And as the Seigneur Chusa, pale with rage, was about to draw his sword to strike Banaias, the latter raised his cutlass, and exclaimed:
'By the belly of Goliath! I will cut you in two like a water melon, if you put a hand on your sword!'
The two seigneurs, having only five or six men as an escort, restrained themselves, from a fear of being stoned by the enraged people, and endeavored to sneak out of the crowd, which, more and more enraged, exclaimed:
'Yes, woe to you! tax-gatherers of Herod and Tiberius! Woe to you! for we are hungry; and the bread moistened with our sweat, which we carry to our lips, you snatch it from our hands in the name of taxes!
'Woe to you! for instead of pardoning misery you overwhelm with miseries people without defence! Woe to you, but happiness to us, for the day of justice approaches, the young man of Nazareth has said so. Yes, yes, for you wicked and oppressors, there will soon be weeping and gnashing of teeth, and then the last shall be first, and the first shall be last.'
Chusa and Gremion, more and more alarmed, consulted each other by a look, not knowing how to escape this menacing crowd. The most threatening already began to pick up large stones at the voice of Banaias, who had exclaimed on replacing his cutlass at his belt, and arming himself with a large stone:
'Our master said this morning, speaking of the poor girl whom these hypocritical pharisees would have stoned, 'Let him who is without sin throw the first stone.' And I, my friends, say this to you—
'Let him who has been flayed by the tax-gatherer throw the first stone at these flayers! and may it be followed by many another!'
'Yes, yes!' cried the crowd, 'Let them disappear under a mountain of stones.'
'Let us stone them!'