E UNKNOWN GOD.

Ye worship in ignorance the same Deity I serve.
To you unknown till now, to you be it now revealed."

'Then declared that solemn man how this great Maker of all things, who
had appointed unto man his several tribes and his various homes--the
Lord of earth and the universal heaven, dwelt not in temples made with
hands; that His presence, His spirit, were in the air we breathed--our
life and our being were with Him. "Think you," he cried, "that the
Invisible is like your statues of gold and marble? Think you that He
needeth sacrifice from you: He who made heaven and earth?" Then spoke he
of fearful and coming times, of the end of the world, of a second rising
of the dead, whereof an assurance had been given to man in the
resurrection of the mighty Being whose religion he came to preach.

'When he thus spoke, the long-pent murmur went forth, and the
philosophers that were mingled with the people, muttered their sage
contempt; there might you have seen the chilling frown of the Stoic, and
the Cynic's sneer; and the Epicurean, who believeth not even in our own
Elysium, muttered a pleasant jest, and swept laughing through the crowd:
but the deep heart of the people was touched and thrilled; and they
trembled, though they knew not why, for verily the stranger had the
voice and majesty of a man to whom "The Unknown God" had committed the
preaching of His faith.'

Ione listened with wrapt attention, and the serious and earnest manner
of the narrator betrayed the impression that he himself had received
from one who had been amongst the audience that on the hill of the
heathen Mars had heard the first tidings of the word of Christ!

Chapter VI

THE PORTER. THE GIRL. AND THE GLADIATOR.

THE door of Diomed's house stood open, and Medon, the old slave, sat at
the bottom of the steps by which you ascended to the mansion. That
luxurious mansion of the rich merchant of Pompeii is still to be seen
just without the gates of the city, at the commencement of the Street of
Tombs; it was a gay neighborhood, despite the dead. On the opposite
side, but at some yards nearer the gate, was a spacious hostelry, at
which those brought by business or by pleasure to Pompeii often stopped
to refresh themselves. In the space before the entrance of the inn now
stood wagons, and carts, and chariots, some just arrived, some just
quitting, in all the bustle of an animated and popular resort of public
entertainment. B