ads and arms; some of them were
intoxicated, and most of them were women.

"Why have you not been worshipping, young fellow?" said one.

"Comely built," said another, "but struck by the furies. I know the cut of
him."

"By Astarte," said a third, "he's one of those sly Gnostics! I have seen
the chap before, with his hangdog look. He is one of Pluto's whelps, first
cousin to Cerberus, and his name's Channibal."

On which they all began to shout out, "I say, Channibal, Channibal, here's
a lad that knows you. Old fellow, come along with us;" and the speaker
made a dash at him.

On this Agellius, who was slowly making his way past them on the broken
and steep path, leapt up in two or three steps to the ridge, and went away
in security; when one woman cried out, "O the toad, I know him now; he is
a wizard; he eats little children; didn't you see him make that sign? it's
a charm. My sister did it; the fool left me to be one of them. She was
ever doing so" (mimicking the sign of the cross). "He's a Christian,
blight him! he'll turn us into beasts."

"Cerberus, bite him!" said another, "he sucks blood;" and taking up a
stone, she made it whiz past his ear as he disappeared from view. A
general scream of contempt and hatred followed. "Where's the ass's head?
put out the lights, put out the lights! gibbet him! that's why he has not
been with honest people down in the vale." And then they struck up a
blasphemous song, the sentiments of which we are not going even to
conceive, much less to attempt in words.

CHAPTER II.

CHRISTIANITY IN SICCA.

The revellers went on their way; Agellius went on his, and made for his
lowly and lonely cottage. He was the elder of the two sons of a Roman
legionary of the Secunda Italica, who had settled with them in Sicca,
where he lost their mother, and died, having in his old age become a
Christian. The fortitude of some confessors at Carthage in the persecution
of Severus had been the initial cause of his conversion. He had been
posted as one of their guards, and had attended them to the scene of their
martyrdom, in addition to the civil force, to whom in the proconsulate the
administration of the law was committed. Therefore, happily for him, it
could not fall to his duty to be their executioner, a function which,
however revolting to his feelings, he might not have had courage to
decline. He remained a pagan, though he