throwing up the loose sand with my sword, I committed the corpse of the holy man to the embrace of earth. I replaced the stone, and led away the weeping Athanasia.

We retraced once more our steps, hearing, for a long while after we had left the sepulchre, the song of the hideous witch singing alone amidst the darkness. Once again we breathed the air of heaven; I dipped my hands into the fountain, lest Sabinus should observe unnecessarily the bloody stains; I returned my sword into its scabbard, and prepared to obey at length the earnest entreaties of the Centurion,

As we came forth from the thicket, within whose circuit all these things had occurred, we heard the neighing of a horse, and I was at first inclined to hasten the more the steps of our flight. But Sabinus insisted on our waiting for a moment, and walked aside towards the point from which the sound proceeded. When he came back, he was leading in his hand two horses fully caparisoned; "We must not stand upon

trifles," said he, "we must make free to mount." I placed Athanasia on one of them, and vaulted on behind her. Sabinus mounted the other, and dashing into a rapid pace, we soon drew near, without having met with any interruption, to the Ostian Gate; for by that, the Centurion said, we should most easily strike into the right path to the Valerian villa, where all our friends were expecting us.

The soldiers who were on guard at the gate challenged us cheerily as we came up to them.

"The word, comrades ?"

"Titus!" quoth the Centurion.

"Pass on-whom bear you with you,

comrades ?"

I.

"A Christian-a Christian prisoner," said

"By Jove, that's worth gold to you, brother," quoth the guard." Open the gate there;-pass on, friends,-and may a curse

go with your burden-I hope I shall have luck one day myself."

The Ostian Gate closed behind us, and we proceeded at a fiery pace westwards, till all the light of the suburbs was left in our

rear.

CHAPTER XII.

We rode in silence thus swiftly, till we had advanced, it may be, four or five miles on the road towards Ostium.

It was then, that on gaining the brow of an eminence more considerable than any we had yet come to, we halted for a moment, as if instinctively. On looking backwards we could still discover, by the now clear and perfect moonlight, the mighty masses of the Eternal City rising black against the horizon, high above all the intervening expanse of gardens and groves. I paused, to regard for the last time the gigantic outline, and heard, borne soft and

sweet through the serene air, the far off melancholy voice of the horn, announcing to the Prætorians the changing of the watch. The martial music of the villages around responded in succession to the note sounded from the Capitol. And then again all was silence, save the night breeze sighing among the poplars, with which our path was skirted.

"Farewell to Rome!" whispered Athanasia-" my heart tells me, Caius, that we have had our last look of the city."

I pressed the maiden to my bosom, and we continued our course down the hill, and were soon buried among the darkness of my paternal woods.

66

Perhaps you are not aware," said the Centurion, who by this time had quite recovered himself, "that we are now riding through your own domain. Many a time, Valerius, have I hunted for bird's nests, when I was a boy, among these fine oak woods; little did I think then, that I should