A Roman Circus.

Te Aroha News, Volume 1, Issue 47, 26 April 1884, Page 5

A Roman Circus.

Rome is astir early — citizens and strangers, slaves and soldiers, all are hurrying toward the great pleasure-ground of Rome— the Circus Ma/rimus. With flutes playing merrily, with swaying standards and gleaming statues, with proud young cadets, with priests, and guards with crested helms, skilled performers, restless horses, and glittering chariots, down the Sacred street winds a long procession, led by the boy magistrate, Marcus of Home, the favourite of the Emperor. It passes into the great ! circus, and files into the arena ; two hundred thousand excited people— think, boys, of a circus-tent that holds two hundred thousand people ! — rise to their feet and welcome it with hearty hand-clapping. The trumpets sound the prelude, the young magistrate (standing in his mgcjestus, or state box) flings the mappa, or white flag, into the course as the signal for the start ; and, as a ringing shout goes up, four glittering chariots, rich in their decorations of gold and polished ivory, and each drawn by four plunging horses, burst from their arched stalls and dash around the track. Green, blue, red, white— the colours of the drivers —stream from their tunics. Around and around they go. Now one and now another is ahead. The people strain and cheer, and many a wager is laid as to the victor. Another shout ! The red chariot, turning too sharply, grates against the meta, or short pillar that stands at the upper end of the track guarding the low central wall ; the horses rear and plunge, the driver struggles manfully to control them, but all in vain ; over goes the ohariot, while the now maddened horses dash wildly on until checked by mounted attendants and led off to their stalls. " Blue ! blue !" " Green ! green !" rise the varying shouts, as the contending chariots still struggle for the lead. White is far behind. Now comes the seventh or final round. Blue leads ! No, green is ahead ! Neck and neck down the home stretch they go magnificently, and then the cheer of victory was heard, as, with a final dash, the green rider strikes the white cord first, and the race is won ! Now, in the interval between the races, come the athletic sports — foot-racing and wrestling, rope-dancing and high leaping, quoitthrowing and javelin matches. One man runt a race with a fleet Cappadocian horse ; another expert rider drives two bare-backed hordes twice round the track, leaping from back to back as the horses dash round. Can you see any very great difference between the circus performance of a.d. 138 and one of a.d. ISS4?— From "Historic Boys," by E. S. Brooks, in St. Nicholas.