"It is Lazarus, the friend of Jesus."
The place where they were to lay him was the cave in which his father and mother were entombed. It was in a deep, shady vale, thickly shaded by cypress, palm and pomegranate trees, and a large tamarind grew, with its stately branches, overclasping the summit of the secluded place of sepulchre. The remote swell of a Roman bugle from the head of a cohort, which was just issuing from a defile, came softly and musically to our ears, as we stood in silence about the grove wherein we were to place the dead. Æmilius, my betrothed, was also present, wearing a white scarf above his silver cuirass, in token of grief, for he also loved Lazarus. Of him, dear father, I have not of late spoken, for should I begin to write of him I should have no room in my letters for any other theme.
The sacred observances at the grove being over, they raised the body of the dead young man from the bier, and four youths, aided by Æmilius at the head to support it, conveyed it into the yawning cavern. A moment they lingered on the threshold, that Mary and Martha might take one more look, imprint upon its icy cold lips one last kiss, press once more his unconscious head to their loving and bursting hearts.
The young men moved slowly forward into the gloom of the cave. Mary rushed in, and with disheveled hair, cried:
"Oh, take him not away forever from the sight of my eyes! Oh, my brother, my brother, would that I had died for thee! for I am willing to lie down with the worm and call it my sister, and sleep in the arms of death, as on the breast of my mother, so thou couldst live! Oh, brother, brother, let them not take thee forever from the sight of my eyes! Without thee, how shall life be life!"
Rolling stone, closing a sepulchre.
Æmilius entered the tomb and, tenderly raising her from the body, on which she had cast herself in the eloquent abandonment of her wild grief, he led her forth, and beckoning to me, placed her in my arms.
The body, being placed in a niche hollowed out in the rock, was decently covered with a grave mantle, all but the calm face, which was bound about by a snow-white napkin. Maidens of the village advanced and cast flowers upon his head, and many, many were the sincere tears, both from beneath manly lids and those of virgins, which bore tribute to his worth.
The burial ceremonies being ended, five strong men replaced the ponderous stone door closely fitting the entrance to the cave, and so secured it, by letting it into a socket, that it would require a like number to remove it.