"But it was very different with me when I laid my hand—would that lightning had blasted it!—on the hammer, and did what I would now give my life to undo! He uttered no groan—no curse; He submitted like a lamb in the slaughterer's grasp. He but said—I cannot repeat what He said."
The soldier's head sank on his broad breast, and the strong man wept.
"Christ said, 'Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do!'" said Asahel, softly.
"I was present through all," continued the soldier, when he had recovered his self-command, "I saw the sudden darkness: it fell over me like a shroud! Every hour of that fearful time convinced me the more that I was helping to torture—to murder—One who was more than man. At last, when I heard the faint words, 'I thirst!' I ran; and putting a sponge filled with vinegar on a reed, I moistened the white, parched lips of the Dying."
"Oh that I had done that!" cried the Christian Jew, bursting into tears. "Blessed man! Thou wert the only one, then, to relieve the Saviour's dying anguish!"
The Roman gazed in astonishment at his companion. "I thought, O follower of Christ!" said he. "That thou wouldst abhor me, even as I abhor mine own self."
"I am a thousandfold more guilty than thou art!" cried Asahel. "I was one of the savage mob. It was as if under the direct influence of Satan that I shouted even as they did. I saw Him suffer—and I did not pity! Thou didst act under compulsion. I—I struck Him; and yet I live!"
Marcus started to his feet with something like an imprecation. "Wretch! Thou art beyond pardon!" he exclaimed.
"I have found pardon!" cried the believer. "And where I found it, so may'st thou."
Then, in a voice trembling with emotion, Asahel recounted the wonders of the Day of Pentecost; and repeated, almost word for word, that address of Peter, on hearing which, three thousand sinners were pricked to the heart and repented.