On the hillock, the cohort halted—one manipule stood to its arms in front, while the rest formed a hollow square, all facing outward around its summit. The torches were lowered, so that with all his endeavors, Catiline could by no means discover what was in process within that guarded space. Again the din of hammers rose on his ear, mixed now with groans and agonizing supplications, which waxed at length into a fearful howl, the utterance of one, past doubt, in more than mortal agony. A strange and terrible suspicion broke upon Catiline, and the sweat started in beadlike drops from his sallow brow. It was not long ere that suspicion became certainty. The clang of the hammers ceased; the wild howls sank into a continuous weak pitiful wailing. The creak of pullies and cordage, the shouts of men plying levers, and hauling ropes, succeeded, and slowly sullenly uprose, hardly seen in the black night air, a huge black cross. It reached its elevation, and was made fast in almost less time than it has taken to relate it, and instantly a pile of faggots which had been raised a short distance in front if it, and steeped in oil or some other unctuous matter, was set on fire. A tall wavering snowwhite glare shot upward, and revealed, writhing in agony, and wailing wofully, the naked form of Chærea, bleeding at every pore from the effects of the merciless Roman scourging, nailed on the fatal cross. So near was the little thicket in which Catiline lay, that he could mark every sinew of that gory frame working in agony, could read every twitch of those convulsed features. Again the Roman trumpets were blown shrill and piercing, and a centurion stepping forward a little way in front of the advanced manipule, shouted at the pitch of his voice, "THUS PERISH ALL THE MESSENGERS OF PARRICIDES AND TRAITORS!" Excited, almost beyond his powers of endurance, by what he beheld and heard, the fierce traitor writhed in his hiding place, not sixty paces distant from the speaker, and gnashed his teeth in impotent malignity. His fingers griped the tough shaft of his massive pilum, as if they would have left their prints in the close-grained ash. While that ferocious spirit was yet strong within him, the wretched freedman, half frenzied doubtless by his tortures, lifted his voice in a wild cry on his master— "Catiline! Catiline!" he shrieked so thrillingly that every man in both camps heard every syllable distinct and clear. "Chærea calls on Catiline. Help! save! Avenge! Catiline! Catiline!" A loud hoarse laugh burst from the Roman legionaries, and the centurion shouted in derision. But at that instant the desperate spectator of that horrid scene sprang to his feet reckless, and shouting, as he leaped into the circle of bright radiance, "Catiline hears Chærea, and delivers,"—hurled his massive javelin with deadly aim at his tortured servant. It was the first blow Catiline ever dealt in mercy, and mercifully did it perform its errand.