“It does not of itself; but it reminds me of so much that is past, and suggests so much that may be about to come, that I feel almost faint to think of either.” “What are your painful thoughts, Diogenes?” “Why, do you see, it is all simple enough to take into one’s arms a good child like Dionysius, wrapped in his cerecloth, fragrant with spices, and lay him in his grave. His parents may weep, but his passage from sorrow to joy was easy and sweet. It is a very different thing, and requires a heart as hardened as mine by practice” (another stroke of the hand across the eyes) “to gather up hastily the torn flesh and broken limbs of such another youth, to wrap them hurriedly in their winding-sheet, then fold them into another sheet full of lime, instead of balsams, and shove them precipitately into their tomb.[75] How differently one would wish to treat a martyr’s body!” [Illustration: An _Arcosolium_.] “True, Diogenes; but a brave officer prefers the plain soldier’s grave, on the field of battle, to the carved sarcophagus on the Via Appia. But are such scenes as you describe common, in times of persecution?” “By no means uncommon, my good young master. I am sure a pious youth like you must have visited, on his anniversary, the tomb of Restitutus in the cemetery of Hermes.” “Indeed I have, and often have I been almost jealous of his early martyrdom. Did you bury him?” “Yes; and his parents had a beautiful tomb made, the _arcosolium_ of his crypt.[76] My father and I made it of six slabs of marble, hastily collected, and I engraved the inscription now beside it. I think I carved better than Majus there,” added the old man, now quite cheerful. “That is not saying much for yourself, father,” rejoined his son, no less smiling; “but here is the copy of the inscription which you wrote,” he added, drawing out a parchment from a number of sheets. “I remember it perfectly,” said Pancratius, glancing over it, and reading it as follows, correcting the errors in orthography, but not those in grammar, as he read: [Illustration] “To Ælius Fabius Restitutus, their most pious son, his parents erected (this tomb). Who lived eighteen years and seven months. In peace.” He continued: “What a glorious youth, to have confessed Christ at such an age!” “No doubt,” replied the old man; “but I dare say you have always thought that his body reposes alone in his sepulchre. Any one would think so from the inscription.” “Certainly I have always thought so. Is it otherwise?”