tuous villas--for instance, those of
Arrius Diomed and Cicero. This Arrius Diomed was one of the freedmen of
Julia, and the mayor of the suburb. A rich citizen, but with a bad
heart, he left his wife and children to perish in his cellar, and fled
alone with one slave only, and all the silver that he could carry away.
He perished in front of his garden gate. May the earth press heavily
upon him!

His villa, which consisted of three stories, not placed one above the
other, but descending in terraces from the top of the hill, deserves a
visit or two. You will there see a pretty court surrounded with columns
and small rooms, one of which--of an elliptical shape and opening on a
garden, and lighted by the evening twilight, but shielded from the sun
by windows and by curtains, the glass panes and rings of which have been
found--is the pleasantest nook cleared out among these ruins. You will
also be shown the baths, the saloons, the bedchambers, the garden, a
host of small apartments brilliantly decorated, basins of marble, and
the cellar still intact, with amphorae, inside of which were still a few
drops of wine not yet dried up, the place where lay the poor suffocated
family--seventeen skeletons surprised there together by death. The fine
ashes that stifled them having hardened with time, retain the print of a
young girl's bosom. It was this strange mould, which is now kept at the
museum, that inspired the _Arria Marcella_ of Theophile Gautier--that
author's masterpiece, perhaps, but at all events a masterpiece.

As for Cicero, get them to show you his villa, if you choose. You will
see absolutely nothing there, and it has been filled up again. Fine
paintings were found there previously, along with superb mosaics and a
rich collection of precious articles; but I shall not copy the
inventory. Was it really the house of Cicero? Who can say? Antiquaries
will have it so, and so be it, then! I do not deny that Cicero had a
country property at Pompeii, for he often mentions it in his letters;
but where it was, exactly, no one can demonstrate. He could have
descried it from Baiae or Misenum, he somewhere writes, had he possessed
longer vision; but in such case he could also have seen the entire side
of Pompeii that looks toward the sea. Therefore, I put aside these
useless discussions and resume our methodical tour.

I have shown you the ancients in their public life; at the Forum and in
the street, in the temples and in the wine