othing but barbarous
spectacles, violent pantomimic performances, like those which England
and Spain have not yet been able to suppress. The troops of mercenary
fighters slaughtered each other in the arenas to amuse the Romans (not
to render them warlike). Citizens took part in these tournaments, and
among them even nobles, emperors, and women; and, at last, the Samnites,
Gauls, and Thracians, who descended into the arena, were only Romans in
disguise. These shows became more and more varied; they were diversified
with hunts (_venationes_), in which wild beasts fought with each other
or against _bestiarii_, or Christians; the amphitheatres, transformed to
lakes, offered to the gaze of the delighted spectator real naval
battles, and ten thousand gladiators were let loose against each other
by the imperial caprice of Trajan. These entertainments lasted one
hundred and twenty-three days. Imagine the carnage!

Part of the gladiators of Pompeii were Greeks, and part were real
barbarians. The traces that they have left in the little city show that
they got along quite merrily there. 'Tis true that they could not live,
as they did at Rome, in close intimacy with emperors and empresses, but
they were, none the less, the spoiled pets of the residents of Pompeii.
Lodged in a sumptuous barrack, they must have been objects of envy to
many of the population. The walls are full of inscriptions concerning
them; the bathing establishments, the inns, and the disreputable haunts,
transmit their names to posterity. The citizens, their wives, and even
their children admired them. In the house of Proculus, at no great
height above the ground, is a picture of a gladiator which must have
been daubed there by the young lad of the house. The gladiator whose
likeness was thus given dwelt in the house. His helmet was found there.
So, then, he was the guest of the family, and Heaven knows how they
feasted him, petted him, and listened to him.

In order to see the gladiators under arms, we must pass over the part of
the city that has not yet been uncovered, and through vineyards and
orchards, until, in a corner of Pompeii, as though down in the bottom of
a ravine, we find the amphitheatre. It is a circus, surrounded by tiers
of seats and abutting on the city ramparts. The exterior wall is not
high, because the amphitheatre had to be hollowed out in the soil. One
might fancy it to be a huge vessel deeply embedded in the sand. In this
external wall