[11] Mineralogists affirm that these lions are not of basalt, because
the volcanic stone to-day known under that name could not have existed
in Egypt; but as Pliny calls the Egyptian stone out of which these lions
have been carved, basalt, and as Winckelmann, the historian of the arts,
also retains this appellation, I have deemed myself justified in using
it in its primitive acceptation.
[12]
"Carpite nunc, tauri, de septem collibus herbas,
Dum licet. Hic magnæ jam locus urbis erit."
TIBULLUS.
"Hoc quodcunque vides hospes quam maxima Roma est,
Ante Phrygem Enean collis et herba fuit."
PROPERTIUS, Book IV. el. 1.
[13]
Roma domus fiet: Veios migrate, Quirites;
Si non et Veios occupat ista domus.
[14] Mounts Citorio and Testacio.
[15] The Janicula, Mount Vaticano and Mount Mario.
Chapter v.
After the excursion to the Capitol and the Forum, Corinne and Nelville
spent two days in visiting the Seven Hills. The Romans formerly observed
a festival in honour of them. These hills, enclosed in her bosom, are
one of the original beauties of Rome; and we may easily conceive what
delight was experienced by feelings attached to their native soil, in
celebrating this singularity.
Oswald and Corinne, having seen the Capitoline Hill the day before,
began their walks by Mount Palatine; it was entirely occupied by the
palace of the Cæsars, called _the golden palace_. This hill offers
nothing to our view, at present, but the ruins of that palace. The four
sides of it were built by Augustus Tiberius, Caligula, and Nero; but the
stones, covered with fertile plants, are all that now remain of it:
Nature has there resumed her empire over the labours of man, and the
beauty of the flowers consoles us for the destruction of the palace. The
luxury of the times of the kings and of the Republic only consisted in
public edifices; private houses were very small, and very simple.
Cicero, Hortensius, and the Gracchi, dwelt upon Mount Palatine, which,
at the decline of Rome, was scarcely sufficient for the abode of a
single man. In the latter ages, the nation was nothing more than an
anonymous crowd, merely designated by the era of its master. We look in
vain here for the two laurels planted before the door of Augustus, the
laurel of war, and that of the fine arts cultivated by peace; both have
disappeared.
There is still remaining, on Mount Palatine, some chambers of the Baths
of Livia; we are there shown the holes which contained the precious
stones that were then lavished upon ceilings, as a common ornament, and
paintings are to be seen there whose colours are yet perfectly
untouched; the fragility of the colours adds to our astonishment at
seeing them preserved, and seems to carry us back nearer to past ages.
If it be true that Livia shortened the days of Augustus, it is in one of
these rooms that the crime was conceived, and the eyes of the sovereign
of the world, betrayed in his most intimate affections, were perhaps
fixed upon one of those pictures whose elegant flowers still remain[16].
What, in old age, were his thoughts upon his life and his pomp? Did he
recall to mind his proscriptions or his glory? Did he hope, or did he
fear a world to come? Does the last thought, which reveals everything to
man; does the last thought of a master of the universe still wander
beneath these vaults?
Mount Aventine offers more traces than any other of the first periods of
the Roman History. Exactly opposite the Palace, raised by Tiberius, we
see the ruins of the Temple of Liberty, which was built by the father of
the Gracchi. At the foot of Mount Aventine stood the temple dedicated to
the Fortune of men by Servius Tullius, to thank the gods for having
raised him from the condition of a slave to the rank of a king. Without
the walls of Rome we find also the ruins of a temple, which was
consecrated to the Fortune of women when Veturia stopped the progress of
Coriolanus. Opposite Mount Aventine is Mount Janicula, on which Porsenna
placed his army. It was opposite this Mount that Horatius Cocles caused
the bridge leading to Rome to be cut away behind him. The foundation of
this bridge is still to be seen; there stands on the bank of the river a
triumphal arch, built of brick, as simple as the action which it recalls
was grand; this arch having been raised, it is said, in honour of
Horatius Cocles. In the middle of the Tiber is perceived an island
formed of sheaves of corn gathered in the fields of Tarquin, which were
a long time exposed on the river because the Roman people would not take
them, believing that they should entail bad fortune on themselves by so
doing. It would be difficult in our days to cast a malediction upon
riches of any sort which could prevent everybody from seizing them.
On Mount Aventine were placed the temple of patrician, and that of
plebeian modesty. At the foot of this hill is seen the temple of Vesta,
which yet remains whole, though it has been often menaced by the
inundations of the Tiber. Not far from thence is the ruin of a prison
for debt, where it is said a fine trait of filial piety was displayed,
which is pretty generally known. It was also in this place that Clelia
and her companions, prisoners of Porsenna, crossed the Tiber in order to
rejoin the Romans. This Aventine Mount affords the soul repose after the
painful reflections which the other hills awaken, and its aspect is as
beautiful as the memories it recalls. The name of _Pulchrum Littus_,
Beautiful Shore, was given to the banks of the river, which rolls at its
foot, which was the walk of the Roman orators when they quitted the
forum--it was there that Cæsar and Pompey met like private citizens, and
sought to captivate Cicero whose independent eloquence was then of more
importance to them than even the power of their armies.
Poetry too lends its aid to embellish this retreat; Virgil has placed
the cavern of Cacus upon Mount Aventine, and the Romans, so great by
their history, are still more so by the heroic fictions with which the
bards have decorated their fabulous origin. Lastly, in returning from
this mountain is seen the house of Nicholas Rienzi, who vainly
endeavoured to revive ancient times among the moderns, and this memento,
feeble as it is, by the side of so many others, gives birth to much
reflection. Mount Cælius is remarkable because there we behold the
remains of the Prætorian camp, and that of the foreign soldiers. This
inscription has been found in the ruins of the edifice built for the
reception of these soldiers:--"To the hallowed genius of foreign camps!"
Hallowed indeed, for those whose power it maintained! What remains of
these ancient barracks, enables us to judge that they were built after
the manner of cloisters, or rather, that cloisters have been built upon
their model.
Mount Esquiline was called the _Poets' Mount_, because Mecenas having
his palace on this hill, Horace, Propertius and Tibullus dwelt there
also. Not far from here are the ruins of the Thermæ of Titus, and of
Trajan. It is believed that Raphael took the model of his arabesques
from the fresco paintings of the Thermæ of Titus. It is there, also,
that was discovered the group of the Laocoon. The freshness of water
affords such pleasure in hot countries that delight is taken in
assembling together all the pomp of luxury, and every enjoyment of the
imagination, in the places appropriated for bathing. It was there that
the Romans exposed their masterpieces of painting and of sculpture. They
were seen by the light of lamps, for it appears by the construction of
these buildings, that daylight never entered them: they wished thus to
preserve themselves from the rays of the sun, so burning in the south:
the sensation they produce must certainly have been the cause of the
ancients calling them the darts of Apollo. It is reasonable to suppose,
from observing the extreme precaution of the ancients to guard against
heat, that the climate was then more burning than it is in our days. It
is in the Thermæ of Caracalla, that were placed the Hercules Farnese,
the Flora, and the group of Dirce. In the baths of Nero near Ostia was
found the Apollo Belvedere. Is it possible to conceive that in
contemplating this noble figure Nero did not feel some generous
emotions?
The Thermæ and the Circuses are the only kind of buildings appropriated
to public amusements of which there remain any relics at Rome. There is
no theatre except that of Marcellus whose ruins still exist. Pliny
relates that there were three hundred and sixty pillars of marble, and
three thousand statues employed in a theatre, which was only to last a
few days. Sometimes the Romans raised fabrics so strong that they
resisted the shock of earthquakes; at others they took pleasure in
devoting immense labour to buildings which they themselves destroyed as
soon as their feasts were over; thus they sported with time in every
shape. Besides, the Romans were not like the Greeks--influenced by a
passion for dramatic representations. It was by Grecian work, and
Grecian artists, that the fine arts flourished at Rome, and Roman
greatness expressed itself rather by the colossal magnificence of
architecture than by the masterpieces of the imagination. This gigantic
luxury, these wonders of riches, possess great and characteristic
dignity, which, though not the dignity of liberty, is that of power. The
monuments appropriated for public baths, were called provinces; in them
were united all the divers productions and divers establishments which a
whole country can produce. The circus (called _Circus Maximus_) of which
the remains are still to be seen, was so near the palace of the Cæsars
that Nero could from his windows give the signal for the games. The
circus was large enough to contain three hundred thousand persons. The
nation almost in its entirety was amused at the same moment, and these
immense festivals might be considered as a kind of popular institution,
which united every man in the cause of pleasure as they were formerly
united in the cause of glory.
Mount Quirinal and Mount Viminal are so near each other that it is
difficult to distinguish them: it was here that the houses of Sallust
and of Pompey, formerly stood; it is here also that the Pope has now
fixed his abode. We cannot take one step in Rome without bringing the
present near to the past, and different periods of the past near to each
other. But we learn to reconcile ourselves to the events of our own
time, in beholding the eternal mutability of the history of man; and we
feel ashamed of letting our own lot disturb us in the presence of so
many ages, which have all overthrown the work of the preceding ones.
By the side of the Seven Hills, on their declivities or on their
summits, are seen a multitude of steeples, and of obelisks; Trajan's
column, the column of Antoninus, the Tower of Conti (whence it is said
Nero beheld the conflagration of Rome), and the Dome of St Peter's,
whose commanding grandeur eclipses that of every other object. It
appears as if the air were peopled with all these monuments, which
extend towards Heaven, and as if an aerial city were majestically
hovering over the terrestrial one.
On entering Rome again Corinne made Oswald pass under the portico of
Octavia, she who loved so well, and suffered so much; then they
traversed the _Path of Infamy_, by which the infamous Tullia passed,
trampling her father's corpse beneath the feet of her horses. At a
distance from this spot is seen the temple raised by Agrippina in honour
of Claudius whom she caused to be poisoned. And lastly we pass the tomb
of Augustus, whose enclosure now serves as an amphitheatre for the
combats of beasts.
"I have caused you to run over very rapidly," said Corinne to Lord
Nelville, "some traces of ancient history; but you will comprehend the
pleasure to be found in these researches, at once learned and poetic,
which speak to the imagination as well as to the mind. There are in Rome
many distinguished men whose only occupation is to discover some new
relation between history and the ruins." "I know no study that would
more captivate and interest me," replied Lord Nelville, "if I felt
sufficiently at rest to give my mind to it: this species of erudition is
much more animated than that which is acquired from books: one would say
that we make what we discover to live again, and that the past
re-appears from beneath the dust in which it has been buried."
"Undoubtedly," said Corinne, "this passion for antiquity is not a vain
prejudice. We live in an age when personal interest seems to be the only
principle of all the actions of men, and what sympathy, what emotion,
what enthusiasm, can ever result from such a principle? It is sweeter to
dream of those days of devotion, of personal sacrifice and heroism,
which however, have existed, and of which the earth still bears some
honourable testimonies."