Momma and Mrs. Malt expressed a desire above all things to see the temple and apartments of the Vestal Virgins, which Miss Callis with some surprise begged them on no account to mention in the presence of the gentlemen.

“There are some things,” remarked Miss Callis austerely, “from which no respectable married lady would wish to lift the veil of the classics.”

Momma was inclined to argue the point, but Miss Callis looked so shocked that she desisted.

“Perhaps, Mrs. Wick,” she said sarcastically, “you intend to go to see the Baths of Caracallus!”

To which momma replied certainly not, that was a very different thing.  And if I am unable to describe the Baths of Caracallus in this history, it is on account of Miss Callis’s personal influence and the remarkable development of her sense of propriety.

At momma’s suggestion we walked slowly all round the Via Sacra, looking steadily down at its little triangular original paving-stones, and tried to imagine ourselves the shackled captives of Scipio.  If the party had not consisted so largely of Emmeline the effort might have been successful.  Fragments of exhumed statuary, discoloured and featureless, stood tipped in rows along the shorn foundations and inspired in Mr. Malt a serious curiosity.

“The ancients,” said Mr. Malt with conviction, “were every bit as smart as the moderns, meaning born intelligence.  Look at that ear—­that ear took talent.  There isn’t a terra-cotta factory in the United States that could turn out a better ear to-day.  But they hadn’t what we call gumption, they put all their capital into one line of business, and you may be sure they swamped the market.  If they’d just done a little inventing now, instead—­worried out the idea of steam, or gas, or electricity—­why Rome might never have fallen to this day.”  And no one interfered with Mr. Malt’s idea that the fall of Rome was a purely commercial disaster.  Doubtless it was out of regard for his feelings, but he was exactly the sort of man to compel you to prove your assertion.

We found the boundaries of the first Forum of the Republic, and poppa, pacing it in a soft felt hat and a silk duster, offered a Senatorial contrast to history.  He looked round him with dignity and made the gesture which goes with his most sustained oratorical flights.  “I wouldn’t have backed up Cato in everything,” he said thoughtfully.  “No.  There were occasions on which I should have voted against the old man, and the little American school-boys of to-day would have had to decline ‘Mugwumpus’ in consequence.”  And at the thought of Cannae and Trasimene the nineteenth century Senator from Illinois fiercely pulled his beard.