CHAP suceeding reigns by the Coliseum, the baths of II. Titus, the Claudian portico, and the temples

dedicated to the goddess of Peace, and to the genius of Rome These monuments of architecture, the property of the Roman people, were adorned with the most beautiful productions of Grecian painting and sculpture; and in the temple of Peace, a very curious library was open to the curiosity of the learned. At a small distance from thence was situated the Forum of Trajan. It was surrounded with a lofty portico, in the form of a quadrangle, into which four triumphal arches opened a noble and spacious entrance im theocentre arose a column of marble, whose height, of one hundred and ten feet, denoted the elevation of the hill that had been cut away. This column, which still subsists in its ancient beauty, exhibited an exact representation of the Dacian victories of its founder. The veteran soldier contemplated the story of his own campaigns, and by an easy illusion of national vanity, the peaceful citizen associated himself to the honours of the triumph. All the other quarters of the capital, and all the provinces of the empire, were embellished by the same liberal spirit of public magnificence, and were filled with amphitheatres, theatres, temples, porticos, tri251 que lo model qon 94(+ umphal roh bus ana

A

* Donatus de Roma Vetere, I. in. c. 4, 5, 6. Nardini Roma Antica, l. iii. 11, 12, 13. and a MS. description of ancient Rome, by Bernardus Oricellarius, or Rucellai, of which I obtained a copy from the library of the Canon Ricardi at Florence. Two celebrated pictures of Timanthes and of Protogenes are mentioned by Pliny, as the Temple of peace; and the Laocoon

was found in the baths of Titus.

umphal arches, baths and aqueducts, all variously CHAP. conducive to the health,qthe devotion, and the II. pleasures of the meanest citizen.The last men tioned of those edifices deserve our peculiar attention. The boldness of thegenterprise, the solidity of the execution, and the uses to which they were subservient, rank the aqueducts among the noblest monuments of Roman genius and power. The aqueducts of a capital claim a just pre-eminence; but the curious traveller, who, without the light of history, should examine those of Spoleto, of Metz, or of Segovia, would very naturally conclude, that those provincial towns had formerly been the residence of some potent monarch. The solitudes of Asia and Africa were once covered with flourishing cities, whose populousness, and even whose existence, was derived from such artificial supplies of a perennial stream of fresh water*. ivory mujord We have computed the inhabitants, cand con- and greatem- ness of the pire. The observation of the number and great- the empire. ness of its cities will serve to confirm the former, and to multiply the latter. It may not be unpleasing to collect a few scattered instances relative to that subject, without forgetting, however, that from the vanity of nations and the poverty of language, the vague appellation of city has been indifferently bestowed on Rome and upon Laurentum. I. Ancient Italy is said to have con- In Italy.

Number

templated the public works, of the Rothe empire.

* Montfaucon l'Antiquite Expliquee, tom. iv. p. 2. 1. i. c. 9. Fabretti has composed a very learned treatise on the aqueducts of Rome. To eifted and 2 brit anw

cities of

II.

CHA P. tained eleven hundred and ninety-seven cities; and for whatsoever æra of antiquity the expression might be intended *, there is not any reason to believe the country less populous in the age of the Antonines, than in that of Romulus, The petty states of Latium were contained within the metropolis of the empire, by whose superior influence they had been attracted. Those parts of Italy which have so long languished under the lazy tyranny of priests and viceroys, had been afflicted only by the more tolerable calamities of war; and the first symptoms of decay, which they experienced, were amply compensated by the rapid improvements of the Cisalpine Gaul. The splendor of Verona may be traced in its remains: yet Verona was less celebrated than Aquileia or Gaul and Paudua, Milan or Ravenna. II. The spirit of improvement had passed the Alps, and been felt even in the woods of Britain, which were gradually cleared away to open a free space for convenient and elegant habitations. York was the seat of government; London was already enriched by commerce; and Bath was celebrated for the salutary effects of its medicinal waters. Gaul could boast of her twelve hundred cities t; and though, in the northern parts, many of them, without excepting Paris itself, were little more than the rude and imperfect townships of a rising people; the southern provinces imitated the wealth

Spain.

'c

wealth and elegance of Italy Many were the c H a p. cities of Gaul, Marseilles, Arles, Nismes, Narbonne, Thoulouse, Bourdeaux, Autun, Vienna, Lyons, Langres, and Treves, whose ancient condition might sustain an equal, and perhaps advantageous comparison with their present state. With regard to Spain, that country flourished as a province, and has declined as a kingdom. Exhausted by the abuse of her strength, by America, and by superstition, her pride might possibly be confounded, if we required such a list of three hundred and sixty cities, as Pliny has exhibited under the reign of Vespasian t. III. Three hun- Africa, dred African cities had once acknowledged the authority of Carthage ‡, nor is it likely that their numbers diminished under the adminisration of the emperors: Carthage itself rose with new splendor from its ashes; and that capital, as well as Capua and Corinth, soon recovered all the advantages which can be separated from independent sovereignty. IV. The provinces of the east Asia. present the contrast of Roman magnificence with Turkish barbarism. The ruins of antiquity scattered over uncultivated fields, and ascribed by ignorance, to the power of magic, scarcely afforded a shelter to the oppressed peasant or wandering Arab. Under the reign of the Cæsars, the proper Asia alone contained five hundred populous

*Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 5.

+ Plin. Hist. Natur. iii. 3, 4. iv. 35. The list seems authentic and accurate the division of the provinces, and the different condition ofthe cities, are minutely distinguished.

+ Strabon. Geograph.1. xvii. p. 1189.

CH A P. pulous cities*, enriched with all the gifts of na

II.

1

ture, and adorned with all the refinements of art. Eleven cities of Asia had once disputed the honour of dedicating a temple to Tiberius, and their respective merits were examined by the senate +. Four of them were immediately rejected as unequal to the burden; and among these was Laodicea, whose splendour is still displayed in its ruins. Laodicea collected a very considerable revenue from its flocks of sheep, celebrated for the fineness of their wool, and had received, a little before the contest, a legacy of above four hundred thousand pounds by the testament of a generous citizen §. If such was the poverty of Laodicea, what must have been the wealth of those cities, whose claim appeared preferable, and particularly of Pergamus, of Smyrna, and of Ephesus, who so long disputed with each other the titular primacy of Asia?

1

• Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ii. 16. Philostrat. in Vit. Sophist. 1. ii, p. 48. Edit. Olear.

+ Tacit. Annal. iv. 55. I have taken some pains in consulting and comparing modern travellers, with regard to the fate of those eleven cities of Asia; seven or eight are totally destroyed, Hypæpe, Tralles, Laodicea, Ilium, Halicarnassus, Miletus, Ephesus, and we may add Sardes. Of the remaining three, Pergamus is a straggling village of two or three thousand inhabitants: Magnesia, under the name of Guzel-hisser, a town of some consequence; and Smyrna, a great city, peopled by an hundred thousand souls. But even at Smyrna, while the Franks have maintained commerce, the Turks have ruined the arts.

* See a very exact and pleasing description of the ruins of Laodicea, in Chandler's Travels through Asia Minor, p. 225, &c.

6 Strabo, 1. xii. p. 866. He had studied at Tralles,