Purulence was at hand. The fluvial wound in the side dripped thickly,
inundating the thigh with blood that was like congealing mulberry juice.
Milky pus, which yet was somewhat reddish, something like the colour of
grey Moselle, oozed from the chest and ran down over the abdomen and the
loin cloth. The knees had been forced together and the rotulæ touched,
but the lower legs were held wide apart, though the feet were placed one
on top of the other. These, beginning to putrefy, were turning green
beneath a river of blood. Spongy and blistered, they were horrible, the
flesh tumefied, swollen over the head of the spike, and the gripping
toes, with the horny blue nails, contradicted the imploring gesture of
the hands, turning that benediction into a curse; and as the hands
pointed heavenward, so the feet seemed to cling to earth, to that ochre
ground, ferruginous like the purple soil of Thuringia.

Above this eruptive cadaver, the head, tumultuous, enormous, encircled
by a disordered crown of thorns, hung down lifeless. One lacklustre eye
half opened as a shudder of terror or of sorrow traversed the expiring
figure. The face was furrowed, the brow seamed, the cheeks blanched; all
the drooping features wept, while the mouth, unnerved, its under jaw
racked by tetanic contractions, laughed atrociously.

The torture had been terrific, and the agony had frightened the mocking
executioners into flight.

Against a dark blue night-sky the cross seemed to bow down, almost to
touch the ground with its tip, while two figures, one on each side, kept
watch over the Christ. One was the Virgin, wearing a hood the colour of
mucous blood over a robe of wan blue. Her face was pale and swollen with
weeping, and she stood rigid, as one who buries his fingernails deep