Christianity in the interim grew from month to month and from year to year, and our wanderers had but just arrived at last in Athens in time to hear, near the statue of "the unknown God," while Damarais, the friend of Aglais, and Dion, the friend of them all, stood near, a majestic stranger, a Roman citizen, him who had sat at the feet of Gamaliel, the glorious Apostle of the Gentiles, who had been "faithful to the heavenly Vision," though he had not seen the Resurrection, explain to the Athenians "him whom they had ignorantly worshipped." And when the sublime messenger of glad tidings related the circumstances of the Passion, the scenes which had been enacted in Pilate's house (so well remembered by them), the next day's dread event, and when he touched upon the preternatural accompaniments of that final catastrophe, and described the darkness which had overspread the earth from the sixth hour of that day, Dionysius, turning pale, drew out the tablets which he carried habitually, examined the date of which, at Heliopolis, he and Apollophanes had jointly made note, and showed symptoms of an emotion such as he had never before experienced. He and Damarais, as is well known, were among the converts of Saint Paul on that great occasion. How our other characters felt we need not describe. Yielding to the entreaties of their beloved Dionysius, they actually loitered in Greece for a few years, during which Christianity had outstripped them and penetrated to Rome, where it was soon welcomed with fire and sword, and where "the blood of martyrs became the seed of Christians." Esther shuddered as she heard names dear to her in the murmured accounts of dreadful torments. Resuming their westward course, how Paulus rejoiced that he had in time sold everything in Italy, and was armed with opulence in the midst of new and strange trials! They gave Italy a wide offing, and passing round by the south of Germany, with an armed escort which Thellus (who had also become a Christian, and had, while they were in Greece, sent for Prudentia) commanded, they never ceased their travels till they reached the banks of the Seine; and there, undiscernible to the vision of Roman tyranny in the distance, they obtained, by means of the treasures they had brought, hundreds of stout Gaulish hands to do their bidding, and soon founded a peaceful home amid a happy colony. Hence they sent letters to Agatha and Paterculus.