beautiful silvery caravan of clouds; while in front rises grandly Monte Gennaro, streaked with gold and pale violet. The bells of Monte Rotondo resound faintly behind us, and far ahead the sheep-dogs are baying; while above in the caerulean, the sky-larks are singing. It is two miles from Mentana to Monte Rotondo, also the site of a battle between the Papal troops and the Garibaldians. Here is a fine old castle built by the Barberini, on the site of a fortress of the Orsini, and now the property of the Buoncompagni. There is a wide and beautiful view from its summit. A road of two miles leads to the railway station in the valley, whence we may return to Rome by the Via Salaria.

One mile and a half from hence, near Fonte di Papa, the road crosses an insignificant brook, which has been held to coincide more than any other with the description which Livy gives of the fatal Allia.

'Aegre ad undecimum lapidem occursum est, qua flumen Allia Crustuminis montibus praealto defluens alveo, haud multum infra viam Tiberino amni miscetur.'

But opinion to-day is more in favour of a locality a mile above C. Marcigliana.

Here, then, or in the upland hollows, which are watered by the Bettina, the Romans experienced their great defeat by the Gauls under Brennus (B.C. 390), which led to the capture of the city, on July 18 (A.D. XV. Kal. Sextiles) called thenceforth Dies Alliensis, and regarded as so ill-omened that no business was transacted upon its anniversary.

'Haec est, in Fastis cui dat gravis Allia nomen.'

-Ovid, 'Ibis,' 221.

'Quosque secans infaustum interluit Allia nomen.'
-Aen. vii. 717.

'Damnata diu Romanis Allia fastis.'

-Lucan, vii. 408.

At about 8 miles from the city, we pass (L.) beneath extensive farm-buildings called Marcigliana Vecchia, which are believed to occupy the site of the town of Crustumerium, though some archaeologists place it at Tor S. Giovanni, two miles to the left, where the two streams forming the Malpasso meet: thus considerably nearer the railway. In Pliny's day there was no trace of it left. In any case, Livy says that the Tiber bank was the point of great slaughter of the left wing of the Romans.

Dionysius speaks of Crustumerium also as an Alban colony sent out long before the building of Rome. The city was taken by Romulus again by Tarquinius Priscus, and once more during the Roman Republic, B.C. 499, after which it remained subject to Rome. In B. C. 477, occurred the 'Crustumerina Secessio,' when the army which was being led by the Decemvirs against the Sabines deserted, and retreated to Crustumerium. Virgil mentions the Crustumian pears, and Servius says that they were red only on one side.

G

CHAPTER XII

TIVOLI

(Reached by train from the Central Station: or by steam-tramway at Porta S. Lorenzo, reached from the Dogana by tram.)

Tivoli, 18 miles distant, is the most attractive of all the places in the neighbourhood of Rome, and the one excursion which none should omit, even if they are only at Rome for a week. The excursion is made by the tram-railway from the Porta S. Lorenzo, by which there are four trains each way daily occupying an hour and three-quarters. The line follows the high road, or Via Tiburtina, so that everything is as well seen as from a carriage, but there is no great beauty on the way to Tivoli. Those who wish to visit Adrian's Villa may be set down by one tram at the station called Villa Hadriana, and go on to Tivoli, or return to Rome, by the next. The terminus is close to the gate of Tivoli and the Villa d'Este. Guides are quite unnecessary, except to save time. It is best to proceed direct through the town to the easily-seen Temple of the Sibyl, and then see the cascades (fee, 1 lira), the exquisite view of the Cascatelle, and finally the Villa d'Este. Those who are not strong enough for the whole round should see the Cascatelle and the Villa d'Este. The round which Tivoli guides and donkey-men take strangers, through the woods and underneath the waterfalls, is long, wasteful of time, and fatiguing. It is far best not to do Tivoli and the Villa Hadriana in the same day. There are two hotels at Tivoli, La Regina (in the town), which is comfortable, clean, and well furnished, but where it is necessary to come to a very strict agreement as to prices on arriving, and La Sibylla, far humbler, but not uncomfortable, and in the most attractive situation. In the former, guests are received en pension at S lire, at the latter at 6 lire a day. Those who stay long will find endless points of interest both in the place itself and the many excursions which may be made from it. In order to learn the topography of Tivoli easily, after leaving the station (railway) walk to the entrance to the Falls, and pass it and the bridge; then turn to the right into Via Sibylla for the hotel of that

name.

THE

THE road from Rome to Tivoli follows the ancient Via Tiburtina for the greater part of its course, and leads through one of the least interesting parts of the Campagna. Issuing from the Porta S. Lorenzo, we pass the great basilica of the same name, and the Campo Verano, with its graves and cypresses, and descending into the valley of the Anio, we cross the river by a modern bridge, near the ancient Ponte Mammolo, which possibly took its name (Pons Mammaeus) from Mammaea, mother of Alexander Severus.

The little Teverone, or Anio, in which Silvia, the reputed mother of Romulus and Remus, exchanged her earthly life for that of a goddess, adds greatly to the charm of the Campagna. It rises near Treba (Trevi) in the Simbrivinian hills, and flows through the gorges of Subiaco and the country of the Aequi until it forms the falls of

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Tivoli. After this stormy beginning it assumes a most peaceful character, gliding gently between deep banks, and usually marked along the brown reaches of the Campagna by its fringe of tender green willows. Silius calls it 'sulphureus,' from the sulphuretted hydrogen which is poured into it at one point by the springs of Albula (Bagni).

'Sulphureis gelidus qua serpit leniter undis
Ad genitorem Anio labens sine murmure Tybrim.'

-Sil. Ital. xii. 539.

On its way through the plain several historical brooks pour their waters into the Anio. Of these, the most remarkable are the Marrana, and the Osa, which flowed beneath the walls of Collatia (Lunghezza). Nibby says that anciently the Anio was navigable from the Ponte Lucano to its mouth.' Strabo mentions that the blocks of travertine from the quarries near Tibur (Cave di Barco), and of lapis gabinus from Gabii, were brought to Rome by means of it.' But in the dark ages the channel was neglected, and the navigation interrupted and abandoned. The course of the Acqua Marcia conduit can be traced by white points.

When we reach the dismal farm-buildings, which encircle the Osteria del Fornaccio, the caves of Cervara and the thirteenth-century towers of Rustica and Cervara are visible at no great distance, rising above the Campagna on the opposite bank of the Anio. There is nothing more of interest except, here and there, the pavement of the ancient road, till we pass, on the left, the ruins of the mediaeval Castell' Arcione. Across the Campagna, on the left, near the Sabine mountains, the picturesque hills called Monti Corniculani may be seen, their three summits occupied by the villages of S. Angelo, Colle Cesi, and Monticelli; on the right we overlook the sites of Collatia (Lunghezza) and far off Gabii (Castiglione), and of other cities of the plain, whose exact positions are not yet identified. After traversing the site, not precisely ascertained, where Hannibal encamped, and leaving to the left the now drained Lago de' Tartari, a smell of sulphur announces the neighbourhood, about a mile distant on the left, of the lakes of the Solfatara, the Aquae Albulae, from which a canal, cut in 1549 by Cardinal d'Este, carries their rushing milk-white waters over the travertine bed toward the Anio.

'But now there spreads around us a region covered with a thick jungle of dwarf ilex and lentisk bushes, among which long-horned, semi-wild cattle wander, cropping the coarse twigs at will. This is that great bed of Travertine" which has been here deposited during uncounted ages by the Anio itself, and over which, again, in parts is being deposited the overflow of the little sulphur lakes called Aquae Albulae, or Bagni; the narrow blue stream of which, confined to an artificial trench, can be now descried flowing in a long, narrow streak away from us westward toward the lower lands. In fact, the too powerful odour advertises us that we have reached that fourteenth mile on the ancient Via Tiburtina, of which Martial writes, Canaque sulphureis Albula fumat aquis," though we have not, as apparently have some of our fellow-travellers from Rome, come either to drink or to bathe in these waters; albeit Strabo, and the Roman doctors of to-day with him, declare both these treatments to be most effectual. We are quite ready