en cleared, there
still remains a large unexcavated space on its southern side. The only
house requiring notice is that called the Casa del Cinghiale, or House
of the Wild Boar, a little way down on the right-hand side in going
from the Forum. Its name is derived from the mosaic pavement of the
prothyrum, representing a boar attacked by two dogs. The house is
remarkable for its well-preserved peristyle of fourteen Ionic columns,
with their capitals. On the right is a brick staircase leading to a
large garden. The atrium is bordered with a mosaic representing the
walls of a city with towers and battlements, supposed by some to be
the walls of Pompeii.

Just beyond this house is a small street or lane, turning down to the
right, called the _Vicolo dei Dodici Dei_, from a painting on the
outside wall of the corner house, in the manner of a frieze,
representing the twelve greater divinities. Below is the usual
painting of serpents. At the corner of the quadrivium is the
apothecary's shop, in which was a large collection of surgical
instruments, mortars, drugs, and pills. The house is not otherwise
remarkable.

Of the early excavations at the southern extremity of the town few
records are preserved. In the Quarter of the Theatres, besides the
public buildings, there are but two houses of any interest. These
occupy the space between the Temple of AEsculapius and the small
theatre. The easternmost of them is one of the most interesting yet
discovered in Pompeii, not for the beauty or curiosity of the building
itself, but for its contents, which prove it to have been the abode
of a sculptor. Here were found statues, some half finished, others
just begun, with blocks of marble, and all the tools required by the
artist. Among these were thirty-two mallets, many compasses, curved
and straight, a great quantity of chisels, three or four levers, jacks
for raising blocks, saws, etc., etc. The house has the usual
arrangement of atrium, tablinum, and peristyle, but, owing to the
inclination of the ground, the peristyle is on a higher level than the
public part of the house, and communicates with it by a flight of
steps. A large reservoir for water extended under the peristyle, which
was in good preservation when first found, but has been much injured
by the failure of the vault beneath.

[Illustration: A LABORATORY, AS FOUND IN POMPEII.]

Returning by the southernmost of the two roads which lead to the
Forum, we find, beside