e dark
groves of myrtle on the hills, the silver ribbon of the inland water,
and the dark blue AEgean Sea. The bleating of sheep and the tinkling
of the bells came up to them from the pastures below, and they imagined
they could hear the shepherds piping to their flocks from one little
hill-top to another.

"The country is not much changed," said Carlton. "And when you stand
where we are now, you can imagine that you see the procession winding
its way over the road to the Eleusinian Mysteries, with the gilded
chariots, and the children carrying garlands, and the priestesses
leading the bulls for the sacrifice."

"What can we imagine is going on here?" said Miss Morris, pointing with
her parasol to the theatre below.

"Oh, this is much later," said Carlton. "This was built by the Romans.
They used to act and to hold their public meetings here. This
corresponds to the top row of our gallery, and you can imagine that you
are looking down on the bent backs of hundreds of bald-headed men in
white robes, listening to the speakers strutting about below there."

"I wonder how much they could hear from this height?" said Mrs. Downs.

"Well, they had that big wall for a sounding-board, and the air is so
soft here that their voices should have carried easily, and I believe
they wore masks with mouth-pieces, that conveyed the sound like a
fireman's trumpet. If you like, I will run down there and call up to
you, and you can hear how it sounded. I will speak in my natural voice
first, and if that doesn't reach you, wave your parasol, and I will try
it a little louder."

"Oh, do!" said Miss Morris. "It will be very good of you. I should
like to hear a real speech in the theatre of Herodes," she said, as she
seated herself on the edge of the marble crater.

"I'll have to speak in English," said Carlton, as he disappeared; "my
Greek isn't good enough to carry that far."

Mrs. Downs seated herself beside her niece, and Carlton began
scrambling down the side of the amphitheatre. The marble benches were
broken in parts, and where they were perfect were covered with a fine
layer of moss as smooth and soft as green velvet, so that Carlton, when
he was not laboriously feeling for his next foothold with the toe of
his boot, was engaged in picking spring flowers from the beds of moss
and sticking them, for safe-keeping, in his button-hole. He was
several minutes in making the descent, and so busily occupied in doing
it that