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Then Esther clasped her hands in glad surprise; then Sanballat, smiling, offered his hundred sestertii a second time without a taker; and then the Romans began to doubt, thinking Messala might have found an equal, if not a master, and that in an Israelite! And now, racing together side by side, a narrow interval between them, the two neared the second goal.
"If I return, I will seek my sestertii again; if I am not victor, I will not return. Hang the crown in thy atrium." To the company he opened his arms, and they came one by one and received his parting embrace. "The gods go with thee, O Quintus!" they said. "Farewell," he replied.
The Romans who were to sail the next day had collected their back pay and were determined to leave their sestertii in the port of Saguntum; the Carthaginians boasted of their Republic, the richest in the world, and other mariners praised their masters, ever generous when they touched that port where business was excellent.
Over these parts of the programme Ben-Hur sped with rapid eyes. At last he came to the announcement of the race. He read it slowly. Attending lovers of the heroic sports were assured they would certainly be gratified by an Orestean struggle unparalleled in Antioch. The city offered the spectacle in honor of the consul. One hundred thousand sestertii and a crown of laurel were the prizes.
It was arranged then that a messenger should go at night to Thord's lodging-place with the four thousand sestertii. When they were done, the giant knocked at the front door; it opened to him; and, passing out of the atrium, he led Ben-Hur into a room adjoining, where the latter completed his attire from the coarse garments of the dead pugilist. They separated directly in the Omphalus.
I offered publicly in the market-place five thousand sestertii for a living cock and hen, but was told that the race had long since been exterminated, and that, as money would no longer buy food, money was no longer desired by the poorest beggar in Rome. There is no more even of the hay I yesterday purchased to be obtained for the most extravagant bribes.
Three sestertii equal to about sixpence sterling, was the price which the republic paid for the modius or peck of the tithe wheat of Sicily. This price, however, was probably below the average market price, the obligation to deliver their wheat at this rate being considered as a tax upon the Sicilian farmers.
Glass in every graceful form and design, some heavy and crystalline, enriched with ornate workmanship by cutter and engraver, some delicate and fragile as a soap-bubble; hock-glasses as green and lucent as sea-water, and with an edge not too thick to part the lips of Titania; glasses of amber, that should turn pale Johannisberger to the true vino d'oro; glasses of glowing ruby tint, than which Bohemia sends us nothing finer; vases and goblets as rare in form and wrought as skilfully as those two cups that Nero bought for six thousand sestertii; medallions bearing in intaglio portraits of distinguished men as clearly and unmistakably cut as on coin or cameo; whole services of glass, more beautiful and almost as valuable as services of plate; plumes of spun glass as fine and sheeny as softest silk; toys and scientific playthings; objects of wonder, admiration, and curiosity: all these were to be seen crowded upon these long, white tables in the cool hall, where the wind, sweeping gently through, brought the smell of the rising tide, and the sound of its waves upon the shore.
"Well, if I put on his tunic, and dress him in these clothes of mine, and you and I go away together, leaving him here, can you not get your sestertii from Messala all the same? You have only to make him believe it me that is dead." Thord laughed till the tears ran into his mouth. "Ha, ha, ha! Ten thousand sestertii were never won so easily.
"Nay, Malluch," said Ben-Hur, "a Roman will wager only in his Roman coin. Suppose you find your friend to-night, and place to his order sestertii in such amount as you choose. And look you, Malluch let him be instructed to seek wagers with Messala and his supporters; Ilderim's four against Messala's." Malluch reflected a moment. "The effect will be to centre interest upon your contest."
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