Roman gentlemen stepped up. They looked kindly upon Ariston.

"This is the lad who saved my son," said Tetreius. "I call you to
witness that he is no longer a slave. Ariston, I send you from my hand a
free man."

He struck his hand lightly on the Greek's shoulder, as all Roman masters
did when they freed a slave. Ariston cried aloud with joy. He sank to
his knees weeping. But Tetreius went on.

"This kind physician says that Caius will live. But he needs good air
and good nursing. He must go to some one of Aesculapius' holy places. He
shall sleep in the temple and sit in the shady porches, and walk in the
sacred groves. The wise priests will give him medicines. The god will
send healing dreams. Do you know of any such place, Ariston?"

The Greek thought of the temple and garden of Aesculapius on the sunny
side of the Acropolis at home in Athens. But he could not speak. He
gazed hungrily into Tetreius' eyes. The Roman smiled.

"Ariston, this ship is bound for Athens! All my life I have loved
her--her statues, her poems, her great deeds. I have wished that my son
might learn from her wise men. The volcano has buried my home, Ariston.
But my wealth and my friends and my son are aboard this ship. What do
you say, my friend? Will you be our guide in Athens?" Ariston leaped up
from his knees. A fire of joy burned in his eyes. He stretched his hands
to the sky.

"O blessed Herakles," he cried, "again thou hast conquered Death. Thou
didst snatch us from the grave of Pompeii. Give health to this Roman
boy. O fairest Athena, shed new beauty upon our violet crowned Athens.
For there is coming to visit her the best of men, my master Tetreius."

[Illustration: _A Marble Table_: The lions' heads were painted yellow.
You can see a table much like this in the garden pictured later.]

VESUVIUS

So a living city was buried in a few hours. Wooded hills and green
fields lay covered under great ash heaps. Ever since that terrible
eruption Vesuvius has been restless. Sometimes she has been quiet for
a hundred years or more and men have almost forgotten that she ever
thundered and spouted and buried cities. But all at once she would move
again. She would shoot steam and ashes into the sky. At night fire
would leap out of her top. A few times she sent out dust and lava and
destroyed houses and fields. A man who lived five hundred years after
Pompeii was destroyed described Vesuvius as she was in his time. He
said:

"This m