l."

So speaking, he assisted Marcia to descend, and, summoning his
servants, gave the rheda and its guardians into their care. Then he
led the way into his house, carefully fastening the street door behind
them, for the porter evidently had not halted in his flight, short of
the slaves' apartments upstairs.

Marcia followed, wondering at the magnificence of the decorations. She
passed through passages lighted by hanging-lamps of gold and silver and
bronze; past walls rich with frescoes in black and yellow and red;
panels and pictures such as Caius Fabius Pictor could never have
dreamed when he ornamented the Temple of Safety; frescoes that so far
surpassed the work of Damophilus and Gorgasus upon the walls of Ceres,
as these had surpassed the art of Pictor himself. Then came courts
surrounded by rows of fluted columns, set with fountains that threw
light sprays of scented water over the flowers and the garments of the
passers; then more passages, with paintings of even greater merit and
delicacy of execution, mingled, here and there, with scenes where the
delicacy was of the execution alone, and that brought hot blushes to
her cheek. Amid all, were scattered richly carved pedestals bearing
beautiful statues done in marble or bronze, or great vases, black or
terra-cotta, with intricately composed groups of figures in the
opposite tint. It came like a veritable revelation to one who had
known nothing but the crude art of the Etruscans and the cruder
handicraft of her own people, tempered, as they were, by the taste of
such Greek artists as fell so far short of their native ideals as to be
willing to waste their skill upon barbarians. She had heard of the
wealth and luxury of the Capuans, but it had never entered her mind to
imagine that the luxury of Capua could demand, or the wealth of
Campania purchase, pictures whose distance and proportions were true to
life itself, and statues that seemed veritably to live and breathe.
Her eyes were big with wonder and admiration, when her guide and host
turned sharply to the right and ushered her into a small room that
looked out through a row of slender pillars into a portico beyond, and
thence into a garden that seemed a very forest of small rose trees.
Around the walls ran a shelf upon which were set a number of circular
boxes, while lying upon the table were several bulky rolls of papyrus,
in parchment wrappers stained yellow or purple.

"My library," said Calavius, in