"Good-bye to the white cocks! Good-bye to the white ox! For Julian knocks them on the head To feed his devils and the dead!" There was a threatening clash of arms. The legionaries unsheathed their swords and prepared to charge. Old Pamva struck the marble flags with his staff, and shouted-- "Hail, gallant army of Satan! Hail, wise Roman dignitary! You'll probably remember the time when you burned us, when you taught us philosophy, and we prayed God to save your lost souls! Welcome to you!" The legionaries gripped their swords, but the prefect with a gesture stopped them. He saw that the crowd was in his power. "What are you threatening us with, blockhead?" asked Pamva, addressing himself to Sallustius. "What can you do? All we want for vengeance is a black night and two or three torches. You fear the Alemanni and the Persians. We are more terrible than they. We are everywhere in the midst of you, inviolable, innumerable! We have no boundaries, no father-land; we recognise but one republic, the universal republic! Born but yesterday, already we are filling the world, filling your cities, your fortresses, your islands, city councils, camps, palaces, senates, forums! We leave you your temples!... And but for our humility, our fraternity, choosing rather to die than to slay, we should have blotted you out.... "We want neither sword nor fire! So many are we, that if we withdrew, you would perish. Your cities would become solitudes, you would be frightened at your own loneliness, at the silence of the universe! All life would stop, at that death-touch! Remember the Roman Empire exists only on sufferance, sustained by the mercy of us Christians!" All eyes being fixed on Pamva no one perceived a man clothed in the old chlamys of a wandering philosopher, with a lean yellow face, curling hair, and long black beard, quickly coming through the lines of legionaries, who respectfully made way for him. He was followed by a few companions, and, leaning towards Sallustius, whispered-- "What are you waiting for?" "They will perhaps disperse of themselves," responded Sallustius. "The Galileans have already too many martyrs for us to make any more of them. They fly towards death as bees to honey!" But the man in the philosopher's robe advanced and cried out with a distinct voice, like a captain accustomed to command-- "Scatter the crowd. Seize the ringleaders!" Everybody wheeled round, and in alarm shouted-- "Augustus! Augustus Julian!" The soldiers charged with drawn swords. The old rag-picker was knocked down, struggling and shrieking under the feet of the legionaries. Many fled, and Strombix was the first to take advantage of the general confusion. Stones hurtled through the air. The metal-founder, defending old Pamva, hurled a large jagged flint at a legionary. It struck the She-wolf, who fell with a slight cry, covered with blood, and convinced that she was dying a martyr.