So saying, he moved away toward the lower vaults, where are the cages of the beasts, and I passed on and ascended the flight of steps leading to that part of the interior where it is the custom of Aurelian to sit. The Emperor was not as yet arrived, but the amphitheatre, in every part of it, was already filled with its countless thousands. All were seated idly conversing, or gazing about as at the ordinary sports of the place. The hum of so many voices struck the ear like the distant roar of the ocean. How few of those thousands--not one perhaps--knew for what it was that Probus and his companions were now about to suffer a most cruel and abhorred death! They knew that their name was Christian, and that Christian was of the same meaning as enemy of the gods and of the empire; but what it was which made the Christian so willing to die, why it was he was so ready to come to that place of horror and give up his body to the beasts--this they knew not. It was to them a riddle they could not read. And they sat and looked on with the same vacant unconcern, or with the same expectation of pleasure, as if they were to witness the destruction of murderers and assassins. This would not have been so, had that class of the citizens of Rome, or any of them, been present, who, regarding us with favor, and hoping that somewhat might yet come of our religion advantageous to the world, maintain a neutral position. These were not there; owing, both to their disinclination to witness scenes so brutalizing, and to apprehensions lest they should be betrayed into words or acts of sympathy, that might lead to their being confounded with the obnoxious tribe, and exposed to the like dangers. All, therefore, within the embrace of those wide-spreading walls were of one heart and one mind. While I sat waiting the coming of the Emperor, and surrounded by those whom I knew not nor had ever seen, one who occupied a part of the same seat, accompanied by his wife and daughters, said to me, ''Tis to be hoped, sir, that so terrible an example as this will have its effect in deterring others from joining this dangerous superstition, and not only that, but strike so wholesome a terror into those who already profess it, that they shall at once abandon it, and so the general massacre of them not be necessary; which, indeed, I should be loth to witness in the streets of Rome.' 'If you knew,' I replied, 'for what it is these people are condemned to such sufferings, you would not, I am sure, express yourself in that manner. You know, I may presume, only what common report has brought to your ears.'