To Eustathius, Bishop of Aegae, for a Rescued Captive

The story of the noble Mary is fit for a tragic play. As she says herself, and as several others confirm, she is the daughter of the most honorable Eudaemon. In the disaster that has overtaken Libya she has fallen from the free rank of her father’s house and become a slave. Some merchants bought her from the barbarians and have sold her to some of our own people. Sold along with her was a girl who had once been one of her own household servants, so that the galling yoke of slavery fell on servant and mistress at one and the same time. But the servant would not ignore the difference between them, and she could not forget her mistress’s former rank. In their misfortune she kept her kindly feeling. After waiting on their common masters, she waited on the woman who was now counted her fellow slave: she washed her feet, made her bed, and attended to other services of the same kind. The buyers came to know of this, and soon the whole town was talking about the free birth of the mistress and the goodness of the servant. When these facts came to the notice of the believing soldiers who are quartered in our city (I was away at the time), they paid the buyers their price and rescued the woman from slavery. [a]

When I came back and was told of her pitiable story and of the admirable purpose of the soldiers, I called down blessings on their heads. I put the noble young woman in the care of one of the respected deacons, and I gave orders that enough should be provided for her needs. Ten months had gone by when she heard that her father was still alive and holding high office in the West, and she very naturally said that she wanted to go back to him. Word came that many messengers from the West are on their way to the fair now being held in your part of the country, and she asked to be allowed to set out with a letter from me. That is why I have written this letter. I beg your piety to take care of a girl of noble birth, and to charge some respectable person to speak with sailors, pilots and merchants, and to put her in the care of trustworthy men who can bring her back to her father. There is no doubt that those who bring the daughter home to her father, when all hope of finding her had been lost, will be richly rewarded.