CHAPTER I.

DIOGENES.

The scenes through which we have hitherto led our reader have been laid in one of those slippery truces, rather than peace, which often intervened between persecution and persecution. Already rumors of war have crossed our path, and its note of preparation has been distinctly heard. The roar of the lions near the Amphitheatre, which startled but dismayed not Sebastian, the reports from the East, the hints of Fulvius, and the threats of Corvinus, have brought us the same news, that before long the horrors of persecution will re-appear, and Christian blood will have to flow, in a fuller and nobler stream than had hitherto watered the Paradise of the New Law. The Church, ever calmly provident, cannot neglect the many signs of a threatened combat, nor the preparations necessary for meeting it. From the moment she earnestly begins to arm herself, we date the second period of our narrative. It is the commencement of conflict.

It was towards the end of October that a young man, not unknown to us, closely muffled up in his cloak, for it was dark and rather chill, might be seen threading his way through the narrow alleys of the district called the Suburra; a region, the extent and exact position of which is still under dispute, but which lay in the immediate vicinity of the Forum. As vice is unfortunately too often linked with poverty, the two found a common asylum here. Pancratius did not seem much at home in this part of the city, and made several wrong turns, till at length he found the street he was in search of. Still, without numbers on the doors, the house he wanted was an unsolved problem, although not quite insoluble. He looked for the neatest dwelling in the street; and

being particularly struck with the cleanliness and good order of one beyond the rest, he boldly knocked at its door. It was opened by an old man, whose name has already appeared in our pages, Diogenes. He was tall and broad-shouldered, as if accustomed to bear burdens, which, however, had given him a stoop in his gait. His hair was a perfect silver, and hung down at the sides of a large massive head; his features were strongly marked in deep melancholy lines, and though the expression of his countenance was calm, it was solemnly sad. He looked like one who had lived much among the dead, and was happiest in their company. His two sons, Majus and Severus, fine athletic youths, were with him. The first was busy carving, or scratching rather, a rude epitaph on an old slab of marble, the reverse of which still bore traces of a heathen sepulchral inscription, rudely effaced by its new possessor.

Pancratius looked over the work in hand and smiled; there was hardly a word rightly spelt, or a part of speech correct; indeed, here it is:

=DE BIANOBA POLLECLA QVE ORDEV BENDET DE BIANOBA=[72]

The other son was making a rough design, in which could be distinguished Jonas devoured by the whale, and Lazarus raised from the dead, both most conventionally drawn with charcoal on a board; a sketch evidently for a more permanent painting elsewhere. Further, it was clear that when the knock came to the door, old Diogenes was busy fitting a new handle to an old pick-axe. These varied occupations in one family might have surprised a modern, but they did not at all the youthful visitor; he well knew that the family belonged to the honorable and religious craft of the Fossores, or excavators of the Christian cemeteries. Indeed, Diogenes was the head and director of that confraternity. In conformity with the assertion of an anonymous writer, contemporary with St. Jerome, some modern antiquarians have considered the _fossor_ as forming a lesser ecclesiastical order in the primitive Church, like the _lector_, or reader. But although this opinion is untenable, it is extremely probable that the duties of this office were in the hands of persons appointed and recognized by ecclesiastical authority. The uniform system pursued in excavating, arranging, and filling up of the numerous cemeteries round Rome, a system too, so complete from the beginning, as not to leave positive signs of improvement or change as time went on, gives us reason to conclude that these wonderful and venerable works were carried on under one direction, and probably by some body associated for that purpose. It was not a cemetery or necropolis company, which made a speculation of burying the dead, but rather a pious and recognized confraternity which was associated for the purpose.

A series of interesting inscriptions, found in the cemetery of St. Agnes, proves that this occupation was continued in particular families; grandfather, father, and sons, having carried it on in the same place.[73] We can thus easily understand the great skill and uniformity of practice observable in the catacombs. But the _fossores_ had evidently a higher office, or even jurisdiction, in that underground world. Though the Church provided space for the burial of all her children, it was natural that some should make compensation for their place of sepulture, if chosen in a favorite spot, such as the vicinity of a martyr’s tomb. These sextons had the management of such transactions, which are often recorded in the ancient cemeteries. The following inscription is preserved in the Capitol:

=EMPTV LOCVM AB ARTEMISIVM VISOMVM HOC EST ET PRAETIVM DATVM FOSSORI HILARO IDEST FOL NOOD PRAESENTIA SEVERI FOSS ET LAVRENTI=

That is--

“This is the grave for two bodies, bought by Artimisius; and the price was given to the Fossor Hilarus,--that is, purses....[74] In the presence of Severus the Fossor and Laurentius.”

Possibly the last named was the witness on the purchaser’s side, and Severus on the seller’s. However this may be, we trust we have laid before our readers all that is known about the profession, as such, of Diogenes and his sons.

We left Pancratius amused at Majus’s rude attempts in glyptic art; his next step was to address him.

“Do you always execute these inscriptions yourself?”

“Oh, no,” answered the artist, looking up and smiling. “I do them for poor people who cannot afford to pay a better hand. This was a good woman who kept a small shop in the _Vianova_, and you may suppose did not become rich, especially as she was very honest. And yet a curious thought struck me as I was carving her epitaph.”

“Let me hear it, Majus.”

“It was, that perhaps some thousand years hence or more, Christians might read with reverence my scratches on the wall, and hear of poor old Pollecla and her barley stall with interest, while the inscription of not a single emperor, who persecuted the Church, would be read or even known.”

“Well, I can hardly imagine that the superb mausoleums of sovereigns will fall to utter decay, and yet the memory of a market-wife descend to distant ages. But what is your reason for thinking thus?”

“Simply because I would sooner commit to the keeping of posterity the memory of the pious poor than that of the wicked rich. And my rude record may possibly be read when triumphal arches have been demolished. It’s dreadfully written though, is it not?”

“Never mind that; its simplicity is worth much fine writing. What is that slab leaning against the wall?”

“Ah, that _is_ a beautiful inscription brought us to put up; you will see the writer and engraver were different people. It is to go to the cemetery at the Lady Agnes’s villa, on the Nomentan way. I believe it is in memory of a most sweet child, whose death is deeply felt by his virtuous parents.” Pancratius took a light to it, and read as follows:

“The innocent boy Dionysius lieth here among the saints. Remember us in your holy prayers, the writer and the engraver.”

“Dear, happy child!” continued Pancratius, when he had perused the inscription: “add me the reader, to the writer and carver of thine epitaph, in thy holy prayers.”

“Amen,” answered the pious family.

But Pancratius, attracted by a certain husky sound in Diogenes’s voice, turned round, and saw the old man vigorously trying to cut off the end of a little wedge which he had driven into the top of the handle of his pick-axe, to keep it fast in the iron; but every moment baffled by some defect in his vision, which he removed by drawing the back of his brawny hand across his eyes. “What is the matter, my good old friend?” said the youth kindly. “Why does this epitaph of young Dionysius particularly affect you?”

“It does not of itself; but it reminds me of so much that is past, and suggests so much that may be about to come, that I feel almost faint to think of either.”

“What are your painful thoughts, Diogenes?”

“Why, do you see, it is all simple enough to take into one’s arms a good child like Dionysius, wrapped in his cerecloth, fragrant with spices, and lay him in his grave. His parents may weep, but his passage from sorrow to joy was easy and sweet. It is a very different thing, and requires a heart as hardened as mine by practice” (another stroke of the hand across the eyes) “to gather up hastily the torn flesh and broken limbs of such another youth, to wrap them hurriedly in their winding-sheet, then fold them into another sheet full of lime, instead of balsams, and shove them precipitately into their tomb.[75] How differently one would wish to treat a martyr’s body!”

“True, Diogenes; but a brave officer prefers the plain soldier’s grave, on the field of battle, to the carved sarcophagus on the Via Appia. But are such scenes as you describe common, in times of persecution?”

“By no means uncommon, my good young master. I am sure a pious youth like you must have visited, on his anniversary, the tomb of Restitutus in the cemetery of Hermes.”

“Indeed I have, and often have I been almost jealous of his early martyrdom. Did you bury him?”

“Yes; and his parents had a beautiful tomb made, the _arcosolium_ of his crypt.[76] My father and I made it of six slabs of marble, hastily collected, and I engraved the inscription now beside it. I think I carved better than Majus there,” added the old man, now quite cheerful.

“That is not saying much for yourself, father,” rejoined his son, no less smiling; “but here is the copy of the inscription which you wrote,” he added, drawing out a parchment from a number of sheets.

“I remember it perfectly,” said Pancratius, glancing over it, and reading it as follows, correcting the errors in orthography, but not those in grammar, as he read:

“To Ælius Fabius Restitutus, their most pious son, his parents erected (this tomb). Who lived eighteen years and seven months. In peace.”

He continued: “What a glorious youth, to have confessed Christ at such an age!”

“No doubt,” replied the old man; “but I dare say you have always thought that his body reposes alone in his sepulchre. Any one would think so from the inscription.”

“Certainly I have always thought so. Is it otherwise?”

“Yes, noble Pancratius, he has a comrade younger than himself lying in the same bed. As we were closing the tomb of Restitutus, the body of a boy not more than twelve or thirteen years old was brought to us. Oh, I shall never forget the sight! He had been hung over a fire, and his head, trunk, and limbs nearly to the knees, were burnt to the very bone; and so disfigured was he that no feature could be recognized. Poor little fellow, what he must have suffered! But why should I pity him? Well, we were pressed for time, and we thought the youth of eighteen would not grudge room for his fellow-soldier of twelve, but would own him for a younger brother; so we laid him at Ælius Fabius’s feet. But we had no second phial of blood to put outside, that a second martyr might be known to lie there; for the fire had dried his blood up in his veins.”[77]

“What a noble boy! If the first was older, the second was younger than I. What say you, Diogenes, don’t you think it likely you may have to perform the same office for me one of these days?”

“Oh, no, I hope not,” said the old digger, with a return of his husky voice. “Do not, I entreat you, allude to such a possibility. Surely my own time must come sooner. How the old trees are spared, indeed, and the young plants cut down!”

“Come, come, my good friend, I won’t afflict you. But I have almost forgotten to deliver the message I came to bring. It is, that to-morrow at dawn you must come to my mother’s house, to arrange about preparing the cemeteries for our coming troubles. Our holy Pope will be there, with the priests of the titles, the regionary deacons, the notaries, whose number has been filled up, and you, the head _fossor_, that all may act in concert.”

“I will not fail, Pancratius,” replied Diogenes.

“And now,” added the youth, “I have a favor to ask you.”

“A favor from me?” asked the old man, surprised.

“Yes; you will have to begin your work immediately, I suppose. Now, often as I have visited, for devotion, our sacred cemeteries, I have never studied or examined them; and this I should like to do with you, who know them so well.”

“Nothing would give me greater pleasure,” answered Diogenes, somewhat flattered by the compliment, but still more pleased by this love for what he so much loved. “After I have received my instructions, I shall go at once to the cemetery of Callistus. Meet me out of the Porta Capena, half an hour before mid-day, and we will go on together.”

“But I shall not be alone,” continued Pancratius. “Two youths, recently baptized, desire much to become acquainted with our cemeteries, which they do not yet much know; and have asked me to initiate them there.”

“Any friends of yours will be always welcome. What are their names, that we may make no mistake?”

“One is Tiburtius, the son of Chromatius, the late prefect; the other is a young man named Torquatus.”

Severus started a little, and said: “Are you quite sure about him, Pancratius?”

Diogenes rebuked him, saying, “That he comes to us in Pancratius’s company is security enough.”

“I own,” interposed the youth, “that I do not know as much about him as about Tiburtius, who is really a gallant, noble fellow. Torquatus is, however, very anxious to obtain all information about our affairs, and seems in earnest. What makes you fear, Severus?”

“Only a trifle, indeed. But as I was going early to the cemetery this morning, I turned into the Baths of Antoninus.”[78]

“What!” interrupted Pancratius, laughing, “do you frequent such fashionable resorts?”

“Not exactly,” replied the honest artist; “but you are not perhaps aware that Cucumio the _capsarius_[79] and his wife are Christians?”

“Is it possible; where shall we find them next?”

“Well, so it is; and moreover they are making a tomb for themselves in the cemetery of Callistus; and I had to show them Majus’s inscription for it.”

“Here it is,” said the latter, exhibiting it, as follows:

CVCVMIO ET VICTORIA SE VIVOS FECERVNT CAPSARARIVS DE ANTONINIANAS.[80]

“Capital!” exclaimed Pancratius, amused at the blunders in the epitaph; “but we are forgetting Torquatus.”

“As I entered the building, then,” said Severus, “I was not a little surprised to find in one corner, at that early hour, this Torquatus in close conversation with the present prefect’s son, Corvinus, the pretended cripple, who thrust himself into Agnes’s house, you remember, when some charitable unknown person (God bless him!) gave large alms to the poor there. Not good company I thought, and at such an hour, for a Christian.”

“True, Severus,” returned Pancratius, blushing deeply; “but he is young as yet in the faith, and probably his old friends do not know of his change. We will hope for the best.”

The two young men offered to accompany Pancratius, who rose to leave, and see him safe through the poor and profligate neighborhood. He accepted their courtesy with pleasure, and bade the old excavator a hearty good night.