Never, Fausta, I feel assured, did Aurelian commission Varus with such an errand. Fallen though he be, he has not yet fallen to that lowest deep. Varus doubtless hoped to prevail over Probus by his base proposals, and by such triumph raise his fortunes yet higher with Aurelian. It was a game worth playing--so he judged, and perhaps wisely--and worth a risk. For doubtless one apostate of the rank of Probus would have been of more avail to them, as Probus said to him, than a thousand slain. For nothing do the judges so weary themselves, and exhaust their powers of persuasion, as to induce the Christians who are brought before them to renounce their faith. So desirous are they of this, that they have caused, in many instances, those who were no Christians to be presented at their tribunals, who have then, after being threatened with torture and death, renounced a faith which they never professed. Once and again has this farce been acted before the Roman people. Their real triumphs of this sort have as yet been very few; and the sensation which they produced was swallowed up and lost in the glory--in the eyes even of the strangers who are in Rome--which has crowned us in the steadfast courage with which our people have remained quietly in their homes, throughout all this dreadful preparation, and then, when the hour of trial drew nigh, and they were placed at the bar of the judge, and were accused of their religion, confessed the charge, boasted of it, and then took their way to the prison, from which, they well knew, death only would deliver them. * * * * * That, Fausta, which we have long feared and looked for, has come to pass, and Probus, our more than friend, our benefactor, and almost our parent, is, by the Emperor, condemned to death; not, as from the words of Varus it might be supposed, to the same torments as those to which Macer was made subject; but to be thrown to the beasts in the Flavian, a death more merciful than that, but yet full of horror. How is it that, in the Roman, mercy seems dead, and the human nature, which he received from the gods, changed to that of the most savage beast!