ble.

Finally, at the summit of the half-moon was the uppermost cavea,
assigned to the common herd and the women. So, after all, we are
somewhat ahead of the Romans in gallantry. Railings separated this tier
from the one we sit in, so as to prevent "the low rabble" from invading
the seats occupied by us respectable men of substance. Upon the wall of
the people's gallery is still seen the ring that held the pole of the
_velarium_. This velarium was an awning that was stretched above the
heads of the spectators to protect them from the sun. In earlier times
the Romans had scouted at this innovation, which they called a piece of
Campanian effeminacy. But little by little, increasing luxury reduced
the Puritans of Rome to silence, and they willingly accepted a velarium
of silk--an homage of Caesar. Nero, who carried everything to excess,
went further: he caused a velarium of purple to be embroidered with
gold. Caligula frequently amused himself by suddenly withdrawing this
movable shelter and leaving the naked heads of the spectators exposed to
the beating rays of the sun. But it seems that at Pompeii the wind
frequently prevented the hoisting of the canvas, and so the poet Martial
tells us that he will keep on his hat.

Such was the arrangement of the main body of the house. Let us now
descend to the orchestra, which, in the Greek theatres, was set apart
for the dancing of the choirs, but in the Roman theatres, was reserved
for the great dignitaries, and at Rome itself for the prince, the
vestals, and the senators. I have somewhere read that, in the great
city, the foreign ambassadors were excluded from these places of honor
because among them could be found the sons of freedmen.

Would you like to go up on the stage? Raised about five feet above the
orchestra, it was broader than ours, but not so deep. The personages of
the antique repertory did not swell to such numbers as in our fairy
spectacles. Far from it. The stage extended between a proscenium or
front, stretching out upon the orchestra by means of a wooden platform,
which has disappeared, and the _postscenium_ or side scenes. There was,
also, a _hyposcenium_ or subterranean part of the theatre, for the
scene-shifters and machinists. The curtain or _siparium_ (a Roman
invention) did not rise to the ceiling as with us, but, on the
contrary, descended so as to disclose the stage, and rolled together
underground, by means of ingenious processes which Mazois has expl