"Nay, but the Friar speaks truth. Bear the old man away, Alessandro!" "Is Rome demented? Haste for the City Guards, Jacopo!" Fra Giuseppe swiftly tied the _pallio_ to his crucifix, and, waving the red cloth on high, "This is the true flag of Christ!" he cried. "This, the symbol of our brethren's martyrdom! See, 'tis the color of the blood He shed for us. Who is for Jesus, follow me!" "For Christ, for Jesus! _Viva Gesú!_" A far-rumbling thunder broke from the swaying mob. His own fire caught extra flame from theirs. "Follow me! This day we will bear witness to Christ, we will establish His kingdom in Rome." There was a wild rush, the soldiers spurred their horses, people fell under their hoofs, and were trampled on. It was a moment of frenzy. The Dominican ran on, waving the red _pallio_, his followers contagiously swollen at every by-street. Unchecked he reached the great Piazza, where a new statue of the Pope gleamed white and majestic. "Down with Anti-Christ!" shouted a cutpurse. "Down with Anti-Christ!" echoed the mob. The Friar waved his hand, and there was silence. He saw the yellow gleam of a Jew's head in the crowd, and called upon him to fling him his cap. It was hurled from hand to hand. Fra Giuseppe held it up in the air. "Men of Rome, Sons of Holy Church, behold the contumelious mark we set upon our fellow-men, so that every ruffian may spit upon them. Behold the yellow--the color of shame, the stigma of women that traffic in their womanhood--with which we brand the venerable brows of rabbis and the heads of honorable merchants. Lo! I set it upon the head of this Anti-Christ, a symbol of our hate for all that is not Love." And raising himself on the captain's stirrup, he crowned the statue with the yellow badge. A great shout of derision rent the air. There was a multifarious tumult of savage voices. "Down with Anti-Christ! Down with the Pope! Down with Baccio Valori! Down with the Princess Teresa!" But in another moment all was a wild _mêlée_. A company of City Guards--pikemen, musketeers, and horsemen with two-handed swords dashed into the Piazza from one street, the Pope's troops from another. They charged the crowd. The soldiers of the revolting captain, revolting in their turn, wheeled round and drove back their followers. There was a babel of groans and shrieks and shouts, muskets rang out, daggers flashed, sword and pike rang against armor, sparks flew, smoke curled, and the mob broke and scurried down the streets, leaving the wet, scarlet ground strewn with bodies. And long ere the roused passions of the riffraff had assuaged themselves by loot and outrage in the remoter streets, in the darkest dungeon of the Nona Tower, on a piece of rotten mattress, huddled in his dripping tinselled cloak, and bleeding from a dozen cuts, Joseph the Dreamer lay prostrate, too exhausted from the fierce struggle with his captors to think on the stake that awaited him. IX