In ancient times three roads lined with tombs led from the Dipylon, namely, the Road to the Academy, the Sacred Way leading to Eleusis, and the Road to the harbor, the Peiraeeus. Along the Road leading to the Academy were buried those who had died fighting for their country on land and on sea. The public burials were made at the end of each campaign, when the bones of the slain were placed in coffins of cypress wood, one coffin for each of the ten Athenian tribes, and an empty one, serving symbolically for the burial of those whose bodies could not be recovered. Citizens and strangers alike were permitted to join in the procession, and as the coffins were lowered, a speaker publicly appointed ascended a lofty pulpit and delivered an oration in honor of the dead. Thukydides says: The public cemetery is situated in the most beautiful spot outside the walls and there the Athenians always bury those who fall in war; but after the battle of Marathon the dead in recognition of their pre-eminent valor were interred on the field. It was here in the winter of 431 B. C., while delivering his immortal funeral oration that Perikles declared: It is difficult to say neither too little nor too much. I do not commiserate the parents of the dead: I would rather comfort them. Those men may be deemed fortunate who have gained the greatest honor. To you who are sons and brothers of the departed I see that the struggle to emulate them will be an arduous one. The dead have been honorably interred and it remains only that their children should be maintained at the public charge until they are grown up; this is the solid prize with which, as with a garland, Athens crowns her sons, living and dead. The tombs of many of the most famous figures in Greek history were in this public cemetery, including those of Harmodios and Aristogeiton, the Tyrannicides; Kleisthenes, the Law-giver; Perikles, the greatest Athenian Statesman; Thrasybulos, the Liberator, who overthrew the Thirty Tyrants; Chabrias; Phormio; Konon and Timotheus, father and son, "second only to Miltiades and Kimon for their brilliant feats"; and Lykurgos, the son of Lykophron, the Athenian orator and statesman, who finished the Dionysiac Theater in stone and built the Docks at the Peiraeeus. The public tombs which once lined the Road to the Academy seem to have been almost entirely destroyed, but many of the private tombs along the Sacred Way may still be seen _in situ_. Some of these, which have been well preserved (thanks to the fact that they were covered by a huge mound in 86 B. C. when the Roman Cornelius Sulla was besieging Athens), are shown in the second illustration. THE THEOSOPHIC TORCH: by Grace Knoche