"I will command to give them weapons," answered Nero.
But the superstitious Vestinius was roused from meditation at once, and asked in a mysterious voice,—
"Have ye noticed that when dying they see something? They look up, and die as it were without pain. I am sure that they see something."
He raised his eyes then to the opening of the amphitheatre, over which night had begun to extend its velarium dotted with stars. But others answered with laughter and jesting suppositions as to what the Christians could see at the moment of death. Meanwhile Caesar gave a signal to the slave torchbearers, and left the Circus; after him followed vestals, senators, dignitaries, and Augustians.