The vehicle employed by the traveller would depend upon circumstances. You would meet the poor man riding on an ass, or plodding on foot with his garments well girt; the better provided on a mule; a finer person or an official on a horse; the more luxurious or easy-going either in some form of carriage or borne in a litter very similar to the oriental palanquin. To carriages, which were of several kinds--two-wheeled, four-wheeled, heavy and light--it may be necessary to make further reference; here it is sufficient to observe that, in order to assist quick travelling, there existed individuals or companies who let out a light form of gig, in which the traveller rode behind a couple of mules or active Gaulish ponies as far as the next important stopping-place, where he could find another jobmaster, or keeper of livery-stables, to send him on further. The rich man, travelling, as he necessarily would, with a train of servants and with full appliances for his comfort, would journey in a coach, painted and gilded, cushioned and curtained, drawn by a team showily caparisoned with rich harness and coloured cloths. This must have presented an appearance somewhat similar to that of the extravagantly decorated travelling-coach of the fourteenth century. The ordinary man of modest means would be satisfied with his mule or horse, and with his one or two slaves to attend him. On the less frequented stretches of road, where there was no proper accommodation for the night, his slaves would unpack the luggage and bring out a plain meal of wine, bread, cheese, and fruits. They would then lay a sort of bedding on the ground and cover it with a rug or blanket. The rich folk might bring their tents or have a bunk made up in their coaches. Where there was some sort of lodging for man and horse the average wayfarer would make the best of it. In the better parts of the empire and in the larger places of resort there were houses corresponding in some measure to the old coaching-inns of the eighteenth century; in the East there were the well-known caravanserais; but for the most part the ancient hostelries must have afforded but undesirable quarters. They were neither select nor clean. You journeyed along till you came to a building half wine-shop and store, half lodging-house. Outside you might be told by an inscription and a sign that it was the "Cock" Inn, or the "Eagle," or the "Elephant," and that there was "good accommodation." Its keeper might either be its proprietor, or merely a slave or other tenant put into it by the owner of a neighbouring estate and country-seat. Your horses or mules would be put up--with a reasonable suspicion on your part that the poor beasts would be cheated in the matter of their fodder--and you would be shown into a room which you might or might not have to share with someone else. In any case you would have to share it with the fleas, if not with worse.