Immediately before him, on the square, steep height, where the earliest little old Rome had huddled itself together, arose the palace of the Caesars.

Half-veiling the vast substruction of rough, brown stone--line upon line of successive ages of builders--the trim, old-fashioned garden walks, under their closely-woven walls of dark glossy foliage, test of long and careful cultivation, wound gradually, among choice trees, statues and fountains, distinct and sparkling in the full morning sunlight, to the richly tinted mass of pavilions and corridors above, centering in the lofty, white-marble dwelling-place of Apollo himself.
How often had Marius looked forward to that first, free wandering through Rome, to which he now went forth with a heat in the town sunshine (like a mist of fine gold-dust spread through the air) to the height of his desire, making the dun coolness of the narrow streets welcome enough at intervals.

He almost feared, descending the stair hastily, lest some unforeseen accident should snatch the little cup of enjoyment from him ere he passed the door.

In such morning rambles in places new to him, [175] life had always seemed to come at its fullest: it was then he could feel his youth, that youth the days of which he had already begun to count jealously, in entire possession.

So the grave, pensive figure, a figure, be it said nevertheless, fresher far than often came across it now, moved through the old city towards the lodgings of Cornelius, certainly not by the most direct course, however eager to rejoin the friend of yesterday.
Bent as keenly on seeing as if his first day in Rome were to be also his last, the two friends descended along the Vicus Tuscus, with its rows of incense-stalls, into the Via Nova, where the fashionable people were busy shopping; and Marius saw with much amusement the frizzled heads, then a la mode.