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TO THE GOLD CREST BUILDING IN MY 'Twas like a vernal morn, yet overhead

From The National Review.

population of the city of Rome compare with that of London? We may take it that London, in its widest extent, has a circuit of nearly fifty miles, and that it is nearly seventeen miles from north to south and from east to west. The population may be taken as about five millions. Rome was of much less extent; but it does not follow that its inhabitants were fewer. The circumference of the city was only about twenty miles, and its diameter seven miles; but its limits were fixed by the fourteen quarters marked out by Augustus, and afterwards enclosed within the walls of Aurelian. Suburbs analogous to Hendon or to Croydon were not reckoned in the population of Rome. A curious proof of this is to be found in the fact that in the census of Rome only large houses or palaces, and houses let out in flats, domus and insulæ, are mentioned. The villas, which are frequently mentioned by Juvenal and other writers, appear to have been entirely beyond the boundary. Even within this limited area the population, it is probable, was as large as that of greatest London. The streets of Rome were very narrow. Over nearly all London the houses vary from two to four stories in height; those of Rome varied from five to seven stories. And Rome was much more completely built over than is modern London. There were, indeed, few vacant spaces; not one of them could compare with Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens, Regent's Park, Greenwich Com

ANCIENT ROME AND MODERN LONDON. IT is commonly believed among Englishmen that in respect of extent, of population, and of wealth, London is the greatest city the world has ever known. Probably, however, Nineveh, Babylon, the Egyptian Thebes, and Rome in the second century of our era and in the third were at least equal to London. Nineveh and Babylon appear to have occupied a greater area. Nineveh was described as a city of three days' journey; Babylon, which is expressly said to have been four-square and twelve miles in every direction, would occupy one hundred and forty-four square miles. The square miles in greatest London are one hundred and twenty. As to Nineveh, Babylon, Thebes, we have no data by which we can with certainty estimate their population and wealth. We know that these were very great; but we cannot measure this greatness by exact figures. When we come to Rome we have precise information. Apart from area, ancient Rome was probably superior to modern London. It was at the least as popular and as wealthy, and it was more beautiful. I know that this conclusion differs from that of Gibbon, and that, practically, Gibbon's work is the only acknowledged authority in our public schools and universities. To relieve the fears of those who hesitate to differ from so great a master, I will give a few instances of the historian's inaccuracy. Gibbon reckons the area of the Roman Empire at one mil-mon, Hampstead Heath, and other public lion six hundred thousand square miles; recreation grounds which are all included really, it was about three million two hun- in London. dred thousand square miles. He gives Gibbon - who was, in every case of the probable tribute of Spain, Gaul, and large figures, extremely sceptical — calEgypt as about five millions sterling each; culates that the city of Rome contained at yet he reckons the total revenue of Rome the most about a million and three-quaras from fifteen to twenty millions. Thus, ters of inhabitants. Lipsius, in his "De he allows, at the most, only five millions Magnitudine Romana," reckons at least from the rest of the world — Africa, Asia | five millions; but Gibbon puts this aside Minor, Austria, European Turkey, and with the remark that "the book, though Italy itself. He seems to take no account ingenious, betrays signs of a heated imag of any revenues other than the tribute or ination." It is singular that both writers land-tax; for, although he accurately enu- rely for their conclusions on the same fig. merates the additional taxes imposed by ures, and differ in their interpretation. It Augustus, he makes no attempt to esti-is distinctly recorded that in the fourth mate their produce.

How, then, in the first place, did the

century, in the reign of Theodosius, there were enumerated 1,730 domus, or great

houses, and 46,602 insulæ, or large build- | proposal was rejected. Seneca asked the ings, let out in flats or single rooms, and Senate to consider "quantum periculi imcorresponding very closely with our model mineret si servi nostri nos numerare coelodging-houses. But how many people did pissent." Tiberius in the year A.D. 21 each of those buildings contain? Lipsius condemned the number and variety of

tiones."* In short, the evidence proving that there were very many slaves in the palaces of Rome is overwhelming, and appears to justify the estimate of at the least a hundred people in every domus.

reckons an average of a hundred. Gibbon slaves, "familiarum numerum et nareckons an average of twenty-five. The only reason given for Gibbon's estimate is that in his time the houses in Paris were mostly let out in flats, and contained only twenty-five people in each house. Thus the question is narrowed. Did the palaces on the one hand, and the insula or lodging-houses on the other, contain an average of twenty-five people or one hundred? The larger number is more probable, and therefore the estimate of a population of five millions is the more acceptable. As to the domus, or palace, we must recollect that it contained not only the master and his family, but many slaves.

that in most cases each flat was occupied by several families, or that in any cases where a whole flat at such a rent was occupied by a single family there was a considerable company of slaves. Thus, the estimate of one hundred persons in each insula seems not excessive.

Then as to the 46,602 insula. Did they contain twenty-five people each (as Gibbon conjectures), or more than one hundred? There are many reasons for thinking that here Lipsius is nearer to the truth than Gibbon. These lodging-houses contained many flats; for we know that laws were passed by Augustus, Tiberius, and Nero, with the object of limiting the height to seventy feet from the ground — edicts The slaves included (besides domestic which are said to have been constantly servants) librarians, doctors, hairdressers, disobeyed. On the authority of Heinepainters, carpenters, architects, and so ceus, Gibbon says that the annual rent of forth. "Almost every profession," Gib-the several flats coenacula was about bon says, "either liberal or mechanical, £360 a year. It may be taken for granted might be found in the house of an opulent senator."* Pedanius Secundus, prefect of the city, whose office corresponded with that of the lord mayor of London, was murdered in his own house in the reign of Nero, A.D. 61, and the murderer was not identified. It was thereupon proposed that all the slaves in the house should be crucified; and, after a long debate in the Senate, which is fully reported by Tacitus,† the proposal was adopted. It was then found that the slaves in this one house numbered four hundred. Again, we are told that when a great man went to make a call, he would, although his journey might not be more than a few hundred yards, have a retinue of at least fifty slaves. Ammianus Marcellinus, quoted by both Lipsius and Gibbon, gives a long description of the progress of a wealthy citizen from Rome to his country residence, a description which clearly suggests a household of four or five hundred slaves. It is certain that when it was proposed that the slaves should wear a distinctive dress the

* Gibbon's Decline and Fall. Cap. a.
†Tacitus, Ann., xiv. 42.

The ground floor of the insula was often occupied by shops; the next two or three floors either by several families on each, or by single families wealthy enough to own a staff of slaves. The upper stories were let in smaller compartments, and often in single rooms. Juvenal † says that a man could purchase in the country, and within twenty miles of Rome, the freehold of a good house and a small garden for the same sum as was required for the yearly rent of a dark chamber in the attics (sub tegulis) in Rome; from which we may conclude that a single room, at the top of a house, would let for something like £20 a year. It seems safe, therefore, to conclude that each of the five or six flats of an insula contained twenty people,

Tacitus, Ann., iii. 53. ↑ Juv., Satire, iii. 233.

and that the 46,602 insula would hold a | paigns." This fund was afterwards kept population of nearly five millions. As up by taxes. there were 1,780 palaces, we may be sure Again, Augustus, by his will left, after that the total population of the city was, legacies to his relations and friends,† as Lipsius and others have calculated, more than £350,000 to be divided viritim more than five millions. It may be said among the people of Rome, £83,000 for that the number of houses, of both kinds, the ten thousand Prætorians, £15,000 for in the reign of Theodosius is no guide to the city militia, and £4 3s. 4d. each to the the number in the reigns of Tiberius, legionary soldiers. Those legacies would Claudius, Nero, and Antoninus. If that require nearly two millions sterling. Nero be true, the argument is still good for the spent in presents alone more than eighreign of Theodosius; but we might ex-teen millions sterling during his reign of pect that the migration under Constantine fourteen years.‡ Vitellius is said to have in the fourth century would have reduced squandered seven millions and a half ster. the population of Rome. The enormous ling in his reign of less than a year.§ growth of the population of Constantinople is ascribed by Gibbon mainly to the great emigration from Rome of opulent senators, officials, tradesmen, and slaves. If there was so vast an exodus in the reign of Constantine, it is probable that the population of five millions in the reign of Theodosius was not greater than that under Tiberius or Hadrian, or at least during the second century.

These are, of course, examples of the wealth of emperors, but of emperors in their private capacity, on which no public claim could be made. We shall, however, arrive at a similar conclusion as to the wealth of Rome from other considerations. Seneca, a man of vile character, yet of almost saintly reputation (so different was his life from his writings), was worth at least two millions and a half It is difficult to compare the realized sterling. Yet Nero said to him: "You wealth and the annual income of Rome know that there are very many men in this with that of London. We can only pick city, and these by no means your equals out isolated facts and indicate the conclu- in accomplishments, who possess still sions which they seem to warrant. It more. As to the freedmen, who are may be well to begin with the private wealthier than the richest citizens, I am fortunes of the emperors, who for a long ashamed to speak." ¶ Much of Seneca's time rejected any kingly title and claimed wealth came from the lavish gifts of Nero; to be only citizens elected to high office, but he derived a great revenue from the as Principes Senatus, Tribuni Plebis, and extortionate interest which he charged for Imperatores; not as civil rulers, but only loans in the provinces. In fact, a rebelas commanding the armies of the State. lion was caused in Britain by Seneca's Most of them began their reigns with large usuries. fortunes. They had, indeed, to provide from the various revenues for all the expenses of government; but the surplus of receipts over expenditure was constantly very large, and that surplus was as completely under their control as if it had been private property. Neither Senate nor people had any voice in the matter. Before the Empire was fully established, Augustus says, "In the consulship of M. Lepidus and L. Arruntius I paid 100,700,000 sesterces (about £900,000), in the name of Tiberius Cæsar and myself, into the military treasury for the fund designed to pay bounties and pensions to soldiers who had served twenty or more cam

Claudius Felix was a freedman. Yet he was the governor of Judæa who judged St. Paul. His brother Pallas also was a freedman of Claudius. He is said by Tacitus to have possessed two millions and a half sterling. A present of £130,000** was voted by the Senate.ft Yet he had formerly been a slave of Antonia, the mother of Claudius. It is to him that

Arnold, p. 101.
Tac., Ann.. i. 8.
Tac., Hist., i. 20.
§ Tac., Hist., ii. 95.
Tac., Ann., xiv. 55.
Tac., Ann., xii., 53.

Arnold, p. 132.
tt Tac., Ann,, xiv. 53.