In the meantime the soldiers had put back on the King His poor man’s garments and had tied the notice about His neck. Others had brought out from the storerooms three massive crosses of pine, the nails, the hammer and the pincers. The escort was ready. Pilate pronounced the usual formula: “I lictor, expedi crucem.” And the sinister procession moved forward. The Centurion rode at the head, he whom Tacitus calls with terrible brevity, “exactor mortis.” Immediately after him came, in the midst of the armed legionaries, Jesus and the two thieves who were to be crucified with Him. Each of them carried a cross on his shoulders, according to the Roman rule. And behind them, the shuffling steps and the uproar of the excited crowd, increased at every step by accomplices and idle sight-seers. It was Parasceve, the day of preparations, the last night before the Passover. Thousands of lambs’ skins were stretched out on the sunlit roofs; and from every house rose a column of smoke, delicate as a flower-bud, which opened out in the air and then was lost in the clear, festal sky. Old women with malignant faces, mumbling anathemas, emerged from the dark alley-ways; dirty-faced little children trotted along with bundles under their arms; bearded men carried on their shoulders a kid or a cask of wine; drovers were dragging along asses with hanging heads; children stared with impudent and melancholy eyes at the foreigners who were walking about circumspectly, impeded by this festal bustling. In every home the house-mother was busy, preparing everything needful for the next day, because with the setting of the sun every one was exempt for twenty-four hours from the curse of Adam. The lambs, skinned and quartered, were all ready for the fire; the loaves of unleavened bread were piled up fresh from the oven; men were decanting the wine, and the children to lend a hand somewhere were cleaning the bitter herbs. There was no one idle, no one whose heart was not rejoicing at the thought of that festal day of repose, when all families would be gathered about the father, when they would eat in peace and drink the wine of Thanksgiving from the same cup; and God would be witness of this cheer because the psalms of the grateful would go up to Him from every house. On that day even the poor felt themselves almost rich; and the rich, because of their unusual profits, felt themselves almost generous; and children whose hopes had not yet been dashed by experience of life felt themselves more loving; and women more loved. Everywhere there was that peaceful confusion, that good-natured tumult, that joyous bustle which goes before a great, popular feast-day. An odor of hope and of Spring purified the old filth of the Jewish ant-heap. And the great eastern sun sent down a flood of light upon the four Hills. SIMON OF CYRENE