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558 DARKNESS AND DAWN
feet of the City, the relative of Aulus Plautius and Poraponia
Grsecina. Suffer me for a moment to speak to your
prisoner/
Impressed by the great names which she had mentioned,
the centurion bade the soldiers bt.md aside for a moment,
and Plautilla, kneeling on the grass, asked with tears for
the Apostle's blessing. He laid his chained hand on her
head and blessed her, and she gave him from her kinswoman
Pomponia a handkerchief with which to bind his
eyes as he knelt for the blow of the executioner. He
'
gratefully accepted it, and said, I know the name of
Pomponia. It is ever pronounced with the blessings of the
saints of God.'
'
'
Yes,' she said, Apostle, and my brother, the nephew
of Vespasian, who is in command in Judaea he too is a
Christian.'
The Apostle upraised in thankfulness his fettered hands.
is far spent. The day is at hand.'
'
The he
'
night,'
The centurion
said,
beckoned to the soldiers to proceed, and
Plautilla stood gazing after them under the shadow of the
pyramid.
About three miles from the walls of Rome, on a green
and level space amid low, undulating hills, was the
then known as Aquae Salvias, and now as Tre Fontane.
spot
To
this spot they inarched in the early morning the chained
prisoner with the soldiers round him, and the centurion
walking at their head. Onesimus followed close behind.
The martyr scarcely spoke. His face was lit with an inward
rapture his
; lips
moved incessantly in silent prayer.
He had no fear.
Lovely to him as the colours of the rainbow
on the thundercloud gleamed the azure of his home.
They reached the green level under the trees. The prisoner
was bidden to kneel down. Onesimus helped him to take off
his upper garment, received his last few words of prayer and
encouragement and blessing, and the gentle pressure of his
hand in farewell. He bound over the Apostle's eyes Plautilla's
handkerchief, and then turned away, hiding his face in
his hands, weeping as if his heart would break. Then he
heard the word of command given. For one instant he looked
up in that instant the sword flashed, and the life of the
greatest of the Apostles was shorn away.