tance," answered Willis; "but you
are opening a large question which cannot be settled in a few words. If
I must speak, I should say this: I should begin with the assumption that
the existence of relics is not improbable; do you grant _that_?"

"I grant nothing," said Bateman; "but go on."

"Why you have plenty of heathen relics, which you admit. What is
Pompeii, and all that is found there, but one vast heathen relic? why
should there not be Christian relics in Rome and elsewhere as well as
pagan?"

"Of course, of course," said Bateman.

"Well, and relics may be identified. You have the tomb of the Scipios,
with their names on them. Did you find ashes in one of them, I suppose
you would be pretty certain that they were the ashes of a Scipio."

"To the point," cried Bateman, "quicker."

"St. Peter," continued Willis, "speaks of David, 'whose sepulchre is
with you unto this day.' Therefore it's nothing wonderful that a
religious relic should be preserved eleven hundred years, and identified
to be such, when a nation makes a point of preserving it."

"This is beating about the bush," cried Bateman impatiently; "get on
quicker."

"Let me go on my own way," said Willis--"then there is nothing
improbable, considering Christians have always been very careful about
the memorials of sacred things--"

"You've not proved that," said Bateman, fearing that some manoeuvre,
he could not tell what, was in progress.

"Well," said Willis, "you don't doubt it, I suppose, at least from the
fourth century, when St. Helena brought from the Holy Land the memorials
of our Lord's passion, and lodged them at Rome in the Basilica, which
was thereupon called Santa Croce. As to the previous times of
persecution, Christians, of course, had fewer opportunities of showing a
similar devotion, and historical records are less copious; yet, in spite
of this, its existence is as certain as any fact of history. They
collected the bones of St. Polycarp, the immediate disciple of St. John,
after he was burnt; as of St. Ignatius before him, after his exposure to
the beasts; and so in like manner the bones or blood of all the martyrs.
No one doubts it; I never heard of any one who did. So the disciples
took up the Baptist's body--it would have been strange if they had
not--and buried it 'in _the_ sepulchre,' as the Evangelist says,
speaking of it as known. Now, why should they not in like manner, and
even with greater reason, have rescued the bodie