soon as they perceived that they were no match for their enemies in
pitched battle, their leaders set up a strange shrill cry, their ranks
dissolved, and they dispersed in all directions, like a heap of feathers
strewn by a gust of wind.

Agapitus took the hasty disappearance of the enemy for wild flight, he
sighed deeply and thankfully and turned to go down to the field of
battle, and to speak consolation to his wounded fellow-Christians.

But in the castle itself he found opportunity for exercising his pious
office, for before him stood the shepherdess whom he had already observed
on his arrival and she said with much embarrassment, but clearly and
quickly, "Old Stephanus there, my lord bishop--Hermas' father for whom I
carry water-bids me ask you to come to him; for his wound has reopened
and he thinks his end is near."

Agapitus immediately obeyed this call; he went with hasty steps towards
the sick man, whose wound Paulus and Orion had already bound up, and
greeted him with a familiarity that he was far from showing to the other
penitents. He had long known the former name and the fate of Stephanus,
and it was by his advice that Hermas had been obliged to join the
deputation sent to Alexandria, for Agapitus was of opinion that no one
ought to flee from the battle of life without having first taken some
part in it.

Stephanus put out his hand to the bishop who sat down beside him, signed
to the bystanders to leave them alone, and listened attentively to the
feeble words of the sufferer. When he had ceased speaking, Agapitus
said: