These two days were marked by the assembling of Christians for worship. But the character of the service was not everywhere the same. Duchesne[23] has exhibited the facts thus: In Africa in the time of Tertullian the Eucharist was celebrated, and it was so at Jerusalem towards the close of the fourth century. In the Church of Alexandria the Eucharist was not celebrated on these days; but the Scriptures were read and interpreted. And in this matter, as in many others, the Church at Rome probably agreed with Alexandria. It is certain, at least as regards Friday, that the mysteries were not publicly celebrated on these days at Rome about the beginning of the fifth century. The observance of Friday as a day of abstinence is still of obligation in the West. CHAPTER II DAYS OF THE MARTYRS We now pass from features of every week to days and seasons of yearly occurrence. In point of time the celebrations connected with the Pascha are the earliest to emerge of sacred days observed annually by the whole Church. But for reasons of convenience it has been thought better to defer the consideration of the difficult questions relating to the Easter controversies till the origin of the days of Martyrs and Saints has been dealt with. The Kalendar in some of its later stages exhibits a highly artificial elaboration. But in its beginnings it was, to a large extent, the outcome of a natural and spontaneous feeling which could not fail to remember in various localities the cruel deaths of men and women who had suffered for the Faith with courage and constancy in such places, or their neighbourhoods. The origins of the Kalendar show in various churches, widely separated, the natural desire to commemorate their own local martyrs on the days on which they had actually suffered. As regards the order of time there is ample reason to convince us that the commemorations of martyrs were features of Church life much earlier than those of St Mary the Virgin, of most of the Apostles, and even of many of the festivals of the Lord Himself. The marks of antiquity that characterise generally the older Kalendars and Martyrologies are (1) the comparative paucity of entries, (2) the fewness of festivals of the Virgin, (3) the fewness of saints who were not martyrs, (4) the absence of the title ‘saint,’ and (5) the absence of feasts in Lent.