of the
Judicial gate; the calmness of the partizans of this rebel may be only
apparent, and once arrived in the quarter of this vile populace, they
may rise to release Jesus. I can answer for the courage of my brave
soldiers; they have, already, this morning, after a deadly combat, put
to flight an immense troop of determined vagabonds, commanded by a
bandit named Banaias, who would have forced us to deliver up Jesus. Not
one of those wretches escaped, despite their furious resistance.'

'The base liar!' said Genevieve to herself on hearing this bragging
officer of militia, who continued:

'Still, Seigneur Caiphus, despite the proved courage of our militia, it
would be prudent, perhaps, to confide the escort of the Nazarene to the
place of execution, to the Roman guard.'

'I am of your opinion,' replied the high priest: 'I will go and ask one
of the officers of Pilate to keep the Nazarene a prisoner in the guard
room of the Roman cohorts until the hour of execution.'

Genevieve then saw, whilst the high priest went to converse with
Pilate's officer, the chief of the militia approach Jesus; presently she
heard this officer, replying probably to some words of the young man,
say to him in a cruel and jesting tone: 'You are in a great hurry to
stretch yourself on the cross. They must first make it, and it is not
made in the twinkling of an eye. You ought to know this better than any
one, in your quality of a former journeyman carpenter.'

One of the officers of Pontius Pilate, to whom the high priest had
spoken, then came to Jesus and said to him: 'I am come to conduct you to
the guard-room of our soldiers: when the cross is ready, they will bring
it, and under our escort you shall start for Calvary! follow us!'

And Jesus, still bound, was conducted to a short distance off, by the
militia, to the court where the Roman soldiers lodged; the door, before
which paced a sentinel, being open, several persons who had, like
Genevieve, followed the Nazarene remained outside to see what was about
to happen.

When the young man was brought to the court of the guard-house (or
praetorium), the Roman soldiers were scattered in different groups: some
were cleaning their arms; others were playing at different games; some
were practising with the lance under the inspection of an officer;
others, extended on benches in the sun, were singing or conversing
amongst themselves. She recognized, from their faces bronzed by the sun,
from t