Count Belisarius (18 page)

This indelicacy was too much for Theodora, who was sitting enthroned at Justinian's side. She rose, excused herself with a respectful obeisance to Justinian, and began to walk away down the nave, her pages behind her, without waiting either for Eucharist or blessing. Etiquette demanded that the ladies in the gallery should rise to accompany her. The Bishop was now demanding that my mistress's head and the Lady Chrysomallo's be shorn until as bald as ostrich eggs. Theodora answered him indirectly; for to have answered him directly would have been an insult to Justinian, who remained silent. She paused in her progress, to call to Cappadocian John, across the benches: ‘Pray tell your eloquent, smooth-chinned friend that it is not becoming for the Razor to preach anathema against the Comb – or wise.'

The ladies clattered noisily down from the gallery to her, and only men and eunuchs were left in the Church to hear the sermon out. But in the buzz of indignant or excited talk that we raised the Bishop soon found it expedient to wind up his argument, with an object apology to His Clemency if he had perhaps spoken with too great frankness and to the personal offence of his most Chaste, Gracious, and Lovely Empress whose glories it was beyond the skill of poets, Christian and pagan alike, to match in their most melodious verses. The Bishop was indeed in a dangerous position, and would never have dared to preach such a sermon if he had not been privately assured by someone or other that the Lady Chrysomallo and my mistress were in disfavour at Court. As for the Razor and the Comb: Theodora's point was that
this. Bishop was himself offending against Church Law by appearing with a shaven chin. Only scissors were allowed to pass over a priest's face. His hair had been irreligiously pomaded too, for he was a typical Ravenna dandy. Before the day was out he had been re-embarked in a small trading vessel and was on his way back to Italy. Theodora made it plain enough to Justinian that she stood by her old associates, so long as they remained loyal to the Throne, as firmly as she stood by her convictions about the single nature of the Son.

These events made a great impression in Constantinople, and my mistress's name became the subject of many untrue but not altogether discreditable tales in the Bazaar. By now her history was well known, and that Theodora had acknowledged her as a friend by the public re-proof of a bishop greatly strengthened her position. Nevertheless, to protect her against personal violence a permanent guard of two Ushers was thenceforth attached to her when she went out for walks or drives; and a whole detachment of Guards when presently she was sent out to the Persian frontier as Theodora's emissary to Belisarius, in circumstances which the next chapter will explain.

I
MUST
at this point give a short account of events in Persia since Belisarius had been appointed to the command of the troops at Daras. The impregnable city of Nisibis, fifteen miles to the eastward, had once been the principal Roman frontier station. It had successfully withstood three long sieges against Sapor, the eleventh Sassanid, when it was peacefully handed over to him by the disgraceful treaty which the Emperor Jovian signed, yielding to Persia five frontier districts. To supply the place of Nisibis, Anastasius had fortified Daras, which remained in Roman territory; but an outpost was needed to secure it against a surprise attack. Justinian therefore permitted Belisarius, at his own request, to build a castle at Mygdon, which was three miles away and only a few hundred yards from the frontier.

Belisarius had made a study of the art of fortification. He sited the castle in a strong position, and began building at a great pace, intending to make it ready for occupation by a garrison before the Persians could interrupt the work. The masons, who were very numerous, built hurriedly, sword at thigh, just as the Jews under Nehemiah are said to have rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem under the jealous eyes of their Samaritan neighbours. Before he began the work Belisarius had gathered together at Daras a great quantity of timber and dressed stones and lime; and the castle walls, which enclosed two acres of land, were soon two men high and rapidly rising higher.

The Persian commander at Nisibis handed an immediate protest to Belisarius, a copy of which he also sent to the Commander of the Roman Armies in the East, with a covering letter to the effect that the Persians took a serious view of this further breach of the treaty clauses relating to frontier fortifications. If building operations did not cease forthwith he would be obliged to resort to compulsion.

This protest was referred at once to Justinian, who replied that it was to be disregarded, and that Belisarius must be reinforced at once. The reinforcements sent were a mixed division of cavalry and infantry under two young Thracian noblemen, brothers, named Coutzes and Boutzes, who jointly commanded the troops stationed in the Lebanon.

By the greatest ill-luck the clash with the Persians in front of Mygdon Castle took place on a day when Belisarius was lying sick, in the worst stage of malarial fever, and fit for nothing. Not more than 8,000 troops were engaged on either side in this battle; in the course of which Boutzes, with half the cavalry, allowed himself to be drawn away in pursuit of a small body of the enemy, and left exposed the flank of the main body, which was composed of infantry. The Persians made a concentrated attack on Coutzes's cavalry on the other flank and routed it, capturing a number of prisoners, including Coutzes himself. The infantry, protected in their flight by Belisarius's Household cavalry under the command of Armenian John, streamed back to the castle. At nightfall Boutzes, returning with his forces intact and proudly exhibiting his plunder, learned of the fate of his brother and grew very angry. He ordered the castle to be evacuated, as a place of evil omen; and the whole Roman force, infantry and cavalry, retired on Daras, carrying the sick Belisarius with them on a litter. Two days later Belisarius, recovered from the delirium of fever, but still so weak that he could hardly sit his horse, made a counter-attack on the Persians, who had occupied the castle and were already dismantling it. At the head of his Household Cavalry, who numbered a thousand men, he drove them from the walls; but Boutzes, who should then have led the infantry back again with supplies for a siege, could not persuade them to follow him; so Mygdon Castle was abandoned once more for lack of a garrison. The Persians razed it to the ground and retired victoriously to Nisibis.

Justinian, on reading the reports that came to him, decided that the Commander of the Armies in the East had made an error of judgement in sending Belisarius inadequate and ill-led forces, and that Belisarius was the only soldier who had not tarnished his reputation. He therefore dismissed this Commander of the Armies and appointed in his place Belisarius, whose age at that time was only twenty-eight. Justinian also sent out to the frontier the Master of the Offices, one of his chief ministers, whose duties included the supervision of posts, communications, and arsenals throughout the Eastern Empire, and foreign embassies abroad. This Master of Offices was charged with resuming peace-negotiations with the Persians but protracting them as long as possible, thus giving Belisarius time to put Daras and the frontier generally into a posture of defence. Belisarius took advantage of this truce to make a tour of inspection of the frontier, strengthening
fortifications, raising and drilling troops, collecting military stores. It was hoped that a renewal of hostilities might be avoided, because Kobad at the age of seventy-five seemed likely to prefer a tranquil old age to the anxieties of a major war. But this was not to be.

Belisarius, who had succeeded in getting together an army of 25,000 men (of whom, however, he could not count on more than 3,000 to show hardihood, either in attack or defence) soon heard that a well-trained army of 40,000 men under the command of the Persian generalissimo Firouz was marching against him. Then came a Persian messenger with an arrogant message for Belisarius: ‘Firouz of the Golden Fillet spends tomorrow night in the City of Daras. Let a bath be prepared for him.'

To which Belisarius replied with the amiable wit which became his handsome person: ‘Belisarius of the Steel Casque assures the Persian Generalissimo that the sweating chamber and the cold douche will both be ready for him.'

The person who felt most insulted by Firouz's message, strangely enough, was not Belisarius but a bath-attendant. He was that same Andreas who had been Belisarius's satchel-slave. Andreas had been given his freedom some years before at Constantinople, and had been employed as instructor at a wrestling-school near the University until he came East to rejoin Belisarius at Daras.

Belisarius's tactical problem now was the familiar table-problem of the poor country inn-keeper who is forced to provide a banquet at short notice for a number of hungry guests: namely, how to make a little go a long way. Like the inn-keeper, he knew that his little was of inferior quality, and like the inn-keeper, too, he solved his problem by a carefully laid table and a brave smile and by putting the best food and wine foremost, keeping the coarser food and the worse wine in reserve. The coarser food and the worse wine were his infantry, half of whom were recent recruits. He had decided, because of the short time at his disposal, not to attempt to train these recruits in more than one art: he therefore chose to make archers of them. He provided them with long, stiff bows and regulated their pay according to their gradually increasing skill with these weapons; but it was only what he called ‘random shooting'. He demanded no more than that each man should be able to send his whole quiverful of forty arrows a distance of at least a hundred yards, keeping them within an angle of not more than ten degrees. Against a massed enemy this would be sufficient
aim. He had already manufactured an enormous quantity of arrows, and continued to keep his artificers busy at forging more arrow-heads and trimming and feathering more shafts. The trained infantry he also perfected in a single art, namely the defence of a narrow bridge against cavalry or infantry charges; he found them all chain-armour and spears of varying lengths, drilling them in the phalanx-formation used by Alexander, the front of which bristled with spears like an Indian porcupine. The half-trained infantry he practised in javelin-throwing.

The better food and wine, in this metaphor of the poor inn-keeper, were his cavalry. He had temporarily broken up his Household cuirassiers into six parties, which he sent as model troops to the six regular squadrons of heavy cavalry, to set them a standard of training for emulation: he did not represent them as instructors, only as challengers in the arts of shooting and tilting and rapid manoeuvre – but instructors they became. He also had with him two light-cavalry squadrons, of Massagetic Huns from beyond Bokhara and Samarkand, old enemies of Persia. And half a squadron of Herulian Huns whose summer quarters were in the Crimea; they were archers, with a quick rate of fire, and for fighting at close quarters they carried lances and broadswords. They wore buff-coats, with light metal plates sewn on them, but no other body armour. (Light cavalry is essential for outpost work on the frontier, Belisarius held, but must be supported by a strong striking force of heavy cavalry garrisoned not far away. The Empire was poor in light cavalry; as might be deduced from the fact that both the Herulian and Massagetic Huns live many hundreds of miles from the Roman border.)

Belisarius went out in front of Daras, just beyond the parade-ground which borders the fosse. He staked out a crooked system of trenches to be dug, six feet deep and twelve feet wide, with a narrow bridge at every hundred paces. The system, viewed from the battlements of the fortress, was like a drawing of a square-crowned, wide-brimmed hat, with the top of the crown resting on the farther edge of the parade-ground. Since this was to be a battle of the Persians' own choosing, and since their object was the capture and dismantling of Daras, Belisarius could afford to remain on the defensive; and indeed to have taken the offensive with troops like his would have been most unwise.

Around the three sides of the open central square, or re-entrant, of the trench-system, Belisarius stationed his infantry, with phalanxes of
spearmen guarding the bridges, supported by the javelin men, and with the archers lining the length of trench between. The trench was set with pointed stakes along its whole extent and was too broad to be leaped by cavalry. Forward on the wings, behind the advanced trenches (the brim of the hat), he stationed heavy cavalry. The bridges across the trenches were somewhat wider here, to allow for more rapid movement. As a connecting link between centre and wings, 600 Massagetic Huns were stationed inside each corner of the re-entrant, ready to bring a cross-fire of arrows against the enemy should they advance against the infantry, or to go to the help of either cavalry wing that might be involved in difficulties. In reserve he kept his own Household Cavalry, now reunited, and the Herulian Huns.

These were his dispositions. Everyone approved them at the council of war at which they were explained. The men were in excellent health in spite of the very hot July weather: the expected outbreak of dysentery and other hot-weather sicknesses, almost inevitable at Daras at this time of year, had not taken place. The fact was that Belisarius had issued most strict regulations about the mixing of all drinking-water with sour wine to purify it; and about the cleanliness of latrines and field kitchens; and especially about allowing no harbourage for flies – for he said that Beelzebub, the Lord of Flies, was the chief devil of destruction and that where there were flies, there was sickness. Moreover, all military exercises had been carried out in the early mornings before the sun was strong; after which the men slept until noon. In the evenings he had sent them out on night-marches to keep them in good physical condition, or employed them in digging. Belisarius never allowed his men to stand idle. They were now in proper fighting spirit, and had the greatest confidence in their young commander.