Ranged thick about. The prefect so began:
“Proclaim thyself.” “A maid named Theodora,
Ward of her aged cousin, Cratidas.”
“What is thine age?” “They tell me, seventeen years.”
“And thy condition?” Whereto she replied:
“Christ’s.” Very patiently he asked:
“Art bond or free?” as runs the rote of law.
She smiled in answering: “Free: made free by Christ;
Else, of free parents honorably born,
Rhoxis and Heräis, who both are dead.”