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( Continued froin Vol . IT . p . 641 . ) Rome , April 23 d . —Took a regular Cicerone , and went out to see antiquities and other curiosities . The principal of these were- ^ the Campus Martius : this , however , is not now to be seen , as the site is completely covered with modern houses ; but I made my guide take me over that part
of the cily in which it lay , beginning near the Via della Fontanella , and extending eastward to the south of the Corso . The Forum Trajani—about half of which was excavated by the French . This was formerly the most splendid forum in Rome ; but nothing remains of it , except some broken piilars of grey granite , ( supposed to have belonged to the Basilica , or Court of Justice , ) and the Column of Trajan , erected to that emperor in the beginning of the second century , by the senate and people of Rome , in
commemoration of his victories . The height of this beautiful column from the pavement , including the statue on its surnraif , is 133 feet , and the spiral course of bassi relicvi , with which it is adorned , represents the Dacian wars . But is it not somewhat incongruous to have substituted the statue of St . Peter for that of Trajan ? It was fr 6 m this that Napoieoii copied that which stands in the Place Vehdome in Pafis , and fie -certainly could not have chosen a more exquisite modef . The Mameftine Prison , in which St .
Peter was confined when at Rome— -an apartment two stories deep , under the church of San Pietro in Vinculis , just by the Arch of Septimius Severus . The only approach which there used to be to this dungeon was through a hole in the floor of the upper apartment . The pillar is still shewn to which it is said that the Apostle was chained ; but in my rnind a considerable degree of doubt was throvin over the whole , when there wa ' s pointed out a
small spring of water in the flooT , which , the good Catholics pretend , burst forth miraculously , that Peter might baptize the newly-cOnverted jailor . The Tarpeian Rock— -now Only about forty feet high , so that either the top must have been lowered , or the ground beloV much raised ,-otherwise its terrors could not have been so grt at as they are represented . * The Cloaca Maxima , or principal common sewer of the ancient city—a most massive work , exactly like the pictures which are given of it , only one arch visible
at the part which I saw , and that nearly choaked up with earth , though in former times , we are toid , it Was so lofty , that a cart loaded with hay could drive under it . The Temple of Jupiter Tonans— -of this there only remain three columns ; of that of Concord , and of that of Antony and Faustina , only the portico of each . The latter appears from the frieze to have been a magnificent structure . The Temple of Peace : —three gigantic arches , and one immense fluted shaft of white marble , 48 feet in height * , are all the
remains of this building , which was one of the grandest in Rome . The Palace of the CcBsars—this formerly covered the whole ralaVine hill on which Romulus founded his infant city . But trie scene is strangely altered from what it was . There is now a large garden on the top of the hill , and another , in possession of an EriglisTnnah , on the roof of the only suite of apartments which remains entire . How little would the proud & 6 mans ever have thought of this , that so barbarous a pe 6 ple as the Britons , living in the remotest corner of the then known world , would thus come and triumph ( as
* Lcmprferc says , that it was about 80 feet in perpendicular height .
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C 82 )
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JOURNAL OF A TOUR ON THE CONTINENT .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Feb. 2, 1829, page 82, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2569/page/10/
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