Dicky said when we got them
that you had to remember that the seats were Roman in order to
appreciate them, they were such very cold stone, and they sloped from
back to front, for the purpose, as we found out afterward from the
guide-book, of letting off the rain water. We were glad to understand
it, but Dicky declared that no explanation would induce him to take a
season ticket for the Arena, it was too destitute of modern
improvements. It was something, though, to sit there watching, with the
ranged multitude, a show in a Roman Amphitheatre--one could imagine
things, lictors and aediles, senators and centurions. It only required
the substitution of togas and girdled robes for trousers and petticoats,
and a purple awning for the emperor, and a brass-plated body-guard with
long spears and hairy arms and legs, and a few details like that. If one
half closed one's eyes it was hardly necessary to imagine. I was half
closing my eyes, and wondering whether they had Vestal Virgins at this
particular amphitheatre, and trying to remember whether they would turn
their thumbs up or down when they wished the clown to be destroyed, when
Dicky grew suddenly pale and sprang to his feet.
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