pit, which, without causing death, yet hastened its
approach. Of this I need not speak, because, for whatever reason, it was
not practised on this occasion. The former, which seems to have been due
to the milder nature of Judaism, and which was derived from a happy
piece of rabbinic exegesis on Prov. xxxi. 6, consisted in giving to the
condemned, immediately before his execution, a draught of wine medicated
with some powerful opiate. It had been the custom of wealthy ladies in
Jerusalem to provide this stupefying potion at their own expense, and
they did so quite irrespectively of their sympathy for any individual
criminal. It was probably taken freely by the two malefactors, but when
they offered it to Jesus he would not take it. The refusal was an act of
sublimest heroism. The effect of the draught was to dull the nerves, to
cloud the intellect, to provide an anaesthetic against some part at least
of the lingering agonies of that dreadful death. But he, whom some
modern sceptics have been base enough to accuse of feminine feebleness
and cowardly despair, preferred rather "to look Death in the face"--to
meet the king of terrors without striving to deaden the force of one
agonizing anticipation, or to still the throbbing of one lacerated
nerve.

The three crosses were laid on the ground--that of Jesus, which was
doubtless taller than the other two, being placed in bitter scorn in the
midst. Perhaps the cross-beam was now nailed to the upright, and
certainly the title, which had either been borne by Jesus fastened round
his neck or carried by one of the soldiers in front of him, was now
nailed to the summit of his cross. Then he was stripped naked of all his
clothes, and then followed the most awful moment of all. He was laid
down upon the implement of torture. His arms were stretched along the
cross-beams; and at the centre of the open palms the point of a huge
iron nail was placed, which, by the blow of a mallet, was driven home
into the wood. Then through either foot separately, or possibly through
both together as they were placed one over the other, another huge nail
tore its way through the quivering flesh. Whether the sufferer was
_also_ bound to the cross we do not know; but, to prevent the hands and
feet being torn away by the weight of the body, which could not "rest
upon nothing but four great wounds," there was, about the centre of the
cross, a wooden projection strong enough to support, at least in part, a
h