taphs, and as the Roman walked along the Appian Way
two thousand years ago, or as we stroll along the same highway to-day, it
is in silent converse with the dead. Sometimes the stone itself addresses
us, as does that of Olus Granius:[22] "This mute stone begs thee to stop,
stranger, until it has disclosed its mission and told thee whose shade it
covers. Here lie the bones of a man, modest, honest, and trusty--the
crier, Olus Granius. That is all. It wanted thee not to be unaware of
this. Fare thee well." This craving for the attention of the passer-by
leads the composer of one epitaph to use somewhat the same device which
our advertisers employ in the street-cars when they say: "Do not look at
this spot," for he writes: "Turn not your eyes this way and wish not to
learn our fate," but two lines later, relenting, he adds: "Now stop,
traveller...within this narrow resting-place,"[23] and then we get the
whole story. Sometimes a dramatic, lifelike touch is given by putting the
inscription into the form of a dialogue between the dead and those who are
left behind. Upon a stone found near Rome runs the inscription:[24]
"Hail, name dear to us, Stephanus,...thy Moschis and thy Diodorus salute
thee." To which the dead man replies: "Hail chaste wife, hail Diodorus,
my friend, my brother." The dead man often begs for a pleasant word from
the passer-by. The Romans, for instance, who left Ostia by the highway,
read upon a stone the sentiment:[25] "May it go well with you who lie
within and, as for you who go your way and read these lines, 'the earth
rest lightly on thee' say." This pious salutation loses some of the flavor
of spontaneity in our eyes when we find that it had become so much of a
convention as to be indicated by the initial letters of the several words:
S(it) t(ibi) t(erra) l(evis). The traveller and the departed exchange good
wishes on a stone found near Velitrae:[26]

"May it go well with you who read and you who pass this way,
The like to mine and me who on this spot my tomb have built."

One class of passers-by was dreaded by the dweller beneath the stone--the
man with a paint-brush who was looking for a conspicuous spot on which to
paint the name of his favorite political candidate. To such an one the
hope is expressed "that his ambition may be realized, provided he
instructs his slave not to paint this stone."[27]

These wayside epitaphs must have left an impress on the mind and character
of the Roman w