Belisarius (whose mother died about this time) grew to be a tall, strong lad, with great breadth of shoulder. His features were noble and regular, his hair black, thick, and curly, and he had a frank smile and a clear laugh. Only from his cheek-bones, which were somewhathigh, would his barbarian descent have been guessed. At school he satisfied his masters with the lively attention he gave his studies, and his schoolfellows with his courage and skill in wrestling and football. He was also a strong swimmer. He formed a small troop of young cavalrymen from the elder boys of the school, supplying them with cobs from his estate if they could not afford to mount themselves, and trained them in his uncle's park. They exercised chiefly in archery and lance-work upon stuffed sacks hung from the boughs of an oak. But they did not omit to engage in tourneys and skirmishes with one another, using blunt weapons; and even in miniature sea-battles from boats on the River Hebrus that runs past the city of Adrianople. Thus they became proficient soldiers before they went to train at the cadet-school at Constantinople, as they all did in a body – disdaining to enter the Civil Service. Some of them, the sons of tradesmen and debarred by decree from leaving their hereditary occupations, had first to buy exemption with bribes at the Palace.
I have alrcady written something about Belisarius's uncle, Modestus, with his Roman ways and his strained rhetorical talk full of puns and recondite allusions. I met him once only, nearly sixty years ago, but my memory of that occasion was often afterwards refreshed by Belisarius, one of whose favourite diversions in private was to mimic Modestus and make my mistress Antonina laugh. I have also inherited a volume of Modestus's poems and another of his painfully composed letters, in the style of Pliny, both of which are inscribed with a dedication to Belisarius. Moreover, when I was in Rome during the siege I met many noble Romans who spoke and behaved in very much the same manner as he, so I know the type well.
The scene is the dining-room of Modestus's villa. There are present: Modestus himself, the burgess Simeon, Malthus the schoolmaster, three other local dignitaries, Bessas (a big, tough Gothic cavalry officer quartered in the town), Symmachus (an Athenian professor of philosophy), Belisarius, now fourteen years of age, with Rufinus and Armenian John and Uliaris and Palaeologus the tutor. Everything is arranged exactly in the old Roman style, for Modestus is an antiquarian and makes no mistakes: he can justify everything by quotation fromsomc Latin author or other of the Golden Age. His guests feel a trifle self-conscious, especially Simeon, who is a convinced Christian and somewhat scandalized by the lasciviousness of the painted frieze that runs between windows and ceiling – the subject being Bacchus, God of Wine, on his drunken return from India. In deference to the wishes that Modestus has expressed in his letter of invitation, most of his guests are dressed, Roman-fashion, in long, white, short-sleeved woollen tunics. But the burgess Simeon is true to the smoky woollen blouse and loose pantaloons that every ordinary inhabitant of Thrace wears, who is not a cleric; and Bessas wears a linen tunic with broad vertical stripes of yellow, green, and red, and breeches of sewn skins, because he is a Goth. Bessas also wears a brownish-yellow military cloak fastened with a large amethyst brooch that sparkles magnificently when it catches the light.
They recline on couches at a round table of ancient sumach-wood; which Bessas finds awkward, being accustomed to sit up to the military board on a hard bench. He envies the boys, who, since they are not yet of age, are provided with chairs, not couches; they sit at a side-table. It is four o'clock now, by Modestus's water-clock, of which he is so proud and which keeps such poor time, and Greek servants bring in the appetizers – dishes of olives, chopped leeks, young onions, tunny-fish in vinegar, prawns, sliced sausage, lettuce, shell-fish. Mal-thus has been appointed wine-master, but Bessas's high military rank entitles him to the consular seat at the tip of the crescent in which they recline. Symmachus the philosopher resents that the principal honours should go to the brownish-yellow cloak of Bessas, a barbarian, rather than to his own grey professorial cloak; but does not dare to show his feelings openly.
