re he looks innocent enough."

"He _is_ innocent," replied her neighbour, who kept a stall for the sale
of figs and olives. "'Tis that wretch who is wicked," looking fiercely
at the Prefect as he moved from the court.

"You are right," said a grave-looking man, speaking low, but with a look
of secret understanding; "but be careful. You can do the brave Lucius no
good, and may betray the others into jeopardy," and he passed swiftly
through the throng.

"'Tis time all these Atheists were exterminated," said Furbo, a sort of
hanger-on at the neighbouring temple of Saturn. "The gods are angry, and
the victims give sinister auspices. To-day when the priest slew the ram
for the sacrifice, would you believe it? it had no heart; and the sacred
chickens refused their food."

"And they certainly are to blame for the floods of the Tiber, which
destroyed all the olives and lentils in my shop," said Fronto, the oil
and vegetable seller.

"And the rain rusted all the wheat on our farm," said Macer, the
villicus or land-steward.

"And the fever has broken out afresh in the Suburra," croaked a withered
old Egyptian crone, like a living mummy, who told fortunes and sold
spells in that crowded and pest-smitten quarter, where the poor swarmed
like flies.

"And the drought has blighted all the vines," echoed Demetrius, the
wine-merchant.

"I never knew trade so dull," whined Ephraim, the Jewish money-lender.
"We'll never have good times again till these accursed Christians are
all destroyed."

"So say I," "And I," "And I," shouted one after another of the mob, till
the wild cry rang round the Forum, _"Christiani adleones"_--"The
Christians to the lions."[18]

[Illustration]

FOOTNOTES:

[16] Euseb. Hist Eccles., viii. 7.

[17] "Salt me the more, that I may be incorruptible," said Tarachus, the
martyr, as he underwent this excruciating torture.

[18] "If the Tiber overflows its banks," says Tertullian, "or if the
Nile does not; if there be drought or earthquakes, famine or pestilence,
the cry is raised, 'the Christians to the lions.' But I pray you," he
adds, in refutation of these absurd charges, "were misfortunes unknown
before Tiberius? The true God was not worshipped when Hannibal conquered
at Cann[ae], or the Gauls filled the city."--Tertul. _Apol._, x.

CHAPTER VI.

THE MARTYR'S BURIAL.

The fawning Greek Isidorus had stealthily wormed his way into the
confidence of Faustus, a servant of Adauctus, by pr