From the Villa of Diomedes they went to the gate where the guard-house
is seen. Buttons told the story of the sentinel who died there on
duty, embellishing it with a few new features of an original
character.

"Now that may be all very well," said the Senator, "but don't ask me
to admire that chap, or the Roman army, or the system. It was all
hollow. Why, don't you see the man was a blockhead? He hadn't sense
enough to see that when the whole place was going to the dogs, it was
no good stopping to guard it. He'd much better have cleared out and
saved his precious life for the good of his country. Do you suppose a
Yankee would act that way?"

"I should suppose not."

"That man, Sir, was a machine, and nothing more. A soldier must know
something else than merely obeying orders."

By this time they had passed through the gate and stood inside. The
street opened before them for a considerable distance with houses on
each side. Including the sidewalks it might have been almost twelve
feet wide. As only the lower part of the walls of the houses was
standing, the show that they made was not imposing. There was no
splendor in the architecture or the material, for the style of the
buildings was extremely simple, and they were made with brick covered
with stucco.

After wandering silently through the streets the Senator at length
burst forth:

"I say it's an enormous imposition!"

"What?" inquired Buttons, faintly.

"Why, the whole system of Cyclopedias, Panoramas, Books of Travel,
Woodbridge's Geography, Sunday-school Books--"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean the descriptions they give of this place. The fellows who
write about it get into the heroics, and what with their descriptions,
and pictures, and moralizing, you believe it is a second Babylon. It
don't seem possible for any of them to tell the truth. Why, there
isn't a single decent-sized house in the place. Oh, it's small! it's
small!"

"It certainly might be larger."

"I know," continued the Senator, with a majestic wave of his hand--"I
know that I'm expected to find this here scene very impressive; but
I'll be hanged if I'm satisfied. Why, in the name of Heaven, when they
give us pictures of the place, can't they make things of the right
size? Why, I've seen a hundred pictures of that gate. They make it
look like a triumphant arch; and now that I'm here, durn me if I can't
touch the top of it when I stand on tiptoe."

In all his walk the Senator fou