¹⁷ One of them said, “Pardon me, my lord. This woman and I live in the same house, and I had a baby while she was there with me. ¹⁸ The third day after my child was born, this woman also had a baby. We were alone; there was no one in the house but the two of us.

¹⁹ “During the night this woman’s son died because she lay on him. ²⁰ So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while I your servant was asleep. She put him by her breast and put her dead son by my breast. ²¹ The next morning, I got up to nurse my son—and he was dead! But when I looked at him closely in the morning light, I saw that it wasn’t the son I had borne.”

¹⁹ When her owners realized that their hope of making money^(A) was gone, they seized Paul and Silas^(B) and dragged^(C) them into the marketplace to face the authorities. ²⁰ They brought them before the magistrates and said, “These men are Jews, and are throwing our city into an uproar^{(D) 21} by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans^(E) to accept or practice.”^(F)