olling to the baths stood curiously for a while to
watch one of the rapidly increasing sect of Christians, who leaned from
a balcony over the street and exhorted a polyglot crowd of freedmen,
slaves and idlers. He was bearded, brown-skinned from exposure, brown-
robed, scrawny, vehement.

"Peculiar times!" one merchant said. "If you and I should cause a crowd
to gather while we prated about refusal to do homage to the gods--of
whom mind you, the emperor is one, and not the least--"

"But let us listen," said the other.

The man's voice was resonant. He used no tricks of oratory such as
Romans over-valued, and was not too careful in the choice of phrases.
The Greek idiom he used was unadorned--the language of the market-place
and harbor-front. He made his points directly, earnestly, not arguing
but like a guide to far-off countries giving information:

"Slaves--freedmen--masters--all are equal before God, and on the last
day all shall rise up from the dead--"

A loiterer heckled him:

"Hah! The crucified too?--what about Maternus?"

The preacher, throwing up his right hand, snatched at opportunity:

"There were two thieves crucified, one on either hand, as I have told
you. To the one was said: 'This day shalt thou be with me in
paradise'; but to the other nothing. Nevertheless, all shall rise up
from the dead on the last day--you, and your friends, and the wise and
the fools, and the slave and the free--aye, and Maternus also--"

One merchant grinned to the other:

"Yet I think it was on the first night that Maternus rose up! They
stiffen if they stay a whole night on the cross. If he could walk to
Daphne three nights later, he had not been crucified many hours. Come,
let us go to the baths before the crowd gets there. If one is late
those insolent attendants lose one's clothing, and there is no chance
whatever of getting a good soft-handed slave to rub one down. Don't you
hate to be currycombed by a rascal with corns on his fingers?"

V. ROME--THE THERMAE OF TITUS

There were even birds, to fill the air with music. All the known world,
and the far-away mysterious lands of which Alexander's followers had
started legends multiplying centuries ago, had contributed to Rome's
adornment; plunder and trade goods drifted through in spite of
distances. The city had become the vortex of the energy, virility and
vice of east and west--a glory of marble and gilded cornices, of domes
and spir