e voice and drive it away from the upper portion, thus
preventing the case-endings of words from reaching with distinct meaning
the ears of those who are in the uppermost seats above the cross-aisles.
In short, it should be so contrived that a line drawn from the lowest to
the highest seat will touch the top edges and angles of all the seats.
Thus the voice will meet with no obstruction.

5. The different entrances ought to be numerous and spacious, the upper
not connected with the lower, but built in a continuous straight line
from all parts of the house, without turnings, so that the people may
not be crowded together when let out from shows, but may have separate
exits from all parts without obstructions.

Particular pains must also be taken that the site be not a "deaf" one,
but one through which the voice can range with the greatest clearness.
This can be brought about if a site is selected where there is no
obstruction due to echo.

6. Voice is a flowing breath of air, perceptible to the hearing by
contact. It moves in an endless number of circular rounds, like the
innumerably increasing circular waves which appear when a stone is
thrown into smooth water, and which keep on spreading indefinitely from
the centre unless interrupted by narrow limits, or by some obstruction
which prevents such waves from reaching their end in due formation. When
they are interrupted by obstructions, the first waves, flowing back,
break up the formation of those which follow.

7. In the same manner the voice executes its movements in concentric
circles; but while in the case of water the circles move horizontally on
a plane surface, the voice not only proceeds horizontally, but also
ascends vertically by regular stages. Therefore, as in the case of the
waves formed in the water, so it is in the case of the voice: the first
wave, when there is no obstruction to interrupt it, does not break up
the second or the following waves, but they all reach the ears of the
lowest and highest spectators without an echo.

8. Hence the ancient architects, following in the footsteps of nature,
perfected the ascending rows of seats in theatres from their
investigations of the ascending voice, and, by means of the canonical
theory of the mathematicians and that of the musicians, endeavoured to
make every voice uttered on the stage come with greater clearness and
sweetness to the ears of the audience. For just as musical instruments
are brought to p