rom the street and
disappeared through the doorway of the sacred place.

The rain poured down more thickly than before; the thunder, once
aroused, now sounded in deep and frequent peals as Antonina raised
herself from the ground and looked around her, in momentary expectation
that the dreaded form of Ulpius must meet her eyes. No living creature
was visible in the street. The forsaken slave still reclined near the
wall of the house where she had first appeared when the Pagan gained
the approaches to the temple; but she now lay there dead. No fresh
bands of robbers appeared in sight. An uninterrupted solitude
prevailed in all directions as far as the eye could reach.

At the moment when Ulpius had relinquished his grasp of her hand,
Antonina had sunk to the ground, helpless and resigned, but not
exhausted beyond all power of sensation or all capacity for thought.
While she lay on the cold pavement of the street, her mind still
pursued its visions of a speedy death, and a tranquil life-in-death to
succeed it in a future state. But, as minute after minute elapsed, and
no harsh voice sounded in her ear, no pitiless hand dragged her from
the ground, no ominous footsteps were audible around her, a change
passed gradually over her thoughts; the instinct of self-preservation
slowly revived within her, and, as she raised herself to look forth on
the gloomy prospect, the chances of uninterrupted flight and present
safety presented by the solitude of the street, aroused her like a
voice of encouragement, like an unexpected promise of help.

Her perception of outer influences returned; she felt the rain that
drenched her garments; she shuddered at the thunder sounding over her
head; she marked with horror the dead bodies lying before her on the
stones. An overpowering desire animated her to fly from the place, to
escape from the desolate scene around, even though she should sink
exhausted by the effort in the next street. Slowly she arose--her limbs
trembled with a premature infirmity; but she gained her feet. She
tottered onward, turning her back on the river, passed bewildered
between long rows of deserted houses, and arrived opposite a public
garden surrounding a little summer-house, whose deserted portico
offered both concealment and shelter. Here, therefore, she took
refuge, crouching in the darkest corner of the building, and hiding her
face in her hands, as if to shut out all view of the dreary though
altered sc