The youth, who knew Latin imperfectly, was too much puzzled and confused to understand the objurgations addressed to him; but a crowd of idlers rapidly collected, and speaking to one of them, he was answered in Greek that the people of the neighbourhood had long been blamed for stealing the lead from the silversmiths. They had not done it, and were indignant at being falsely accused. And now, as he had been caught in the act, he would be haled off to the court of the City Prætor, and it would be likely to go hard with him. If he got off with thirty lashes he might think himself lucky. More probably he would be condemned to branding, or--since an example was needed--to the cross. The youth could only cry, and wring his hands, and protest his innocence; but his protests were met by the jeers of the crowd. ‘Ah!’ said one, ‘how will you like to have the three letters branded with a hot iron right across your forehead? That won’t make the girls like your face better.’ ‘Whose slave are you?’ asked another. ‘Won’t you catch it from your master! You’ll have to work chained in the slave-jail or at the mill, and may bid good-bye to the sunlight for a year or two at least.’ ‘Slave?’ said another. ‘I don’t believe he’s a slave. He looks too ragged and starved. He’s had no regular rations for a long time, I’ll be bound.’ ‘A runaway, I expect,’ said a third. ‘Well, anyhow he’ll have to give an account of himself, unless he likes to have a ride on the little horse,[31] or have his neck wedged tight into a wooden fork.’ ‘_Furcifer?_ Gallows-bird!’ cried others of the crowd. ‘And we honest citizens are to be accused of stealing because of his tricks!’ ‘It’s a sad pity, too,’ said a young woman; ‘for look how handsome he is with those dark Asiatic eyes!’ As most of these remarks had been poured out in voluble and slang Latin, the young Phrygian could only make out enough to know that he was in evil case; and, weakened as he was by exposure and insufficient food, he could but feebly plead for mercy, and protest that he had done no wrong. But the police had not dragged him far when they saw Pudens and Titus approaching them down the Viminal Hill, on which the centurion lived. At the sight of a centurion in the armour of the Prætorians, and a boy who wore a golden bulla, and whom some of them recognised as a son of the brave general Vespasian, the crowd made way. As they passed by, Titus noticed the youth’s distress, and, compassionate as usual, begged Pudens to ask what was the matter. The _vigiles_ briefly explained how they had seized their prisoner, who must have been guilty of the lead-stealing complained of, for the axe was in his hand, and no one else was near. ‘What have you to say for yourself?’ asked the centurion. ‘I am innocent,’ said the prisoner, in Greek; ‘the axe is not mine. I only picked it up to look at it. It must have been a young student who was using it, for I saw him run out of the Forum with his slave.’