at unequal distances, accordingly as the nature of the ground demanded greater or less means of defence, was pierced with loopholes and was not very solid. Vitruvius would have had them rounded and of cut stone; those of Pompeii are of quarried stone, and in small rough ashlars, stuck together with mortar. The third story of each tower reached to the platform of the rampart, with which it communicated by two doors. Notwithstanding all that remains of them, the walls of Pompeii were no longer of service at the time of the eruption. Demolished by Sylla and then by Augustus, shattered by the earthquake, and interrupted as I have said, they left the city open. They must have served for a public promenade, like the bastions of Geneva. Eight gates opened around the city (perhaps there was a ninth that has now disappeared, opening out upon the sea). The most singular of all of them is the Nola gate, the construction of which appears to be very ancient. We there come across those fine cut stones that reveal the handiwork of primitive times. A head considerably broken and defaced, surmounting the arcade, was accompanied with an Oscan inscription, which, having been badly read by a savant, led for an instant to the belief that the Campanians of the sixth century before Jesus Christ worshipped the Egyptian Isis. The learned interpreter had read: _Isis propheta_ (I translate it into Latin, supposing you to know as little as I do of the Oscan tongue). The inscription really ran, _idem probavit_. [Illustration: The Nola Gate at Pompeii.] It is worth while passing through the gate to get a look at the angle formed by the ramparts at this one point. I doubt whether the city was ever attacked on that side. Before reaching the gate the assailants would have had to wind along through a narrow gallery, where the archers, posted on the walls and armed with arrows and stones, would have crushed them all. The Herculaneum gate is less ancient, and yet more devastated by time than the former one. The arcade has fallen in, and it requires some attention to reinstate it. This gate formed three entrances. The two side ways were probably intended for pedestrians; the one in the middle was closed by means of a portcullis sliding in a groove, still visible, but covered with stucco. As the portcullis, in descending, would have, thrown down this coating, we must infer that at the time of the eruption it had not been in use for a long while, Pompeii having ceased to be a fortified place. The Herculaneum gate was not masked inside, so that the archers, standing upon the terraces that covered the side entrances, could fire upon the enemy even after the portcullis had been carried. We know that one of the stratagems of the besieged consisted in allowing the enemy to push in, and then suddenly shutting down upon them the formidable _cataracta_ suspended by iron chains. They then slaughtered the poor wretches indiscriminately and covered themselves with glory.