some of the drivers are more in favor than others; and then
the discovery follows that nearly every individual on the benches,
women and children as well as men, wears a color, most frequently a
ribbon upon the breast or in the hair: now it is green, now yellow,
now blue; but, searching the great body carefully, it is manifest
that there is a preponderance of white, and scarlet and gold.

In a modern assemblage called together as this one is, particularly
where there are sums at hazard upon the race, a preference would be
decided by the qualities or performance of the horses; here, however,
nationality was the rule. If the Byzantine and Sidonian found small
support, it was because their cities were scarcely represented
on the benches. On their side, the Greeks, though very numerous,
were divided between the Corinthian and the Athenian, leaving but
a scant showing of green and yellow. Messala's scarlet and gold
would have been but little better had not the citizens of Antioch,
proverbially a race of courtiers, joined the Romans by adopting the
color of their favorite. There were left then the country people,
or Syrians, the Jews, and the Arabs; and they, from faith in the
blood of the sheik's four, blent largely with hate of the Romans,
whom they desired, above all things, to see beaten and humbled,
mounted the white, making the most noisy, and probably the most
numerous, faction of all.

As the charioteers move on in the circuit, the excitement increases;
at the second goal, where, especially in the galleries, the white is
the ruling color, the people exhaust their flowers and rive the air
with screams.

"Messala! Messala!"

"Ben-Hur! Ben-Hur!"

Such are the cries.

Upon the passage of the procession, the factionists take their
seats and resume conversation.

"Ah, by Bacchus! was he not handsome?" exclaims a woman, whose
Romanism is betrayed by the colors flying in her hair.

"And how splendid his chariot!" replies a neighbor, of the same
proclivities. "It is all ivory and gold. Jupiter grant he wins!"

The notes on the bench behind them were entirely different.

"A hundred shekels on the Jew!"

The voice is high and shrill.

"Nay, be thou not rash," whispers a moderating friend to the speaker.
"The children of Jacob are not much given to Gentile sports, which are
too often accursed in the sight of the Lord."

"True, but saw you ever one more cool and assured? And what an
arm he has!"

"And what hors