Last but not least of the palace buildings was the Hippodrome, or Circus. This was a tremendous stadium about 2,000 feet long and 600 feet wide. On three sides of it were thirty or forty rows of seats, and at the north end was the Cathisma, or balcony, where the emperor and empress sat in state. It must have held 100,000 people. In the days of old the Hippodrome was the center of almost every kind of citizen activity. Here were held wildly exciting chariot races during which the Green and Blue factions (they were like the Democrats and Republicans in the United States) forgot their politics to bet on their favorites, and were ready to fly at each other with stones or swords if the wrong one got ahead. Here there were wild beast fights, bearbaiting, acrobatic feats, performances by clowns, jugglers, trained dogs, and even a trained, gilded crocodile. But not fights by gladiators, for the Christian Byzantines did not think it was right for one man to kill another in the name of sport. Here, too, the emperor-elect stood to hear the crowds proclaim him, and it was here that more than once he had to face the people and promise to obey his own laws. Some very bloody riots, called the Nika revolt, started at the Hippodrome, and it was there that they were put down with a loss of 30,000 lives. But Robert of Clari did not limit his sightseeing to the Great Palace and its grounds. He went everywhere. He visited the new Palace of Blachernae by the Golden Horn and saw that it was almost as splendid as the Bukoleon, even though it had _only_ twenty chapels and two or three hundred chambers! He stood at the Golden Gate with its two life-sized elephants made of copper. This gate was only opened when the emperor, called the Augustus, returned from a victory. Then he was taken through it seated on a golden throne on a golden four-wheeled chariot. The clergy scattered incense, and the crowd shouted, “Life eternal to our holy Augustus!” Robert also saw the Gate of the Golden Mantle with its shining globe which was supposed to protect the city from being destroyed by lightning. A statue on the globe proclaimed in large letters: “Anyone who lives in Constantinople a year can be rich enough to afford a golden mantle like the one I wear.” He saw the great monument to Justinian. It towered into the air, and on top of it was a bronze statue of this mighty emperor. He was on horseback and wore a headdress very much like that of an Aztec chieftain. He also saw the holy relics with which the city was filled—two pieces of the true cross, the head of the lance that pierced Christ’s side, two of the nails used in the Crucifixion, a vial containing the Saviour’s blood, the tunic that He wore on the first Good Friday, the crown of thorns itself, and the famous “handkerchief of Edessa” on which His portrait had been imprinted by a miracle.