhere, and great bowls of spring flowers on the tables. And in an old-fashioned grate with hobs, a fire sparkled cheerfully, for it was a cold gloomy afternoon.
Tea was laid on a table in front of the fire, and in a few moments the dearest old woman in a frilled close-fitting cap and a spotless apron, entered, bringing a teapot and a kettle, which she placed on the hob.
She smiled at Rachel.
“The very image of her father, isn’t she, sir?” she remarked.
“Oh! Did you know Dad?” enquired Rachel, joyfully.
“Martha has known all my young friends,” said Mr. Sheston.
“Many’s the time your father has sat where you’re sitting now, my dear,” the old woman continued. “He was no older than you then, and had just your look.”
She went out of the room quietly, leaving Rachel much interested, and glad to be in a place that Dad had once known well.
She would like to have asked all sorts of questions about her father when he was a little boy, but, remembering his letter, she felt in some curious way that it would be better not to do so.
Tea was a most cosy and delicious meal, but it was only after old Martha had cleared the table and swept up the hearth that Rachel said rather disappointedly—“Then we’re not going to the British Museum?” Mr. Sheston smiled. “Not to-day. I’m going to tell you a story instead. But first you’ll have to listen to a little lecture.” He took an atlas from one of the book-shelves, and opened it on the table before her. “The story I am going to tell you has something to do with Greece, and in order that you may understand it better, I want you first to look at this. It is a map of Europe as it was three thousand years ago, showing the countries round the Mediterranean Sea. All the parts of the countries that belonged to Greece in those days are coloured pink.”
Rachel looked, and saw many pink islands in the Mediterranean Sea, as well as pink strips along the coast of Asia Minor, and even a pink tip to the heel of Italy.
“The Greek people had a lot of land—only all scattered about,” she remarked.
Mr. Sheston nodded.
“Like England, it was a little country owning a lot of land—‘scattered about,’ as you say. Well now, these islands were the Greek colonies, just as India and South Africa and Australia are our colonies. Again, like the English, the Greeks were great colonists. They sent out their people to live and build and work in places sometimes far distant from the mother country. But now I want you to find on the map one particular island-colony called Rhodes.”
“Here it is!” cried Rachel, in a minute, putting her finger on a pink-coloured spot. “It’s a good long way from Greece,” she observed, “and quite close to Asia Minor.”
“It belonged to Greece, however,” said Mr. Sheston, folding up the map. “I only want you to remember its name, and where it is. Now come and look at this statue.”
He got up, and Rachel followed him to a recess on which stood a beautiful little figure of a god.
“That is a god called Phœbus Apollo,” said Mr. Sheston. “To the Greeks he meant all the best things in the world—the sun, poetry, music, wisdom and truth, and everything that is free and beautiful.”
“The gods they worshipped in Egypt and Babylon weren’t beautiful,” said Rachel. “But this god is. He’s much better than the others.”
“Because the Greeks themselves were in some ways higher and better than the Egyptians or the Babylonians. They were thinkers and artists, and their minds were free. Therefore they were able to imagine beautiful gods, and they became the greatest race of people that ever lived.... Do you remember the name of their chief city?”
“Athens,” answered Rachel, who was rather good at geography.
“Yes, Athens,” repeated Mr. Sheston, softly. “Wonderful Athens! Well, now, my dear, I can begin my story, asking you to remember that Greece had many colonies, peopled by Greeks whose general life was very much like the life led by the citizens of Athens in the mother country. They worshipped the same gods—Phœbus Apollo amongst them—and they were, in fact, part of the Grecian Empire....”
He was silent for a minute or two, and the room was so quiet and restful that Rachel had almost begun to feel pleasantly drowsy when she heard his voice again. “What I am going to tell you, I once told your father years ago in this very room, and he sat just where you are sitting now,” he said. Before she had time to make a reply, he began the story, and though his first words ought, as Rachel afterwards reflected, to have been rather startling, they seemed perfectly natural, for she was getting used to the idea that, as Dad said, Mr. Sheston was “the oldest man in the world.”
“When I was a little boy, nearer three than two thousand years ago, I lived in the island of Rhodes. You know where it is, because a minute or two ago, you found it on the map, and saw it marked in the Mediterranean Sea as an island some long way from Greece.
“In the map, it was nothing but a little blotch coloured pink, so it’s not surprising if you have no idea what I see, when I remember Rhodes as I knew it nearly three thousand years ago. I’ll describe the vision that rises before me now.
“First of all, my own home. It is a big white house with pillars at the entrance, and a flat roof, standing in a garden full of roses that slopes down almost to the harbour of the town of Rhodes. The harbour is full of ships—our own, and those from Tyre and Athens and Smyrna, and all the great seaports on the Mediterranean—ships with curious curved sails, some of them purple and embroidered with strange devices.”
(“Like the ships from Tyre I saw at Babylon,” thought Rachel, though she did not care to interrupt.)
“Beyond the great harbour with its crowded shipping and merchandise of green and purple figs, heaps of dates, bales of fine muslin and linen, chests—some full of spices, others of gold and ivory—lies the sea, blue as the bluest sapphire, over which, going and coming from every harbour of every country whose shores touched the Mediterranean, ships go sailing. That is the picture I have in my mind when I think of Rhodes as I knew it ages ago.
“My name in those days was Cleon, and I had a beautiful mother, and a little sister called Penelope.
“But before I go on, I must tell you that by the time I came into the world, Athens, our mother city, where my father had been born, was no longer so great and powerful as it had been in the days a hundred years before my time. All sorts of trouble had come to Greece. It had been conquered by a certain king called Alexander the Great, who died just before I was born, and all the time I was a child, the generals of his army were quarrelling among themselves—each one trying to get the largest share of all the great kingdoms their master King Alexander had won. You will ask what that had to do with Rhodes, and with my beautiful home, and with the happiness of everyone I loved. It had all too much to do with us, as I will explain.
“Our island had indeed been conquered by Alexander the Great, but fifty years before I was born we had regained our liberty, had become a republic and also the greatest sea nation in the world. But now, though the great conqueror himself was dead, one of his generals, jealous of our power, determined to subdue us and make us slaves again. This man’s name was Demetrius, and, because he had become so famous in war, he was generally called Demetrius, the Besieger of Cities.
“I was twelve years old when the news came that this dreaded Demetrius had declared war on Rhodes, and was coming to besiege us, and never shall I forget the speech my father (who was Governor of Rhodes) made to the citizens that day!
“‘We are Greeks,’ he said, ‘and worthy children of Athens, our mother city. Never will we yield to Demetrius! Let us prepare for the greatest siege that has ever been known.’
“A great shout answered him, and my father at once began to make preparations.
“‘First of all,’ he said, ‘every useless person must be sent out of Rhodes.’ That meant all the women and children, and all men who were not strong enough to fight. For, in the long siege that was expected, there would not be sufficient food for anyone but workmen and soldiers. Workmen must instantly begin to make every sort of warlike weapon, including machines as far as possible like those which Demetrius would certainly employ against the city. Other workmen must strengthen its walls, toiling day and night. Everyone in fact must labour as they had never done before. I followed him from the marketplace that day full of dread. If all the children were to go, should I have to leave Rhodes just at this stirring time, when I so longed to be in the midst of things? Yet I dared not ask my father to let me stay, for I knew I must not trouble him with my affairs when he had the whole town’s business on his mind. I was very miserable, for I knew he intended to send me, with my mother and little sister, to Athens. But you shall hear how it was that I after all remained in Rhodes through the whole dreadful siege.
“One of our greatest friends was a certain young sculptor called Chares. He was very fond of me, and deeply interested in a curious gift which, even as a child, I possessed. My greatest amusement and interest had always been to draw plans of houses and towns, and I drew them so correctly and well that everyone was amazed, for I had never been taught. To me there was nothing wonderful about this, for it seemed quite easy, and I could never understand why Chares looked upon my work with so much astonishment.
“As soon as I dared I began to beg and entreat not to be sent away, till my father, growing angry, silenced me, and I was just creeping off miserably when Chares, who was with us, spoke.
“He had picked up a plan of the town on which I had been working, and I saw him studying it attentively, all the time I was begging to stay.
“‘Yield to the boy, Hippias,’ he exclaimed, suddenly. ‘Who knows that this gift of his,’ he tapped the paper he held, ‘may not be of value? I think he should remain with us.’
“My father looked from me to Chares, and, after a moment’s silence, said quietly, and to my great joy, ‘So be it. That is’—turning to me—he went on: ‘if you can bear hunger and even wounds perhaps, like a man. We must have no whimpering children in Rhodes.’
“I felt I could bear anything if only I might remain, and I was unspeakably grateful to my dear Chares for his interference. I knew my father not only trusted him greatly, but also had an idea that he was favoured by the gods, and could look into the future. It was because he pleaded for me that my wish was granted.
“In a few days I was the youngest person left in Rhodes, which was now filled only with soldiers and workmen. Those were wonderful days when we waited for the coming of the fleet that was to destroy us! Almost every hour fresh troops were landed, for the countries that were friendly to us sent us soldiers in plenty. Many of them were our own countrymen—Greeks from other colonies, who rejoiced to fight with us, and arrived shouting, singing, and full of delight. All day long I ran here, there and everywhere in the town. Now I was down by the harbour to see a fresh ship full of warriors come sailing in; now I walked round the city walls to watch the workmen strengthening and repairing them. But most time of all I spent in the sheds where the great war engines were being built, for these fascinated me beyond measure, and I wondered whether even the celebrated Demetrius had better or larger ones than those we were making. I was soon to know.
“My father had brought me up to reverence the gods, and the chief god of our worship was Phœbus Apollo—lord of the sun which poured its light so gloriously upon our island, and ripened our grapes and figs, and made the whole land lovely and pleasant to the sight.
“In our garden there was a little white marble temple, and in it, with an altar in front, stood a beautiful statue of the god, made by our friend, Chares, the sculptor. Here I often went to pray for victory. One morning I woke before sunrise, and the loveliness of the sky made me wish to worship the god of the approaching day.
“Like a vast mirror the scarcely heaving sea reflected the pink glow of the sky, where little golden clouds like feathers floated just above the horizon, and a broad band of amber was growing momentarily brighter.
“I rose quickly from my place on the roof, and, running past rooms filled with sleeping soldiers (for our house had been turned into a barracks), made my way into the garden all mysterious, dim and dewy in the dawn.
“I crossed wet lawns, stopped to pick a handful of the roses that poured in a crimson torrent from a stone urn, and then ran on to the grove of lemon trees in which stood the temple.
“To my surprise I found someone there before me. A dark figure stood within. Just at that moment, the first ray of the risen sun darted like a golden arrow between the pillars of the temple, and the marble statue of the god appeared bathed in dazzling light.
“The figure I had seen was now kneeling at the foot of the altar, and I recognised Chares.
“Very softly I crept into the temple, and, dropping my roses on the altar, knelt beside him.
“Then Chares rose to his feet, and stretching out his arms, prayed aloud. His words, spoken in the Greek tongue, sounded like beautiful poetry, but I can only give you in another and different language, a poor idea of the prayer he offered to Phœbus Apollo.
“‘O mighty lord of the sun and of all the beauty in striving for which men are raised above the beasts that perish, grant us victory in the coming strife. I, Chares, thy worshipper, who have many times fashioned in thine honour statues which but faintly show forth my dreams of thy perfection, do make a vow before thee here, at the rising of the sun, that, if to thy people of Rhodes comes the victory we crave, I will raise to thy glory such a statue as never man yet beheld—the Wonder of the World, an everlasting sign of thy mercy, the best and last work of my hands.’
“The little temple was flooded with sunlight, and the heap of roses on the altar was glowing like a crimson fire, when Chares turned, and, seeing me beside him, laid his hand on my shoulder. We moved out of the temple, and he was just going to speak when I pointed with a cry to the horizon. Crowding sails were in sight, and Chares started. ‘They come!’ he exclaimed. ‘At what better moment than after my prayer and vow?’
“But, even before the last words were uttered, such a shout went up from the harbour and the town as to make my heart beat and set me trembling with excitement. From the house, across the lawns to the gates which led to the seashore, the soldiers came rushing, and, in a few moments, Rhodes was humming and buzzing like a hornet’s nest.
“So the famous siege of Rhodes began. You will read all about it when you are older, for it was one of the most celebrated sieges in history. To me, as to hundreds of others, it was a time which, though full of excitement, was still more full of misery and sorrow. My dear father was killed fighting bravely, and many, many of our friends.
“Months passed, and sometimes we won a victory, breaking through the enemy forces, and sometimes Demetrius, with his terrible war machines, triumphed. He had succeeded in landing on our island and was encamped on a hill near our city, while we within our walls, resisted all his efforts to break them down.
“After nine or ten months of fighting, our sailors won a splendid victory against the fleet of Demetrius, and the temples of the gods were crowded with worshippers giving thanks for our success.
“Since my father’s death, Chares had lived with me in our once beautiful house (now a barracks for the soldiers), and he and I preferred to worship in our own little private temple of Phœbus Apollo. When we left it that day, the sun was setting, and the roses, which during the war had grown in wild profusion, almost smothered the shrine, and made it look as though set in the midst of scarlet flames.
“Chares glanced back at it, and put his hand on my shoulder.
“‘Cleon,’ he said, ‘if the statue I have in mind ever rises to the honour of the god, it will be through you.’
“I was startled and impressed by his words which I did not understand. How could I, still a child, and not even allowed to fight, have anything to do with victory—if victory ever came? For we knew that Demetrius had but retired to bring fresh forces against us. I began to say something like this, but Chares paid no heed to my words.
“‘Are you keeping your drawings and plans in safety?’ he asked, as though to change the subject. For he knew that my days now were chiefly occupied in making plans of different parts of the city, and also careful drawings of our own, as well as of the enemy’s war machines. This I did to amuse myself, and often, though Chares did not know this, ran into great danger in my eagerness to see something I thought useful or important, more closely.
“‘How do you think this gift has come to you?’ asked Chares presently, when I had assured him that I kept all my drawings.
“And when I said I had never thought about it, and did not consider it a ‘gift,’ because to me it was like a kind of game, he replied gravely,
“‘Some day you will know.’
“We were not left long to enjoy our victory, for soon rumours began to fly about which filled us with anxiety.
“Demetrius, beaten for the time, had indeed retired, but it was known that he had invented, and was building, a new and a more terrible war engine than had ever before been designed. By this time, in Rhodes, we were nearly starving, for our food was almost all gone, and Phrynis, our general, was full of anxiety, for though he did not doubt the courage of our troops, he knew they could not fight if they were weak for lack of nourishment. You may imagine his relief when, just at the blackest moment of despair, some ships sent by our friend, the King of Egypt, managed to get past the watching fleet of the enemy, laden with corn, and, a few days afterwards, other ships arrived with fresh troops to help our tired men.
“After they had rested and been well fed, Phrynis gave orders for soldiers and sailors to prepare for the great machine which would soon be at our gates, by building an inner wall behind that which encircled the city. To do this it was necessary to pull down a great many houses, and, among them, my own beautiful home, and even the little temple of Phœbus Apollo. Before this was done, we held a solemn service within the temple, and again Chares renewed his vow to make the statue, and begged forgiveness of the god for having to destroy one of his dwelling-places. I thought my heart would break when instead of the white house I knew and loved, with its marble columns, its flights of marble steps leading to a garden beautiful as a dream, I saw waste land, scattered over with stones and rubbish, all the roses trampled under foot, and desolation far and wide about the new wall that was rising. But we were fighting for our lives, and there was no time either for sorrow or regret.
“Meanwhile, the war machine which Demetrius was preparing for our destruction was nearly completed. It was being built upon that part of the island already in possession of the enemy, and marvellous tales about its size and deadliness were daily brought into the city by those of our soldiers who had seen it. The name they said that was given to the new engine was helepolis, which means destroyer of cities. As time went on, I could think of nothing but this awful monster, which I was quite sure might be overcome if only one could think of the means.
“By now, so many were the plans I had made of our city that there was scarcely a yard of it I did not know, and one day I said to Chares,
“‘If only we could discover to which point of the walls this helepolis will be brought when it begins its attack upon us.’
“Chares glanced at me quickly.
“‘Why?’ he asked.
“‘Because, if only I knew that, I should also know at once what to do.’
“I spoke with great confidence, for I was really quite sure of the plan I had in mind—though why I was so sure, I could not tell.
“Chares looked at me again, and then as though he had dismissed the subject, said, ‘To-day I will take you where you may work at your maps and plans in greater quiet.’
“Since the destruction of our house, another in the heart of the town had become our General Headquarters, and here everything was crowded and rough and noisy with the incessant tramping of soldiers about its door, and there was no spot in it that I could call my own. So I was glad that Chares had found a place for me, and, when after several hours’ absence, he returned, I willingly followed him to a house on the hill-side beyond the walls. We passed through a quiet garden and presently entered a room, where, to my surprise, I saw our general Phrynis, several other officers, and one or two men I knew to be engineers. These men smiled in an amused way when I came in, and I heard one whisper to another,
“‘Have we been brought here to consult with a child?’
“But Chares drew a stool up to the table in the window space, and told me to open the ground plans of the city and the maps I had brought, and when the men crowded round to see, I noticed that their faces altered as they passed my drawings from one to the other in silence.
“At last Phrynis, who was very grave, spoke touching a point on one of my plans of the town.
“‘Cleon,’ he said, ‘if the new war engine should be posted at this part of the wall, what would you do supposing you had everything you wanted at your command?’
“Then I began to explain very fast and confidently—(for it all seemed quite simple to me)—just the way in which I would lay a mine under that part of the wall, and just the spot where the engine would sink, if certain directions were carried out.
“The men glanced at one another again in silence, and all at once Phrynis rose. ‘The work begins to-night,’ I heard him say. ‘There is no time to lose. Back to the city.’
“The soldiers clattered out, leaving me alone with Chares, who took my hand and whispered hurriedly, ‘It is right you should know—though you understand that no word must cross your lips. It is there, opposite the place on the plan pointed out to you by Phrynis, that the machine will be planted. This we have learnt through our spies. So important is the secret that Phrynis would hold no meeting in the city itself, and therefore have we come to this quiet place. You are to follow and direct the work as soon as it grows dark.’
“Can you at all imagine what a thrilling night that was for me when by the light of torches I saw hundreds of men working under my direction? At the time I was too preoccupied to wonder how it happened that I knew exactly what to say and do. It seemed to me every now and then that I had done and said the same things many times before and therefore need not hesitate, nor even think. It was as though something was happening in my sleep, quite easily and naturally.
“When the first streak of dawn was in the sky, the work was finished, and, all at once worn out, I was almost carried by Chares to our barracks, where I slept for hours. All the rest of that day we waited in suspense, for, though we knew the war machine was ready, we were not sure when the attack would be made.
“It came the next morning. Shouts and battle cries from the besiegers, and terrific blasts from their trumpets were followed by flights of arrows, as the huge monster moving towards us over the waste ground beyond the walls drew near.
“I watched it, with my heart thumping. The ground already in the possession of Demetrius had been levelled so that the ‘destroyer of cities’ might move more easily, and I knew just where the mine would strike it—if only we had not been deceived about the track over which it was to pass!
“But suppose Demetrius had changed his plans? Or that the spies were wrong? Suppose the machine should pass a shade too far on the right or the left of the mine. It would then arrive safely beneath the wall, and we should all, I thought, be destroyed. For never had I, or any of the Rhodians, imagined such a monster as this!
“It was like a square castle upon wheels. Thousands of soldiers pushed it forward, but their toil was made easier by the wheels or castors which turned every way under the great frame supporting it. Nine storeys I counted, with staircases leading up and down from one to the other. The whole monster, half animal, half tower (as it looked), was covered with iron plates like the scales on a serpent. In the front of each storey there were little windows with leather curtains which moved up and down, covering them—meant, no doubt, to break the force of the stones and darts we should hurl in our defence. On it came, towering above our walls, its windows like the awful eyes of some dragon, glaring at its victims. As yet it had not begun to spit forth stones and darts and flaming torches, but evidently it was only waiting for this till it should be closer at hand, and more deadly in effect.
“While I held my breath in terror lest anything in my plan should go wrong, I yet noticed with pride the spirit of our men who shouted their battle-cries, and shot streams of arrows in return for those sent over by the enemy foot-soldiers. Nearer and nearer came the monster—my heart stood still—and then, just as I was feeling I must faint or scream, with such a crash as to make the whole city totter, it suddenly disappeared into the ground. Almost disappeared, for only the topmost and smallest storey was visible!
“At first it seemed as though the whole world had been suddenly struck dumb. Not a sound was heard from either side, besiegers or besieged. Then, after that moment of deathly silence a cry went up from the city that was like nothing I ever heard. The next moment I felt the arms of Chares
