DAYS NEAR ROME INTRODUCTORY 'The Campagna di Roma is nothing else than the land of Latium, which is separated from Tuscany by the Tiber. From the time of Constantine the Great the name of Latium has fallen into disuse, and that of Campania has been used in its place, and in the middle ages this name indicated a great part of the so-called "Ducatus Romanus." 'Since the middle ages this district has been divided into two parts, the Campagna, which comprises the inland district, and the Maritima, which extends along the sea-coast as far as Terracina. Nature herself has separated it by mountains and plains into distinct compartments. It is divided into three plains: first, the Campagna around the city, watered by the Tiber and the Anio, and hemmed in by the Alban and Sabine mountains, the hills above Ronciglione, and the sea-coast; secondly, the great plain in which the Pontine Marshes are situated, bounded on one side by the Alban and Volscian Hills and on the other by the sea; and lastly, the valley of the Sacco which runs between the Volscian and the Equian and Hernican Hills, and falls into the Liris near Isoletta below Ceprano.'-Gregorovius. THE THE more distant excursions described in this volume are not always the most interesting, and of course cannot be recommended for aged or delicate persons. There are, however, some even of these which may be undertaken without the slightest inconvenience or discomfort, and which form a delightful change from Rome itself in the Spring. The most advisable of these easy tours is that by the southern railway, making the excursions (separately) to Cori and Ninfa from Velletri. Another is from Ferentino to Alatri and Trisulti. Subiaco, Olevano, and Palestrina may be comfortably visited from Rome by rail or motor in the day. The Abruzzi beyond will delight those who can enjoy the wilder moods of nature. In the Ciminian Hills, which, combined with Caprarola or Bracciano, afford in Spring perhaps the most delightful of the excursions from Rome, the accommodation is indifferent though improving. Much may be seen in drives from Viterbo, a good central situation, where a week may be passed with real profit, especially to the lover or student of things mediaeval. Perhaps there is no town in the world whence such a variety of excursions may be made as from Rome. They are so entirely different from one another. The phase of scenery, the architecture of the towns, the costume, the habits, the, songs (and this means A so much to Italian peasants), even the language, is changed, according to the direction you take on leaving the capital. And whether tourists confine themselves to the inner circle of sights usually known to strangers, which is hemmed in by the hills which encircle the Campagna; or whether they are induced to penetrate among the glorious heights of the Volscian and Hernican Mountains, the deep recesses of the Sabina, behind Subiaco, or amid the lost cities of Etruria, they will find that the small disagreeables and the occasional difficulties, which must frequently be endured at the time, weigh as nothing in the balance against the store of beautiful mental pictures, of instructive recollections of people and character, and of heart-stirring associations, which will be laid up for the rest of life. And they will come to feel that it is just because they were not first-rate roads, not easy carriages, not comfortable inns, that it was all so interesting, because thus, not only the places themselves remained the same, but the simple poetical character of the people was unspoilt. The comparative stagnation of life under the Papal Government did much to preserve the mediaeval character of towns in the Papal States. Militarism is rapidly killing it. Should the present progressive state of things continue, much of the beauty of Rome itself will disappear. It is to the environs that poets must turn for their inspiration and artists for their pictures, and as the obliterating hand advances, they must wander further away. Even Cori and Ninfa, Alatri and Anagni, Subiaco, Soracte, Palestrina, and Caprarola will not long remain quite unspoilt. It must necessarily be with the present work as with the many which have preceded it. Some who follow in the paths it indicates will think its descriptions exaggerated, others will find them not sufficiently glowing. For Rome, more than any other place, produces different impressions on different minds. The Campagna in its ruin and desolation will be described as dismal and monotonous,' or 'solemn and beautiful,' according to the feelings of those who traverse it. Some will only be impressed with the dirt, the poverty, the ruinousness of the mountain-towns; others with their picturesqueness and colour. It is necessary to real enjoyment of these mountain-places to cast out all the black motes which too often obscure our vision. When this is done, what a store of sunny memories may be laid up. 'Yea, from the very soil of silent Rome Rome used to be unlike other towns in having scarcely any suburbs; on nearly every side one entered the country almost at once: unfortunately that is no longer the case. Yet it does not take long to get there. Without its varied mountain distances, without the brilliant atmosphere to illuminate it, it is impossible to say how ugly the Campagna would be. As it is it could not be more beautiful. For so vast an expanse there are few marked features; only, here and there, the Aqueducts, spanning the plain in mighty groups of arches, sometimes merely marked by a white line among the purple wind-flowers, or stern old towers of other days. Between and under the aqueducts run the modern roads, often following the course of the Consular highways, and, as in the case of the Tiburtina and Prenestina, still paved in parts with polygonal blocks of lava, laid down two thousand years ago, over which the wine-carts rattle along, with their revolving hoods (cappote), shelters alike against sun and shower-formerly often drawn by grand, meekeyed oxen, but to-day by horses. Hard by, black crosses, by the dusty wayside amongst the thistles, keep their dismal record of accidents; while refuges of hurdles, erected at intervals, used to attest the presence of the nearly obsolete Campagna buffaloes and the means of escape from them. But the buffaloes have well-nigh vanished, and the last hurdles of this kind are to be found on the Via Ostiense. In the winter the plain is crimson and gold with the decaying vegetation; but, as spring advances, it changes so rapidly to green that it is as if it were suddenly touched with exquisite enamel. As summer advances, the growth becomes coarse and rampageous to a degree-thistles, breast - high; rank bugloss; hemlock; huge reseda; acres covered with the tall and stately, but evilsmelling, asphodel. Here and there a low bush of hawthorn and a band of green willows mark where the Anio or a tributary meanders. Almost every building is mediaeval, but more often than not it is built upon a classical foundation. The most conspicuous are the tall towers of brick and stone, relics for the most part of Frangipani, Orsini, and Colonna feuds, and erected as refuges for the shepherds of one of the great proprietors, against the inroads of his neighbours. Besides these, there are Capanne, or round huts built of reeds, such as Virgil describes, and the rifled tombs, sometimes used as houses, in the doors of which we see the shepherdwife, with folded panni shading her face, seated spinning, while the shepherds themselves, mantled, and dressed in goatskins, are out with their flocks and big white dogs on the neighbouring turfy hillocks. 'Next to the picturesquely conspicuous Towers, the most frequent landmarks are the conical shepherds' huts, usually on the higher grounds, inhabited during about half the year by a race of men so cut off from all social and civilising influences that one might expect to find the lowest brutality, and all the fiercest passions, in a moral soil thus neglected. The shepherd of these parts, in his broad-brimmed black hat, long loose jacket and leggings, both alike of unshorn sheep- or goat-skin, might seem the original type whence an idealising dream devised the mythologic satyr. His temporary dwelling is made of branches of the yellow-flowering Spanish broom, and is open at the pointed apex for the escape of smoke from the wood-fire lit in the middle, around which are ranged beds, something like berths in a ship, and usually for several people, as this hut is inhabited by many inmates, |