Section 288
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ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY. 257 then cast myself on my back upon the ground. But they seized me by the hands and feet, and dragged me away, whilst those who were witnesses of all these things, Caius, Faustus, Peter, and Paul, followed on. These also, taking me up, bore me away from the town, and carried me off on an unsaddled ass." Such is the account of Dionysius respecting himself. CHAPTER XLI. Of those who suffered martyrdom at Alexandria. BUT the same writer in the epistle which he addressed to Fabius bishop of Antioch, relates the conflicts of those who suffered martyrdom at Alexandria in the following manner : " The perse cution with us did not begin with the imperial edict, but preceded it a whole year. And a certain prophet and poet, inauspicious to the city, whoever he was, excited the mass of the heathen against us, stirring them up to their native superstition. Stimu lated by him, and taking full liberty to exercise any kind of wickedness, they considered this the only piety, and the worship of their daemons, viz., to slay us. First then, seizing a certain aged man named Metra, they called upon him to utter impious expressions, and as he did not obey, they beat his body with clubs, and pricked his face and eyes ; after which they led him away to the suburbs, where they stoned him. Next they led a woman called Quinta, who was a believer, to the temple of an idol, and attempted to force her to worship ; but when she turned away in disgust, they tied her by the feet, and dragged her through the whole city, over the rough stones of the paved streets, dashing her against the millstones, and scourging her at the same time, until they brought her to the same place, where they stoned her. Then, with one accord, all rushed upon the houses of the pious, and whomsoever of their neighbours they knew, they drove thither in all haste, and despoiled and plunder ed them, setting apart the more valuable of the articles for them selves ; but the more common and wooden furniture they threw 2K