University of Virginia Library

Yes, let us go to the Martyr: she lies as yet in her thraldom,
She, who so soon shall become the Free Citizen, fettered and pinioned,
Deep in a rock-hewn den,—no room for sitting or standing,
Down, in the lowest pit, in the place of uttermost darkness.
Hail to the patience of martyrs! Not only the courage of action,
Face to face called as they were to the rack or the stake or the lion:
But in the long drear hours, most trying heroic endurance,
When in the pitch black den, in nakedness, cold and in hunger,
Creatures of slime around, and the cold drip falling above them,
Never a sound to be heard and never a friend that might comfort,
Memories of pain for the past, for the future, expectance of torture,
Severed from all but their God, they slept in the bed of their glory!
Hundreds of shrines have I seen, upreared when the faith was triumphant,
Sending their hymns of glory to heaven from ages to ages,
Temples, inspired themselves by the Spirit of Wisdom and Beauty:
Rheims, the peerless in Art, and Bourges, unrivalled in boldness;
Chartres, whose fair twin spires look down from the hill which they hallow;
Her too, Seville, that mirrors herself in the broad Guadalquiver;
Dearer to me by far, more worthy the goal of a pilgrim,
That rock pit I have entered, so utterly, hopelessly, rayless;
Here, where the Rhone gives the Arar her bridal meeting in Lyons—
Here were the Martyrs in bonds, whose praise is in all of the Churches;
Here Blandina before she preached from a pulpit of torture;
Rendered his spirit to God even here, Pothinus the aged:
This was the very same rock, and this is the very same darkness.
—Such was the dungeon where now they came and set loose Theodora:
Bolts flew back, and the rough locks creaked, and the bars were unstapled,
While with no gentle touch they unmanacled cold hands and numbed feet.
Then to the chamber they led her that opened right on to the Arena,
Whence the last earthly steps, that thousands had taken to glory.
Mighty its huge rough stones, the theatre's very foundations,
Gloomy the single and doubled-barred window; on this and on that side
Ran in a circle the dens, each barred with its wicket of iron:
Facing the spot, but across the Arena, the throne of the Præfect.
Here Theodora was led: she deemed by herself to have suffered;
Lo! as she entered, a child, himself, too, it seemed, as a victim,
Standing alone: seven summers would number his little existence.
“Here,” quoth the jailer, “who list, may see the Art-magic of Christians;
This is the lesson ye learn from the crucified God of Judæa.
Father and mother stood firm to the last, and yesterday suffered,
Racked, and exposed to the beasts; and the Præfect, in mercy, gave order
This, the child of their love, might witness their passion; if mayhap
He might be frightened to wisdom, and sprinkle the Altar with incense.
Yester-eve I myself did my best to change him in purpose,
Leading him round and showing the Caveæ: then too Placilla,
(She has a gentle heart, has my wife) tried her woman's persuasions.
All was in vain, all nought. And say we not well it is magic?”
“You,” said the child forthwith, not heeding the words of the jailer,
“You,”—and he fixed his eyes on the Virgin— “are found with the Martyrs.”
“Yea,” she replied, “by God's grace; that grace which can strengthen us weak ones,
Just as it strengthened the mightiest of saints that have gone on this journey.”—
“Tell me then more,” said Philemon, “while yet there is time for the telling;
Tell me yet more of the glory they now have, my father and mother:
All the night long I dreamt, or, more frightful, I saw in my waking
That long scene of their passion; the spring of the lion upon him,
Dragging him out in the midst; the sound never left me a moment,
Crash of devouring his prey; and her, how the leopard flew at her,
Wounding her over and over again, till he sent her to glory.
These sounds ring in my ears; these sights are ever before me;
What they suffered I saw; you tell me what I can not see.”
Then, half-kneeling, half-propped by the stool where they fetter the victims,
Throwing one arm round the child, once more she told him the story,
Writ for the sake of the Saints, in the great Evangel of Patmos.
Nor did the gathering rush of the multitudes, tramping by thousands,
No, nor the roar and the yell, sometimes single, and sometimes responsive,
Cause that the voice should tremble, or tale should falter an instant.
So she declared how the joys that they two were in Paradise sharing,
“Eye hath not seen, ear heard, nor heart of man hath conceived them:
Joys, not only for them, as you know, but for us when our turn comes,
If we be only found faithful as they; for the Lord That was with them,
He will be also with us; for His we have been and we now are,
Children of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.
Look, then, my child; we too are beginning a dangerous journey,
Dangerous and painful besides; but the bright Home rises before us.
Though we may not, as yet, tell what it will cost to attain it,
This we know and are sure, 'twill be worth much more than the attaining.
Though by the way we pass we have not passed heretoforetime,
Courage, my own dear child, for the God of courage is with us.”

Hastily ended she thus; for now the flourish of trumpets
Warned that the Asiarch was near, and the spectacle drew to its opening.
Clanged yet again the gate of that prison chamber, and entered
Two of the theatre slaves, and this the last of their missions.
One in his hand bare a net; the other, the key that admitted
On to the scene of the strife. Then, rising, to whom Theodora:
“Which of us suffers the first? Or are we to conquer together?”
“Conquer!” half-sneered the slave. “The child is exposed to the lion
First by himself; then you, in your turn, to the net and the wild cow.”
Fearfulness then and a horror there fell on the little Philemon;
Pale were his cheeks as death, and he trembled as trembles the aspen.
Him Theodora with words of love and encouragement, holding
Fast by the child's cold hand, did all that she might do to comfort;
Told him to hold out yet,—that the crown would be safe in a minute,
Told him how Father and Mother were waiting in rapture to meet him
There on the other side, where sorrow is ended for ever.
Yet not the less the flesh was weak though the spirit was willing;
So when the slave had opened the panel that showed the Arena,
Marking if all were in place, and waiting the Asiarch's signal,
Then took the key that must open the way the child should return not;
Utterly failed his heart. “I must yield—I cannot endure it.”
Brief was the space for words. “My child,” said brave Theodora,
“If you draw back, I myself, when we stand at the Judge's tribunal,
Will be the first to accuse you to Him, and to call you apostate.
Go in His strength, not your own—two minutes, and what will it matter?
Go, for His time is come, and remember me when you are with Him.
“Yes, I will go,” said the child. “Lord Jesus, receive Thou my spirit.”

Thus in the arena he stood by himself, one minute, not longer:
Here on this side a child; on the other ten myriad pagans.
Then did the Christians in place send up one deep supplication
God would again show His praise in the mouth of babes and of sucklings:
Trembling nor fear none now; but Philemon came forward a little
Nearer the mouth of the den, where the creaking winch told was the lion.
Back flew the gate: black-maned, the beast, with the roar of his fury
Sprang in one bound on the child,—and the child was in Abraham's bosom.

Then, when the theatre-slaves had driven him in with his victim,
Forth Theodora was led, all calm in her maidenly palla.
—Close now your eyes, Christian maidens; a maiden is spoiled of her vestments
All in the gaze of thousands, a sight both to men and to angels:
Open them rather; despoiled Christ's Bride may be, never dishonoured;
Finding more perfect reward, a more beautiful garment hereafter.
Her in a net well woven and waxed, and with intricate meshes,
Staking it fast in the ground with the pegs, they bound as in prison.
Then they retired. And again the incense of prayer floated upwards,
All for the Conqueror's meed in one deep agony striving.
Open the cavern flew; and the wild cow, sorely tormented,
Fiery darts in her neck, and smarting with flame and with brimstone,
Rushed, if it might, to revenge, and it speedily fell on the Martyr.
Why should I tell—all is past—how this way and that way it gored her,
Tearing the flesh from the bones, for the net protracted her torments?
Scarcely one word could the Scribes of the Church catch; only they fancied
One brief prayer for herself, and one—so it seemed—for the tyrants.

Ah! in those moments of strife what years of agony crowded;
Ah! in the Land without time that they led to, what pleasures eternal!