ANDROCLUS AND THE LION.
!THOSE whose childhood was nourished on "Sandford
and Merton" will probably remember the story of Androclus and the lion, although they may have forgotten some of Mr. Barlow's edifying dialectic, resulting invariably in the confusion of Tommy. But - even some very good scholars are not aware that this famous story has been pre- served to us in that mine of curious learning, the " Attic Nights" of Aulus Genius (V., 14). It is there given on the authority of Apion Pleistonices, a man famous in his time, about whom we shall have something to say presently. This is how he told the story "A great fight with wild beasts was being exhibited to the people in the Circus Maximus. Happening to be in Rome at the time, I attended as a spectator. There were many savage, many huge beasts, and all were remarkable either for their shape or their ferocity. But it was above all the monstrous size of the lions that excited admiration, and, beyond all the rest, of one. This particular lion by his velocity and dreadful size, by his terrific and resounding roar, by his muscles and his waving mane, had attracted to himself the attention and gaze a all. Among several others who had been brought in to fight with the beasts was Androclus. When that lion caught sight of him in the distance, all of a sudden he stopped as if in astonishment, and then, as though recognising him, walked up to him quite quietly. Then he wagged his tail in a caressing way, as a dog does when fawning on you, and, having come quite close, gently licked the legs and hands of the man, who was by this time almost dead with fear. Amid these blandishments, however, of the awful beast Androclus recovered his lost self- possession, and began to direct his gaze at the lion.. Then their' recognition seemed mutual, and you might have seen man and lion evincing every sign of joy and satisfaction. This surprising incident was hailed with loud shouts by the people, and Androclus was summoned by the Emperor and asked the reason why so ferocious a lion -he'd spared him in particular. Then Androclus related a wonderful story that might well raise our admiration. When my master,' he said, was Proconsul of Africa, I was driven to run away °Wing to the unjust and daily floggings which I received from him, and, to make my retreat safer from my master, who was governor of the country, I retired into lonely fields and deserts, determined, if food should fail me, to seek death by some Means or other. Then, when the midday sun was scorching and blazing, I came across a remote cavern, -which was just the.place to hide in, and into-it I made my way and concealed myself there. Not. long afterwards this lion came to the same cavern, with one foot disabled and bleeding, uttering groans and low growls that seemed to express pity for his pain and the torture of the wound.' -Hereupon he declared that at the first sight of theapproaching lion he had been scared with terror. 'But when,' he continued, the lion came into what, as the fact showed, Was his' own dwelling, and sa* me lurking in the distance, he came up to me quite gently and tamely, and, lifting his paw, shOived it and stretched it outto'nie with all -the appearance of asking for aid.. There was a 'huge stalk stuck in the pad of his 'paw, -which I extracted, and then wrung out the matter which had collected in the interior of the wound, and, having now pretty nearly lost my fear, I dried the inside care- fully, and wiped off the gore. Relieved by this medical treatment on my part, he reposed his paw in my hands, lay down, and went off to sleep. From that day forth for three years, the lion and I lived together in the same cave and on the same food. For he used to bring to me in the cate choice limbs of the beasts which he hunted, and I, not having the means of kindling a fire, used to roast them in the midday sun and eat them. Having got tired, however, of this wild. beast life,' be said, 'when the lion had gone out hunting, ,I left the cave, and, after I had gone about three days' journey, was seen by soldiers, arrested, and brought to my master it Rome from Africa. He at once took care to have me con- demned on a capital charge and given to the beasts. But I infer,' be said, that this lion also was taken prisoner after I had separated from him, and that he is now showing grati- tude to me for my kindness in healing him.'" This, according to Apion, was the tale told by Androelus, and we are further informed that it was all written down on a board and carried round and made known to the people, in consequence of which Androclus was by general request released from his punishment, while the lion was made 'a present to him by the votes of the people. "Afterwards." said Apion, "*e used to see Androclus, with the lion bound by a light rein, going the round of the taverns in the city, Androclus himself getting presents of money, and the lion being sprinkled with flowers, while all who met them said 'Here is the lion who was host to a man; here is a man who was doctor to a lion."
Such is the famous story which still entertains children. What credit, if any, can we attach to it?
The recognition of a man by a lion in the Roman amphi- theatre seems to be a fact of history. Seneca, who was 'a contemporary of Apion, says that he saw it. But then Seneca says also that the man had once been the lion's keeper. This fits in better with the lion being led about by the man, *MCI: Apion says that he saw. Seneca adds that the lion protected the man against the other wild beasts, and then goes on to maintain—the passage is in his "De Beneficiis" (II., 19)—that a beast is not capable of an act of kindness. The Stoics did not recognise our kinship with the lower-animals, but; like the Roman Catholic Church, regarded them de tout en has.
Apart from the general improbability of the story, there is one little point in Apion's narrative which inspires mistrust. The lion wagged his tail like a dog to testify his pleasure on renewing acquaintance with an old friend. Now the present writer has never been intimate with lions, but he has been on the most friendly terms with cats. They have many modes of displaying endearment, but certainly wagging the tail is not one of them. When a cat wags its tail you had better look out,—at least, if you happen to be a bird. If, then, we may reason from the less to the greater, Androclus would have hail good reason to mistrust the intentions of a lion who came at him wagging his tail. This, however, is a mere embellish- ment, and need not impugn the general veracity of tne narrator, if we otherwise have reason to trust him.
Apion, the son of Posidonius, was surnamed Pleistonices, whether on account of his many victories or of his many quarrels,—that is a niatter of spelling, which varies.• Be was a citizen of Alexandria, though, according to his enemy Josephus, he was really born at Oasis, and was pure Egyptian.. He is admitted on all hands to have been a great grammarian, and was especially famous for his studies on Homer. At the same time, writers who have no grudge against him dwell on his vanity, which was excessive even for a Greek. The Emperor Tiberius may have intended a compli- ment by calling him "the cymbal of the world," but Pliny the Elder (" Praef.," § 25) remarks that he was rather his own drum. He gave expression to the hatred of the Greek residents at Alexandria against the Jews, whom they regarded as an inferior race, but with whom they were obliged to live on evil terms of citizenship owing to the liberal pelicy of Alexander, which had been continued-by the Ptolemies, and was confirmed by Julius Caesar. So when deputations were -being sent to the Emperor Gains from the contending nationalities, headed on the Jewish side by Phil% it was Apion who was chosen to plead the Muni.) of the Greeks. This he did effectively, if unscrupulously, by poisoning the mind of the mad Emperor against the impious nation who refused to worship him. Apion was also the author of a treatise against theJews, which is now lc/Iowa to tbe world only through the reply of Jompbus. Another work of his was an account of the marvels of Egypt, which is often referred to by other writers. One of the state- ments contained in this work was that in the writer's ewn time there was a colossal statue of Seraph; in emerald, nine cubits high (Plin., "N. H.," XXXVII. (19)). Perhaps we may be infected with Jewish prejudice against Apion, but we should suspect that emerald of being false. Another story, however, related by Apion on his own knowledge, is more germane to our present purpose, rinse it also contains a surprising piece of natural history. In the fifth book ef his work on Egypt he somehow found occasion to mention that a delphin had fallen in love with ft boy named Hyacinth. lie bad seen the thing himself in the Bay of Putgoli. With a flutter of the soul within and a careful folding of the spines without, lest they might hurt the beloved's flesh, the delphin 'would receive the boy on his back and carry him for a distance of some twenty.five miles. The course of true love did. not, however, run smooth, for the boy fell ill and died. The dolphin came day after day to their usnal trysting.place op the shore, but never again finding the boy there to meet him in the ripples, pined away and died. His dead body was found one day on the shore and buried by those who were aware of the circumstances in the tomb of the boy whom he loved so well.
Why is it, we wonder, that stories with fishes in them are always such a trial to our faith. And is that the explanation ef the slang word" fishy " ? The fish seems to have the same deleterious effect on human veracity that the horse has on human honesty. "It's nae that the fushes are bigger up there," says Punch's Scotohman, "but we're nae such leears down here." The present writer has, when staying in a river- side inn, known a barbel grow several pounds in weight in the interval between one narration of its capture and another. But a wider experience than our own testifies to the "tall- ness" of stories about fishes, or, to be more zoologically exact, about marine animals. There is a fish in the story of Jonah, there is a fish in the story of Tobit, there is a fish in the story of Arlon, there is a fish in the story of Polycrates and his ring,--the induction might be carried on indefinitely. Apion's little story, therefore, about the dolphin does not increase the credibility of his story about the lion. But what of that ? The lion story does not, therefore, please us less. It is One of the things which ought to be true, if they are not. The real moral of the matter goes to confirm Bacon's remark with a difference, showing how an effective bit of fiction floats down the stream of time, while many weightier matters go to the bottom.
The Jews, as we have seen, had no reason to love Apion. In a work which Eusebius ("H. E.," III., 88) speaks of as having appeared "quite the other day," some Jewish Christians had their revenge on him by representing him as the disciple and companion of Simon Magus, for which there is at all events this much ground, that magic and necromancy are ascribed to him by Pliny, who when a young man had himself seen him ("N. H.," XXX. (6) ). The writer of the same Jewish-Christian romance also took revenge on St. Paul by introducing certain features which obviously belong to him into the portrait of Simon Hague. The hatred displayed against St. Paul seemed so fresh that some German theologians jumped to the conclusion that there must have been sources of the work in question going back to the first century. If that were so, we might be inclined to regard the connexion between Apion and Simon Magus as historical But the Jews are a secular people, and a century or two does not count for much in their animosities. They still annually execrate the memory of Haman.
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