y dead, wended slowly the solemn
procession. There was no wailing of the pagan _n[ae]nia_ or funeral dirge,
neither was there the chanting of the Christian hymn. But in silence, or
with only whispered utterance, they reached the door of the private
grounds of the Villa Marcella.

First the bodies were borne to the villa, where, by loving hands, the
stains of dust and blood were washed away. Then, robed in white and
bestrewn with flowers, they were placed on the biers in the marble
atriun. Again the good presbyter Primitius read the words of life as at
the burial of Lucius, the martyr,[53] and vows and prayers were offered
up to God.

While this solemn service was in progress, a lady, deeply-veiled, was
seen to be agitated by violent grief. Convulsive sobs shook her frame,
and her tears fell fast. When the forms of the martyrs were uncovered,
that their friends might take their last farewell, the Empress Valeria,
for it was she, flung herself on her knees beside the body of the late
slave maiden, and rained tears of deep emotion on her face. More lovely
in death than in life, the fine-cut features seemed like the most
exquisite work of the sculptor carved in translucent alabaster. A crown
of asphodel blossoms the emblems of immortality--encircled her brow, and
a palm branch--the symbol of the martyr's victory--was placed upon her
breast.

"Give her an honoured place among the holy dead," said the Empress, amid
her sobs, to the venerable Primitius.

"I have given orders," said the Lady Marcella, "that she, with her
father and brother, shall sleep side by side in the chamber prepared as
the last resting-place for my own family. We shall count it a precious
privilege, in God's own good time, to be laid to rest near the dust of
His holy confessors and martyrs."

"Aurelius shall share the tomb," said Hilarus, the fossor, "which he
made for himself while yet alive, beside his noble wife, Aurelia
Theudosia."

"Be it mine to honour with a memorial tablet the remains of my good
master Adauctus," said Faustus, the freedman, with deep emotion.[54]

"It shall be my privilege," said the Empress, "to provide for my beloved
handmaiden, as a mark of the great love I bore her, a memorial of her
saintly virtues; and let her bear my name in death as in life, so that
those who read her epitaph may know she was the freedwoman and friend of
an unhappy Empress."

The Empress Valeria now retired, and with her trusty escort, returned