s were more open, and would be little suited to our
more rigorous climate. They knew how to make themselves comfortable,
built rooms well protected from the weather, and heated with hypocausts.
These were furnaces made beneath the house, which generated hot air; and
this was admitted into the rooms by earthenware flue-tiles. The dwellers
had both summer and winter apartments; and when the cold weather arrived
the hypocaust furnaces were lighted, and the family adjourned to their
winter quarters.

The floors were made of _tesserae_, or small cubes of different
materials and various colours, which were arranged in beautiful
patterns. Some of these pavements were of most elegant and elaborate
designs, having figures in them representing the seasons, or some
mythological characters.

The walls were painted with decorations of very beautiful designs,
representing the cornfields, just as the Roman artists in Italy loved to
depict the vine in their mural paintings. The mortar used by the Romans
is very hard and tenacious, and their bricks were small and thin,
varying from 8 inches square to 18 inches by 12, and were about 2 inches
in thickness. Frequently we find the impression of an animal's foot on
these bricks and tiles, formed when they were in a soft state before
they were baked, and one tile recently found had the impression of a
Roman baby's foot. Roman bricks have often been used by subsequent
builders, and are found built up in the masonry of much later periods.

[Illustration: CAPITAL OF COLUMN]

It is quite possible to build up in imagination the old Roman city, and
to depict before our mind's eye the scenes that once took place where
now the rustics toil and till the ground. We enter the forum, the great
centre of the city, the common resort and lounging-place of the
citizens, who met together to discuss the latest news from Rome, to
transact their business, and exchange gossip. On the west side stood the
noble basilica, or hall of justice--a splendid building, its entrance
being adorned with fine Corinthian columns; and slabs of polished
Purbeck marble, and even of green and white marble from the Pyrenees,
covered the walls. It was a long rectangular hall, 233 feet in length by
58 feet in width, and at each side was a semicircular apse, which was
called the Tribune. Here the magistrate sat to administer justice, or an
orator stood to address the citizens. In the centre of the western wall
was another apse, whe