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allegiance by a sense of the way in which all we saw tallied with the description of him who sang of Nature so surpassingly well, who challenges posterity in charmed accents, and could shape the sternest and most concise of tongues into those melodious cadences that invest his undying verse with all the magic of music and all the freshness of youth. For this was clearly the "Angulus iste," the nook which "restored him to himself "-this the lovely spot which his steward longed to exchange for the slums of Rome. Below lay the green sward by the river, where it was sweet to recline in slumber. Here grew the vine, still trained, like his own, on the trunks and branches of trees. Yonder the brook which the rain would swell till it overflowed its margin, and his lazy steward and slaves were fain to bank it up; and above, among a wild jumble of hills, lay the woods where, on the Calends of March, Faunus interposed to save him from the attack of the wolf as he strolled along unarmed, singing of the soft voice and sweet smiles of his Lalage! The brook is now nearly dammed up; a wall of close-fitting rock-hewn stones gathers its waters into a still, dark pool; its overflow gushes out in a tiny rill that rushed down beside our path, mingling its murmur with the hum of myriads of insects that swarmed in the air.'-Horace, by Theo. Martin in 'Classics for English Readers.'

Visitors to Licenza will be glad further to beguile the long drive with the following extract:

Entering the valley which opens to the north. On a height which rises to the right stand two villages, Cantalupo and Bardela; the latter is supposed to be the Mandela, which the poet describes as rugosus frigore pagus; and, certes, it stands in an airy position, at the point of junction of the two valleys. You soon come to a small stream, of no remarkable character, but it is the Digentia, the gelidus rivus, at which the poet was wont to slake his thirst-me quoties reficit-and which flows away through the meadows to the You are now in the foot of the said hill of Birdela-quem Mandela bibit. Sabine valley, so fondly loved and highly prized.

"Cur valle permutem Sabinâ
Divitias operosiores?"

'A long lofty ridge forms the left-hand barrier of the valley. It is Lucretilis. It has no striking features to attract the eye-with its easy swells, undulating outline, and slopes covered with wood, it well merits the title of amoenus, though that was doubtless due to its grateful shade, rather than to its appearance. Ere long you espy, high up beneath the brow of the mountain, à village perched on a precipitous grey cliff. It is Rocca Giovine, now occupying the site of the ruined temple of Vacuna.

On a conical height commanding this valley stands the town of Licenza ; while other loftier heights tower behind, from which the village of Civitella, apparently inaccessible, looks down on the valley like an eagle from its eyrie. In the foreground a knoll crested with chestnuts, rising some eighty or a hundred feet above the stream, marks the site of the much-besung farm. This knoll stands at the bend of a streamlet, or rather at the point where several rivulets unite to form the Digentia. Behind the knoll stood the Farm. Its mosaic pavement, still shown, is black and white, in very simple geometrical figures, and with the other remains, is quite in harmony with an abode where

"Non ebur neque aureum

Meâ renidet in domo lacunar;

Non trabes Hymettiae

Premunt columnas ultimâ recisas
Africâ."

-Carm. ii. xviii.

'From the poet's description, we learn that his land was little cultivated :

"Quid, si rubicunda benigne

Corna vepres et pruna ferunt; si quercus et ilex
Multâ fruge pecus, multâ dominum juvat umbrâ?"

You may remember, too, that he says of the neighbourhood:

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'Tempora mutantur, and soils may change also-the cultivation of nineteen centuries has rendered this more fertile; for vines hang in festoons from tree to tree over the site of his abode; the cornels and sloes have in great measure given way to the olive and fig; and the walnut and Spanish chestnut have taken the place of the oak and ilex. Nevertheless the poet's description still holds good of the uncultivated spots in the neighbourhood, which are overrun with brambles and are fragrant with odoriferous herbs; and until late years the ground was covered with wood-with cere and quercie, different kinds of oak, and with scarlet-holm and Spanish chestnut.

"The Farm is situated on a rising ground, which sinks with a gentle slope to the stream, leaving a level intervening strip, yellow in the harvest. În this I recognised the pratum apricum which was in danger of being overflowed. The aprica rura were probably then, as now, sown with corn-purae rivus aquae, et segetis lecta fides meae. Here it must have been that the poet was wont to repose after his meal; prope rivum somnus in herbâ; and here his personal efforts, perhaps, to dam out the stream, provoked his neighbours to a smile

"Rident vicini glebas et saxa moventem."

From a Letter by G. Dennis- De Villa Horatii,'—given in Milman's Works of Quintus Horatius Flaccus.'

Those who are able to encounter rather a tough walk will not be satisfied without trying to reach the spring which is supposed to be Fons Bandusiae.

The spring now commonly called the "Fonte Blandusia" rises at the head of a narrow glen, which opens into the broader valley of the Digentia just beyond the Farm, and stretches up for two or three miles into the heart of the mountains, dividing Lucretilis from Ustica. This is evidently the reducta vallis to which Tyndaris was invited; and is known by the peasants as the "Valle Rustica," than which no name could be more appropriate; though it probably was not conferred with reference to the scenery, but as a corruption of "Ustica." Whether Ustica cubans were a mountain or a valley, or both, as hath been opined, I leave to the critics to determine; but the mountain on the right of the glen, which contrasts its recumbent form with the steepbrowed Lucretilis, is still called "Ustica," and sometimes "Rustica," by the peasantry. The penultimate, however, is now pronounced short. The streamlet is called "Le Chiuse"; it is the same which flows beneath the villa, and threatens the "pratum apricum.” I ascended its course from the Farm, by the path which Horace must have taken to the fountain. It flows over a rocky bed, here overshadowed by dwarf willows, there by widespreading fig-trees, and is flanked by vineyards for some distance. Then all cultivation ceases-the scenery becomes wilder-the path steeper-the valley contracts to a ravine-a bare grey-and-red rock rises on the right, schistose, rugged, and stern; another similar cliff rises opposite, crested with ilex, and overtopt by the dark head of Lucretilis. As I approached the fountain I came to an open grassy spot, where cattle and goats were feeding.

"Tu frigus amabile

Fessis vomere tauris
Pracbes, et pecori vago."

The spot is exquisitely Arcadian; no wonder it captivated the poet's fancy. It is now just as it must have met his eye. During the noontide heat, the vast Lucretilis throws his grateful shade across the glen,

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Goats still wander among the underwood, cropping arbutos et thyma which cover the ground in profusion, or frisking amongst the rocks as smooth-faced -levia saxa-as when they re-echoed the notes of the poet's pipe.

'Crossing the stream by the huge rocks which almost choke its bed, I climbed through brambles and sloes to the fountain. It is a most picturesque spot. Large masses of moss-clad rock lie piled up in the cleft between the hills, and among them the streamlet works its way, overshadowed by hanging woods of ilex, beach, hornbeam, maple, chestnut, nut, and walnutwhich throw so dense a shade that scarcely a ray of the all-glaring sun can play on the turf below.

"Te flagrantis atrox hora Caniculae
Nescit tangere: tu frigus amabile
Praebes.'

The water springs from three small holes at the top of a shelving rock of no great height, and glides down into a sandy basin, which it overflows, trickling in a slender thread over the rocks into a small pool, and thence sinking in a mimic cascade into the rugged channel which bears it down the glen. From the rocks which separate the upper from the lower basin of the fountain, springs a moss-grown walnut tree, which stretches its giant limbs over the whole. The water itself merits all that has been said or sung of it; it is verily splendidior vitro. Nothing-not even the Thracian Hebrus-can exceed it in purity, coolness, and sweetness.

"Hae latebrae dulces, et jam (si credes) amoenae!

Well might the poet choose this as a retreat from the fierce noontide heat. Here he could lie the livelong day on the soft turf and sing

"ruris amoeni

Rivos, et musco circumlita saxa, nemusque,"

while his goats strayed around, cropping the cyclamen which decks the brink of the fountain, or the wild strawberries and sweet herbs which scent the air around. Here, while all nature below was fainting with the heat, might he enjoy the grateful shade of Lucretilis. Or here might he well sing the praises of the fountain itself, as he listened to its "babbling waters," and feasted his eye on the rich union of wood and rock around it.

"Me dicente cavis impositam ilicem
Saxis unde loquaces

Lymphae desiliunt tuae."

'Just as it was then, so is it now-even to the very ilices overhanging the hollow rocks whence it springs. And so exactly, in every particular, does this fountain answer to the celebrated Fons, that my faith in its identity is firm and steadfast.'-G. Dennis.

On this farm lovers of Horace have been fain to place the fountain of Bandusia, which the poet loved so well, and to which he prophesied, and truly, as the issue has proved, immortality from his song (Od. iii. 13). Charming as the poem is, there could be no stronger proof of the poet's hold upon the hearts of men of all ages than the enthusiasm with which the very site of the spring has been contested.

"Bandusia's fount in clearness crystalline

O worthy of the wine, the flowers we vow!
To-morrow shall be thine

A kid, whose crescent brow

"Is sprouting, all for love and victory

In vain; his warm red blood, so early stirred,
Thy gelid stream shall dye,

Child of the wanton herd.

"Thee the fierce Sirian star, to madness fired,
Forbears to touch; sweet cool thy waters yield
To ox with ploughing tired

And flocks that range afield.

"Thou too one day shall win proud eminence,
'Mid honoured founts, while I the ilex sing
Crowning the cavern, whence

Thy babbling wavelets spring" (C.).

-Horace,' by Theodore Martin.

The ascent of Monte Gennaro may be made from Licenza, but it is better to make it from Tivoli itself, whence a carriage may be taken to S. Polo, and horses ordered there, or order horses to meet train at S. Polo. Hence it is a constant ascent over ridges of hill until we reach the long upland valley called Val del Paradiso, which is exceeding beautiful, covered in spring with primroses, violet, and crocus, and many of the flowers of Switzerland. Here herds of cattle feed under the ilexes. This bare but noble mountain bears monumental witness to the denudation, chiefly due to the goat, which has been permitted to take place since ancient days. It was doubtless once mantled with forests abounding in boar, lynx, and wolf. On its summit, called Monte Zappi (1271 mètres), the astronomers La Maire and Boscovich erected a stone shelter, and from it they determined the distance to the cross upon S. Peter's at 34 kilomètres, or 22 miles. The last part of the ascent is steep and entirely over uneven rock. The view from the top, 3965 feet above the sea, is magnificent, though many will doubt whether it is sufficiently finer than that from Monte Cavo, to repay the fatigue of an excursion which is certainly long and far more tiring. The start at 3 A.M. is altogether unnecessary, 6 or 7 A.M. being early enough. It is best to descend by the almost perpendicular staircase called La Scarpellata, but the steps are rugged and of course can only be traversed on foot. There is a pleasant ride through meadows from S. Francesco, ascending afterwards by the olive-woods, and coming up to Tivoli by the grand terraces of the Villa of Quintilius Varus and the Madonna del Quintiliolo. We leave a little to the right the low isolated Monti Corniculani (which may be made the object of a separate excursion from Tivoli). Their southern height is occupied by the village of Monticelli, the next by Colle Cesi, the northern by S. Angelo in Cappoccio. All the villages are dirty and ruinous, but contain picturesque bits. S. Angelo is supposed to Occupy the site of Corniculum (?), which was burnt by Tarquin. Ocrisia, the widow of its slain chieftain, was taken, after the siege, to Rome, where she was delivered of a boy, who was educated in the house of Tarquin, and became King Servius Tullius (?). Many platforms of polygonal Roman masonry remain. A study of these may be made in this neighbourhood. The large-eyed short-statured folk, with often excellent profiles, probably faithfully record for us the features of their Sabine ancestors, among whom Tatius was a king and Vespasian an emperor.

CHAPTER XIV

VELLETRI

Velletri (1155 feet) is a station on the Naples line, one hour and twenty minutes from Rome (Albergo della Campana). A carriage for the day to Cori costs 25 lire, to Ninfa 22 lire, but the price must be settled beforehand. The trains are few and slow.

VEL

ELLETRI is quite as good a centre for excursions as Albano, but not so interesting a place. Its streets are wide and clean; the air healthy and invigorating. Like Albano, it has no costumes of its own, but on festas the people flock in from the neighbouring villages, and enliven it with their white panni and brilliant redand-blue bodices. Of the old Volscian city of Velitrae, which once occupied this site and which was so long at war with Rome, there are but few traces. The place was surrounded by Coriolanus with vallum and fosse. But the inhabitants of the Volscian city were removed to Etruria and Rome, B.C. 332, where they became the forefathers of the Trasteverini, and though in imperial times the place again rose to a certain importance, and though Augustus himself is declared by the natives to have been born there (in contradiction to the account of Suetonius, who expressly states that he was born at Rome, 'ad capita Bubula,' at the sign of the Ox-heads, on the east flank of the Palatine), the principal existing remains are mediaeval. It is true that the Octavii were sprung from Velitrae. As late as the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. shows were given in the amphitheatre here.

From the station a gradual ascent of 15 m. walk leads into the town, fringed with trees, and with beautiful views of the Volscian range, over the hill-side slopes rich with vines which produce the renowned wine. The town is girdled with crumbling mediaeval walls. The folly which has affected almost every town in Italy since 1870, has altered all the old historical appellations of the streets into the cheap 'Corso Cavour,' &c. One whole side of the principal square is occupied by the façade of the three-storeyed Palazzo Lancellotti-Ginnetti, built by Martino Longhi. The exterior gives no idea of the beauty within. On the first floor is an open gallery of great length, the arcades divided by pillars decorated with caryatides. A marble staircase, with an open loggia on each landing, ascends to the top of the palace, which commands a memorable view. Near the top of the staircase is a fine statue of Pudicitia (with its own head, the head of that in the Vatican being

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