Edward Bulwer-Lytton: The Last Days of Pompeii

BOOK THE THIRD 3. Chapter III (continued)

'Father,' said Olinthus, 'thou on whose form the miracle of the Redeemer worked; thou who wert snatched from the grave to become the living witness of His mercy and His power; behold! a stranger in our meeting--a new lamb gathered to the fold!'

'Let me bless him,' said the old man: the throng gave way. Apaecides approached him as by an instinct: he fell on his knees before him--the old man laid his hand on the priest's head, and blessed him, but not aloud. As his lips moved, his eyes were upturned, and tears--those tears that good men only shed in the hope of happiness to another--flowed fast down his cheeks.

The children were on either side of the convert; his heart was theirs--he had become as one of them--to enter into the kingdom of Heaven.