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ROMAN TRADITIONS OF PETER AND PAUL. 239
shining mantle around him, while a light breeze played
in its folds.
The emperor himself could not repress a cry of amaze-
ment. Senators and knights started from their seats, to
see the wonder. Amid lively gesticulation, the aged
Seneca spoke with some Greek philosophers invited to
the feast, of the possible cause of the phenomenon. A
Hellenic artist, who put aside all explanations, took out
his pencil, and with bold strokes drew Simon’s attitude
as model for that of a sculptured statue, were such a
form imagined without apparent foothold, floating in
the air.
Paul and Peter fell upon their knees, and clasped their
hands in prayer. Martialis and the other Christians
formed a protecting circle around them, as they prayed.
When Simon had carefully ordered his mantle, he
gave a signal, and from the roof of the temple of Jupiter,
flutes, bassoons, cymbals and drums, were heard. Upon
this, music instantly arose from the summit of the Pala-
tine hill; and immediately after, from the Esquiline, the
Coelian, from the heights of the Viminal and the Quiri-
nal, from the topmost point of Janiculus and from the
more distant Vaticanus. Rome swam in a sea of tones ;
and through that sea, Simon slowly and solemnly rose,
like the moon in her ascent, to higher spaces. It was as
though invisible hands bore him, as he looked down,
smiling at the people. The sun glistened upon the golden
fillet on his head and the waving folds of his mantle, the
breeze scattered his long locks ; and ever as he rose, the
air seemed more transparent, that the crowd might see
his Olympian countenance long.
And the people cried :
" This is the might of a god,
not of a man !
"
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