said, ‘Your child was only four years old, mine was nine years old. Give me a victim to equal her.’ ‘Certainly,’ replied the other, and seeing at his side his eldest son, who was ready to be married, he stabbed him four or five times with his dagger; and, not content with shedding the blood of his two sons, he killed his wife too, in order to oblige his enemy to murder his wife in like manner. Lastly, a little girl and a baby at the breast had also their throats cut, so that in a single day seven persons were sacrificed to the vengeance of two bloodthirsty men, more cruel than the most ferocious brutes. I have actually in my church a young man who sought refuge among us, wounded by a spear-thrust which his father inflicted on him in order to kill him and thus oblige his foe to slay his own son in like manner. The barbarian had already stabbed two of his children on other occasions for the same purpose. Such atrocious examples will seem to you to partake more of fable than of truth; but believe me that far from exaggerating, I could produce many others not less tragical.”(393) (M113) The same contempt of death which many races have exhibited in modern times was displayed in antiquity by the hardy natives of Europe before Christianity had painted the world beyond the grave in colours at which even their bold spirits quailed. Thus, for example, at their banquets the rude Thracians used to suspend a halter over a movable stone and cast lots among themselves. The man on whom the lot fell mounted the stone with a scimitar in his hand and thrust his head into the noose. A comrade then rolled the stone from under him, and while he did so the other attempted to sever the rope with his scimitar. If he succeeded he dropped to the ground and was saved; if he failed, he was hanged, and his dying struggles were greeted with peals of laughter by his fellows, who regarded the whole thing as a capital joke.(394) The Greek traveller Posidonius, who visited Gaul early in the first century before our era, records that among the Celts men were to be found who for a sum of money or a number of jars of wine, which they distributed among their kinsmen or friends, would allow themselves to be publicly slaughtered in a theatre. They lay down on their backs upon a shield and a man came and cut their throats with a sword.(395)