Valerius Maximus relates the following anecdote: "After the ancient custom of the Macedonians, certain noble youths waited on Alexander the Great when he sacrificed to the gods. One of these, holding a censer in his hand, stood before the king. It chanced that a live coal fell upon his arm, and so burnt it that the smell of the charred flesh affected the bystanders; yet the sufferer suppressed the pain, in silence, and held his arm immovable, lest by shaking the censer he should interrupt the sacrifice, or by his groaning disturb the king. Alexander, that he might still further try his fortitude, purposely continued and protracted the sacrifice; yet the noble-hearted boy persisted in his resolute intention." To this rare instance of fortitude he adds another. "Anaxarchus, a philosopher of Abdera, was remarkable for freedom of speech, which no personal consideration restrained. He was a friend of Alexander, and when the great conqueror was wounded, said bluntly, 'Behold the blood of a man and not of a god.' But Alexander was too noble to be offended at such a home truth. It was otherwise with Nicocreon, tyrant of Cyprus, to whose court Anaxarchus betook himself on the death of Alexander. When the sage openly reproached him with his cruelties, Nicocreon seized and threatened to pound him in a stone mortar with iron hammers. 'Pound the body of Anaxarchus at thy pleasure,' exclaimed he; 'his soul thou canst not pound.' The tyrant, in a paroxysm of rage, ordered his tongue to be cut from his mouth. {169} 'Effeminate wretch,' cried the undaunted monitor, 'neither shall that part of my body be at thy disposal.' So saying, he bit off his own tongue, and spat it in the face of his persecutor." Bacon, in his History of Life and Death, mentions a certain tradition of a man, who being under the executioner's hands for high treason, after his heart was plucked from his body, was yet heard to murmur several words of prayer. He also instances another strange example in the case of the Burgundian who murdered the Prince of Orange. When the first part of his sentence, which only related to cutting off his curls of hair, was carried out, he absolutely shed shed tears; yet, when scourged with rods of iron, and his flesh torn with red-hot pincers, he uttered neither sigh nor grown. Before his sense of feeling became extinct under reiterated tortures, a part of the scaffold fell on the head of a spectator. The criminal was observed to laugh at the accident.