418 PELOPONNESUS. 
CHAP. By a simple contrivance, which is here visible, 
VII. 
the seats of the spectators were not upon a level 
w i tn tn e places for the feet of those who sate 
th?pLtI behind them ; a groove, eighteen inches wide, 
and about two inches deep, being dug in the 
solid mass of stone whereof each seat consisted, 
expressly for the reception of the feet; and this 
groove extended behind every row of spec- 
tators; by which means their garments were 
not trampled upon by persons seated above 
them. The width of each seat was fourteen 
inches, and its perpendicular elevation sixteen 
inches. The number of the seats, counted as 
steps from the Conistra or Pit, to the top of the 
Coilon, was fifty-six 1 : in the same direction 
from the Pit, upwards, the semicircular ranges 
of the seats were intersected at right angles by 
above twenty flights of little stairs ; each flight 
being twenty-eight inches and a half wide, and 
each step exactly half the height of one of the 
benches : these, crossing the several rows from 
the Pit upwards, enabled persons to ascend to 
the top of the theatre, without incommoding the 
spectators when seated. Guilletiere, speaking 
of such stairs, says, that near to them were 
(1) Sir W. Cell says fifty-five. 
