t this time escape the fate that awaits him;' and the
two men separated. Aurelia, who seemed to have been reflecting, said to
her companion: 'Jane, I cannot express to you what I experience from the
words of this young man. At one time so simple, tender and elevated, at
another satirical and threatening, they penetrate my heart. They are, to
my mind, like a new world that is opening; for to us, poor heathens, the
word charity is new. Far from being appeased, my curiosity, my interest,
increase, and whatever may happen, I will follow you; what matter, after
all, if we do return to our dwellings after daybreak?'

Hearing her mistress thus speak, Genevieve was very happy, for thinking
of her brother slaves of Gaul, she, too, felt a great desire to hear
more of the words of the young Nazarene, the friend and liberator of
captives. At the moment of quitting the tavern with her mistress and
the charitable wife of the seigneur Chusa, Genevieve was the witness of
a scene that proved to her how speedily the word of Jesus had borne its
fruit. Magdalen, the handsome, repentant courtezan, habited in the old
woollen mantle of a poor woman, exchanged for such rich attire,
Magdalen, following the anxious crowd behind Jesus, struck her foot
against a stone in the street, tottered, and would have fallen to the
ground but for the assistance of Jane and Aurelia, who, fortunately,
being close to her, hastened to support her.

'What! you, Jane, the wife of the Seigneur Chusa?' said the courtezan,
reddening with confusion, thinking, no doubt, of the rich presents she
had received from Chusa: 'you, Jane, you have no fear in tendering me a
helping hand; I, a poor creature justly despised by all honest women?'

'Magdalen,' replied Jane with charming kindness: 'did not our young
master tell you to go in peace, and that all your sins would be remitted
you, because you have loved much? By what right should I be more severe
than Jesus of Nazareth? Your hand, Magdalen, your hand; 'tis a sister
who asks it of you as a sign of pardon and oblivion of the past!'

Magdalen took the hand that Jane offered her, but it was to kiss it with
respect, and cover it with tears of repentance.

'Ah! Jane,' said quietly to her friend Genevieve's mistress; 'the young
man of Nazareth would be gratified to see you practice his precepts so
generously.'

Jane, Aurelia and Magdalen, following the crowd, were soon outside of
the gates of Jerusalem.

The sun, now ris