noon
All that gave splendour to the city at other hours of the day was at this period hidden from the eye . The elegant courtiers reclined in their lofty chambers ; the guards on duty ensconced themselves in angles of walls and recesses of porticoes ; the graceful ladies slumbered on perfumed couches in darkened rooms ; the gilded chariots were shut into the carriage-houses ; the prancing horses were confined in the stables ; and even the wares in the market-places were removed from exposure to the sun . It was clear that the luxurious inhabitants of Ravenna recognised no duties of sufficient importance , and no pleasures of sufficient attraction , to necessitate the exposure of their susceptible bodies to the noontide heat . To give the reader some idea of the manner in which the indolent patricians of the Court loitered away their noon , and to satisfy , at the same time , the exigencies attaching to the conduct of this story , it is requisite to quit the lounging-places of the plebeians in the streets for the couches of the nobles in the Emperor 's palace . Passing through the massive entrance gates , crossing the vast hall of the Imperial abode , with its statues , its marbles , and its guards in attendance , and thence ascending the noble staircase , the first object that might on this occasion have attracted the observer , when he gained the approaches to the private apartments , was a door at an extremity of the corridor , richly carved and standing half open . At this spot were grouped some fifteen or twenty individuals , who conversed by signs , and maintained in all their movements the most decorous and complete silence . Sometimes one of the party stole on tiptoe to the door , and looked cautiously through , returning almost instantaneously , and expressing to his next neighbour , by various grimaces , his immense interest in the sight he had just beheld .