ment of this form now remaining at Rome.* Reaching, at length, through crooked lanes, formed by the walls of surrounding vine-yards, the Gate of St. Sebastian, the Portus Capenus of the wall of Aurelian, without turning aside to trace the endless labyrinth of the Baths of Caracalla, or to examine the unaccountable composition of the Mons Testaceus, a considerable hill entirely formed of fragments of ancient pottery, we behold with • This indestructible Mausoleum is a hundred feet square, and as many high. There are several inscriptions upon it. By one of them C. CESTIUS. L. F. POB. EPULO. PR. TR. PL. VII, VIR. EPULONUM. its illustrious Occupant appears to have been one of the seven Officers who had the direction of the Sacrificial Feasts. with veneration the everlasting pavement of the Appian Way.* On the left hand is the tomb of the Horatii-now a shapeless mass of Roman brick, disguised by a modern turret for the convenience of a Vine-dresser. On the right (if I mistake not) is that of the Scipios, forgotten by Tradition, though recorded by Livy, till it was accidentally Poring Antiquaries can still trace, among the endless walls of the Baths of Caracalla, the Vestibulum, which was an immense Rotunda, a Theatre, two Libraries (one Greek, the other Latin) a Grove then planted, with the plane-tree in which were placed chairs for Poets, Philosophers, and Rhetoricians, and two Temples; beside the rooms where the Wrestlers undressed, where they were sprinkled with dust, after having been anointed with oil, where they sunned themselves, and where they exhibited the Gymnastic games; and beside the Terraces for throwing the discus or quoit, the Piscina or pool for Swimmers, and Baths whether cold, tepid, warm, or sweating, sufficient to accommodate three thousand Persons at a time: For the Imperial Therma were rather luxurious Lyceums to which the Baths, properly so called, were nothing more than a sensual appendage. cidentally discovered in 1780, when its precious contents were lodged in the Museum of the Vatican.* Not far distant is the principal opening of the Catacombs, those endless excavations originally formed by digging puzzolana for the enormous Edifices of ancient Rome-now venerated by the Catholic Church as the burying-place of the Primitive Martyrs; into which I shall not venture to descend, nor shall I pledge my veracity upon the number of miles through which it is said the winding cavities may be pursued. On the opposite side of the Roman Way, at the distance of a mile or two after * "Extra Portam Capenam," says Livy, "in Scipionum monumento tres statuæ sunt; quarum duæ P. & L. Scipionum dicuntur esse 3 tertia Poeta Ennii. Lib. xxxviii. c. 56. after the ancient pavement has been quitted by the modern road, is the superb Mausoleum of the Wife of Crassusthat Crassus whose wealth was a counterpoise to the name of Pompey, and the fortune of Cæsar, since he was one of the Triumvirate which, at Lucca, divided the dominions of the Roman World. This noble Monument, more durable -perhaps more splendid, than the tomb of Mausolus erected by Artemisia (a wonder of ancient Greece, when she proudly despised the Barbarians of the West) is a round Tower sixty feet diameter, rising from a square Basement; and it was once surmounted with a Dome. There still remains a beautiful entablature of white marble. It is of the Doric Order, bearing ox-heads, hung with garlands, in the alternate metopes, which shew no marks of antiquity but the perfection of the workmanship, and the laconism of the inscription: CECILIE Q. CRETICI F. CRASSI. inscribed in large capitals, upon a marble pannel. The form and the materials of this magnificent structure would seem to have entitled it to endless duration, if it had been left to time and nature; but the Dome was levelled to make room for a fortification, in the wars of the Barons; and in less turbulent times, when the fort became useless, immense blocks of stone * Crassus to Cecilia Metella the Daughter of Q. Creticus. |