the other rises near at hand and flows into the celebrated baths--the
_termid_, as the natives, using the old Greek word, still call it. It is a
large and deep stone basin, half full of warm water, in which small
fishes, snakes and tortoises disport themselves; the massive engirdling
walls demonstrate its Roman origin. Thick mists hang over the _termid_ in
the early mornings, when the air is chilly, but later on it becomes a
lively place, full of laughter and splashings. Here, for a sou, you may
get the boys to jump down from the parapet and wallow among the muddy ooze
at the bottom; the liquid, though transparent, is not colourless, but
rather of the blue-green tint of the aquamarine crystal; it flows rapidly,
and all impurities are carried away.

There are always elderly folk idling about these premises, and youngsters
with rods tempting the fish out of the water; day after day the game goes
on, the foolish creatures nibble at the bait and are drawn up on high;
their fellows see the beginning of the tragedy, but never the end, where,
floundering in the street, the victims cover their silvery scales with a
coating of dust and expire ignominiously, as unlike live fishes as if they
came ready cooked out of the kitchen _panes et frits_.

Above this basin is another one, that of the women; and below it, at the
foot of a lurid stairway, a suite of subterranean (Roman) chambers, a kind
of Turkish bath for men, where the water hurries darkly through; the place
is reeking with a steamy heat, and objectionable beyond words; it would
not be easy to describe, in the language of polite society, those features
in which it is most repulsive to Europeans.

[Illustration: Entrance to the Termid]

How easily, as in former days, might now a health-giving wonder be created