Having passed the gate, we find ourselves on one of those fine paved roads which, starting at Rome in all directions, have everywhere left very visible traces, and in many places still serve for traffic. The Greeks had gracefulness, the Romans grandeur. Nothing shows this more strikingly than their magnificent highways that pierce mountains, fill up ravines, level the plains, cross the marshes, bestride rivers, and even valleys, and stretched thus from the Tiber to the Euphrates. In order to construct them, they first traced two parallel furrows, from between which they removed all the loose earth, which they replaced with selected materials, strongly packed, pressed, and pounded down. Upon this foundation (the _pavimentum_) was placed a layer of rough stone (_statumen_), then a filling-in of gravel and lime (the _rudus_), and, finally, a third bed of chalk, brick, lime, clay, and sand, kneaded and pounded in together into a solid crust. This was the nucleus. Last of all, they placed above it those large rough blocks of lava which you will find everywhere in the environs of Naples. As before remarked, these roads have served for twenty centuries, and they are good yet. [Illustration: The Herculaneum Gate, restored.] The Herculaneum road formed a delightful promenade at the gates of Pompeii; a street lined with trees and villas, like the Champs Elyseés at Paris, and descending from the city to the country between two rows of jaunty monuments prettily-adorned, niches, kiosks, and gay pavilions, from which the view was admirable. This promenade was the cemetery of Pompeii. But let not this intimation trouble you, for nothing was less mournful in ancient times than a cemetery. The ancients were not fond of death; they even avoided pronouncing its name, and resorted to all sorts of subterfuges to avoid the doleful word. They spoke of the deceased as "those who had been," or "those who are gone." Very demonstrative, at the first moment they would utter loud lamentations. Their sorrow thus vented its first paroxysms. But the first explosion over, there remained none of that clinging melancholy or serious impression that continues in our Christian countries. The natives of the south are epicureans in their religious belief, as in their habits of life. Their cemeteries were spacious avenues, and children played jackstones on the tombs.