Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1891-01-03

could not imagine the answer my shadow
| might have given.
And yet we told that the streets were brillian,
once-that they were filled with richly attired
people. jeweled and clad in Tyrian dyes; that
beautiful women, gracefully yelled, passed
through them, followed by slaves; that the
| shops glittered with wonderful and beautiful
things; that one caught glimpses Of fountains
and exquisite temples and triumphal arches
/ that all was brightness and grace and color and
| wealth Of life. Today one only sees the narrow
streets, the broken columns, the fallen temples
and the ruins of the houses that were their
| owners tombs I, 800 years ago.
| Though my shadow companion could not
make me understand what her answers might
have been to some Of the questions should
| have liked to ask. and which neither my imagi-
| nation nor the unimformed guide could reply
| to, yet think her presence helped me to give
| some fancied life and color to the ruined houses
| and made them some thing as they might have
been when they were homes
| Through street after narrow street we walked,
| through houses and temples. through forums
| and once sumptuous baths and theaters. The
| excavations, which are made by the govern
ment, are still going on. The silent streets,
the ruins themselves seem to be kept swept
and in order. But for the broken halls and
columns, the rCohess buildings left open to
| the sunshine, all is so free from obstacles and
again. Eighteen centuries, eighteen centuries
since Pompeiisn feet trod these stones"
The large streets are called estrada" the
| smaller ones '.Bicolo." The Strada di Mercu-
rio (the Street of Mercury, the Strada della
Fortuna (the Street of Fortune), the Strada
deli Abbondanza (the Street of Abundance,
the Strada dele Terme (Street of the Baths J,
Strada del Faro Street of the FORUM, the BIZ
colo del Fauno little Street of the Faun), BIZ
colo del Balcone Pensile (Street Of the Hanging
Balcony.
These are of course only few Of the names.
All the houses have their names also, most of
them taken from some statue or painting which
decorated them. Some Of them we're given by the
scientific excavators and were taken from seal
or sigret ring found in the ruins.
There is the Casa di Apollo blouse of Apollo),
the House Of Adonis, the House of Castor and
Pollok, the House of the Faun, the House Of the
Little Fountain and of the Great Fountain, the
House OF the Tragic Poet, the House of Pansa,
the House of Sallust, the House Of the Centaur.
They are all names like these.
In the present day when a man builds .
house he builds it solely after his own tastes
and fancies. His entrance hall is square or OBJ
long or irregular, as he pleases; he builds as
many stories as he is inclined to mount, he
just where he thinks best. In other times there
seems to have been an idea that the houses men
lived in should naturally be as much alike as
the shells on the backs of snails and tortoises
are like each other. In London one sees rows
and rows of melancholy structures all exactly
the same; one sees them in New York, though
there they are not smoke-begrimed all to one
hopelessly dingy shade. And in Pompeii one
passes from street to street and finds in all the
houses tue one plan.
One enters, through a narrow passage, the
yestibulam. which leads one to a court which
was called the "atrium." and which has in the
center u sort OF square, shallow pool made in
the mosaic pavement to receiye the rain water
which emptied itself into it from the aperture
in the sloping roof. This was called the ''im-
pluvium." AT the opposite end of this ''atrium'
was q room called the .'tablinum." and all around
it tiny rooms which, in modern days. would
seem scarcely more than closets. But it was
the center court or ''peristylium" where the
people really lived, and which am sure they
must have felt to be truly their home. Surely
they could not have spent much time in the
tiny rooms. which had no windows, and no
doors to close-only draperies to hang over
them.
Bat the ''peristyle" was open to the sunshine
and the blue southern Italian sky. There was
a colonnade around it, whose columns were
garlanded with flowers. The center was a gar
den. There was the tiny piscina with the gold
fish: there were pedestls with vases of brilliant
flowers upon them; perhaps there foun-
tain and sometimes graceful statue.
Around this peristyle there were other tiny
rooms in which the people Of the house must
have slept. They used to sit in the shade of
the colonnade and work or receive their guests
there.
was when my little shadow, with the blue-black
hair and deep soft eyes and the white tunic
played in the peristylium. / tried to make
picture of the red and yellow columns, the CAV
cclors, the frescoes, the rich draperies, the
mosaic pavements, the graceful couches of
bronze ornamented with gold and silver, the
wonderful sumptuous stuffs thrown over them.
But though with the help of what l had heard
and read and seen could make sort of half
antique Roman, half antique Grecian picture,
II 81 .lzC-
for my little girl. What did children do l. 500
years ago? Does any one really know 1 think
there were no antique Pompeiian dolls ex-
cavated: l saw none in the museum. But
surely she had something of wood or stone or
some composition. which was made in the form
of a miniature child, and which she could hold
i'll her arms and sing to sleep and dress when it
awakened. in n dolls tunic, and sandals and
girdle. and for whose head she could Irvine a
tiny garland Of flowers. All, it must have been
So even 1.S11 years ago.
She had no books to read; even the grown-up
people had scarcely any. "A very small room.
We are told, was sufficient to contain the few
rolls of papyrus which the ancients deemed a
notable collection of books" She must have
looked at the frescoes on the walls, the pictured
legends of gods and goddesses, and told her
self stories about them. Perhaps her mother
told her about them, too. and perhaps there
was some favorite slaye--a sort of Pompeiian
Uncle Remus-who could tell stories of god
ueSstS anu SOus, OF fauns ana SatyrS, and OF uls
own country. from which he had, perhaps,
been taken as prisoner of war.
For the rest she had the flowers and the gold
fish. it may be. some birds or pet dog with
golden collar.
There was the beautiful sea, too" fancied
her saying. 1t was as blue as the sky and
there were ships coming and going from strange
countries. And we loved the mountain then.
1t was beautiful, too. 1t was covered with
lovely soft green meadows, and the most fertile
vineyards were upon it. The grapes in them
were larger and more purple and sweeter than
those that grew anywhere else. Only at the
very top it was sterile, and the earth was like
ashes and the rocks were blackened as il thew
had been burned. Wise men who had climbed
TO look at them used to say strange things about
them and tell strange stories. They said that
1t might once have been volcano one Of the
mountains that are filed with fire. and which
sometimes spout forth flames and showers Of
boiling water and molten stones They were
stories which made me afraid, but could not
help drawing near to listen when they talked:
but did not believe that ever there had been
time when our beautiful green mountain had
been so terrible. The children used to talk
about it among themselves and speak Of the
soft grass and the flowers that grew on il. and
the sweet purple and white grapes in the vine
yards, and say it must be all q PHILOSOPHERS le-
gend and could not be true"
We went to the wonderful baths where the
rich and idle spent the greater part of their
days Longing. talking, listening to the reading
of some poet and passing, under the hands Of
slaves. through the luxurious processes of bath
inc Wae ftasa 1,ef .r,, -