John, being younger, arrived first; he saw the place empty, and dared
not enter. Only when there were three at the entrance did he, the
person now speaking to them, enter, and find on the stone a shirt with a
winding sheet; but the body he found not.

Fear fell on them then, because they thought that the priests had borne
away Christ, and both returned home in greater grief still. Other
disciples came later and raised a lament, now in company, so that the
Lord of Hosts might hear them more easily, and now separately and in
turn. The spirit died within them, for they had hoped that the Master
would redeem Israel, and it was now the third day since his death; hence
they did not understand why the Father had deserted the Son, and they
preferred not to look at the daylight, but to die, so grievous was the
burden.

The remembrance of those terrible moments pressed even then from the
eyes of the old man two tears, which were visible by the light of the
fire, coursing down his gray beard. His hairless and aged head was
shaking, and the voice died in his breast.

"That man is speaking the truth and is weeping over it," said Vinicius
in his soul. Sorrow seized by the throat the simple-hearted listeners
also. They had heard more than once of Christ's sufferings, and it was
known to them that joy succeeded sorrow; but since an apostle who had
seen it told this, they wrung their hands under the impression, and
sobbed or beat their breasts.

But they calmed themselves gradually, for the wish to hear more gained
the mastery. The old man closed his eyes, as if to see distant things
more distinctly in his soul, and continued,--"When the disciples had