everlasting happiness in the next. [Illustration: _Scenes from the History of Jonas._] The frequent repetition of the story of Jonas in a Christian cemetery needs no explanation, our Lord himself having put it forward as a type of His own resurrection, and so a pledge of ours also. The particular form, however, under which this story appears, was not suggested, as Noe’s ark was, by the place which it held in the cycle of Christian doctrine, but rather by a certain Pagan model with which the Romans of that day were very familiar. The mythological tale of Andromeda, and the sea-monster to which she was exposed on the coast near Joppa (for so the story ran), was a favourite subject for the decoration of the walls in Roman villas, temples, and other public buildings. It may be seen in Pompeii, and, much nearer to the Catacombs, in Rome itself—_e.g._, in the barracks of one of the cohorts of the imperial police, discovered a few years ago in Trastevere; and in both places the monster is the precise counterpart of that which is always represented as swallowing or casting up Jonas; a kind of dragon, with large head and ears, a long slender neck, and a very tortuous body. Of course, in the infancy of Christian art, it was convenient to have a model at hand to represent an unknown monster, and, as we have said, we do not doubt that this is the true history of its origin. Still this was not the only reason which recommended the adoption of so grotesque a form; it offered the further advantage of creating as strong a contrast as possible between this “great fish,” which was a type of death, and the ordinary fish, which, as we have seen, was the recognised symbol of the Author of life.