connivance of corrupt officials, the protection of an upright father was
rendered of no avail, by a perjurer being found who would appear before
the proper tribunal and swear the maid or woman in question to be his
slave. The decision once given in the libertine's favor, there was no
longer hope for her--she was lost forever.

Not always, however, would Roman freemen tamely brook open injustice,
much less shame, without revenging it, though they died in doing so. The
case of Appius--who was himself both the libertine and judge--is in
point. Having set his licentious eyes upon the beautiful
Virginia--daughter of Virginius, a centurion of the army--and having in
vain sought to obtain possession of her person by tampering with the
matron who conveyed her to and from her school, he induced an equally
licentious individual, one Claudius, to claim her as his slave, and
bring the matter before himself for decision. In vain the anguished
father asserted that Virginia was his child. With an air of apparent
impartiality, Appius decreed that she belonged to Claudius, who
thereupon proceeded to remove her. The father begged that they might at
least be allowed to take leave of each other, which request was granted,
on condition of their doing so in the presence of the oppressor. Drawing
the girl, now nearly dead from fright, toward himself, and also toward
the shambles, adjoining which they were, he snatched thence a knife,
and, before any suspected his intention, stabbed her to the heart,
crying, "This alone can preserve your honor and your freedom."[E]

The fearful deed of the centurion is appalling; but remember his ideas
of right and wrong were veiled in pagan darkness. He took the life of
his child to save her from a fate incomparably worse than that of death;
and made his name historic by doing so. Thousands of fathers have found
their efforts to protect the innocence of their daughters as unavailing