Perpetua. A Tale of Nimes in A.D. 213

BY THE Rev. S. BARING-GOULD, M.A.
Copyright, 1897, by E. P. DUTTON & COMPANY
PERPETUA
A TALE OF NÎMES IN A.D. 213

The Kalends (first) of March.
A brilliant day in the town of Nemausus—the modern Nîmes—in the Province of Gallia Narbonensis, that arrogated to itself the title of being the province, a title that has continued in use to the present day, as distinguishing the olive-growing, rose-producing, ruin-strewn portion of Southern France, whose fringe is kissed by the blue Mediterranean.
Not a cloud in the nemophyla-blue sky. The sun streamed down, with a heat that was unabsorbed, and with rays unshorn by any intervenient vapor, as in our northern clime. Yet a cool air from the distant snowy Alps touched, as with the kiss of a vestal, every heated brow, and refreshed it.
The anemones were in bloom, and the roses were budding. Tulips spangled the vineyards, and under the olives and in the most arid soil, there appeared the grape hyacinth and the star of Bethlehem.
At the back of the white city stands a rock, the extreme limit of a spur of the Cebennæ, forming an amphitheatre, the stones scrambled over by blue and white periwinkle, and the crags heavy with syringa and flowering thorns.
In the midst of this circus of rock welled up a river of transparent bottle-green water, that filled a reservoir, in which circled white swans.