of the Capitol, is nearly buried in ruins, and for some time | eluded our search. At length, in traversing a street full of filth and beggars, extending along the very summit of the hill, we observed upon the front of an old house a label inscribed with the words "Alla Rocca Tarpeia ;" and following the directions, as well as half a dozen ragged urchins who had volunteered their services as guides, we passed through the second story of the building into a garden in the rear, and after so much labour, reached the cliff, whence criminals were thrown into the Forum. The precipice was formerly eighty or a hundred feet; but is now less than half that height. A female cicerone, the tenant of the house, and now the sole executioner, took her station by the balustrade of the garden, (shaded with the fig-tree and pomegranate,) and discoursed with great volubility of "Romulo e Remulo," pointing out the localities in the vicinity. We had the curiosity to descend by a circuitous path to the foot of the rock, which is shelving and cannot be well seen from the top. The base is cavernous, and seems to have been rudely scooped out for a dwelling. It is a dark and gloomy retreat, fit only for another den of Cacus. The floor was covered with straw, on which sat a sun-burnt fisherman packing herring. He looked as if he might have just rained down from the cliff.

On the eastern end of the Capitoline Hill are several objects of some interest, the first of which are the remains of the Mamertine Prison, built by Aneus Martius. Its position exactly corresponds with Livy's description—“ media urbe, imminens Foro"-in the midst of the city, overhanging the Forum. A little church is now erected above it, called San Pietro in Carcere, (St. Peter in Prison,) which is one of the most popular shrines in Rome, being at all hours of the day thronged with devotees. One of the canons of the church, a very courteous but superstitious man, in this instance acted as our cicerone, although at the moment of our visit on Sunday morning, he was just in the act of putting on his sacerdotal robes, to officiate at the altar. Five wax-tapers were lighted, and each of us bearing one in his hand, we descended like spirits into the dismal regions below, under the protection of a priest, who could exorcise any spectres that might intrude upon the holy precincts. On his way down the blind stairway, he gravely pointed to an indentation in the solid rock out of which the prison was hewn, and an inscription informed us that it was the print of St. Peter's.

head, which was thrust against the wall, in a scuffle with the gaoler! The rock yielded to the occiput of the Apostle, and thus was he preserved by a miracle-to endure the horrors of a dungeon, and afterwards to be crucified with his head downwards. But it was not deemed worth while to disturb the faith of our guide, or to cavil about the authenticity of such an incident.

The Mamertine Prison is small in its dimensions, consisting of two rooms, one above the other, and communicating by a trap-door, through which the prisoners used to be let down. Near the wall in the lower story or dungeon, stands a stone pillar, covered with an iron grate, to which Peter and Paul are said to have been chained; and within a few feet of it, is a living fountain of pure water, which, as a tablet tells the visitant, miraculously gushed out all at once, and from which the two persecuted Apostles baptized fortyseven converts to christianity, during their imprisonment. Through the wall on one side of the dungeon is a secret passage, now closed by a rusty iron door, communicating with the catacombs, which once extended for many miles beneath the city. It was in this confined and dark abode, that Jugurtha was left to starve, and Cethegus and Lentulus, accomplices in the conspiracy of Cataline, were strangled to death. On returning to the upper air, our obliging cicerone, accepted a paul* or two for his services, resumed his ecclesiastical costume, and hastened to his sacred functions.

It is supposed that the temple of Jupiter Feretrius, the oldest at Rome, and instituted by the founder of the city himself, stood upon the opposite brow of the hill. Its dimensions, however, were so contracted, that it might have been crowded into a corner. It was only ten feet in length and five in breadth-a striking illustration of the simplicity of the age, and of the remark of the historian, that never did so great an empire spring from an origin so humble. In his animated account of the foundation of this temple, Livy states that it was soon filled with the trophies of vanquished nations, and that it was subsequently increased to double its size:- “bina postea, intra tot annos, tot bella, opima parta

*The paulo, ten of which makes a scudo or Roman dollar, is equal to about ten cents American currency. Both of these coins are silver, bearing the impress of the papal arms, with a female figure upon the reverse. lesser coins are of copper, called biocchi, answering very nearly to the cents of our country.

The

sunt spolia." The site is at present occupied by the modern church of Santa Maria d' Aracœli, to which the ascent is by a flight of 124 steps of marble, said to be from the ruins of the temple of Quirinal Jove. Twenty-two ancient columns of Egyptian granite separate the nave of the church from the aisles; and near the sacristy is an octagonal, antique altar of white marble, which Augustus is said to have erected and dedicated to "the first-born God," at the birth of our Saviour. The name of Ara Cœli, (Altar of Heaven,) is derived from this circumstance. As anticipations of the approach of a new era were common all over the East, preIvious to the advent of the Saviour, and as the Romans had frequent intercourse with Egypt, Palestine, and Asia Minor, who can say that the above mentioned tradition is not founded in truth, and that the Fourth Eclogue of Virgil might not have been written at the dedication of this very altar, deriving its exalted images from the Hebrew prophets, instead of the leaves of a Sybil! Pope's Messiah, with the book of Isaiah for a text, and the events of sixteen centuries for a commentary, is scarcely more descriptive of the reign of the Prince of Peace, than the lofty and polished numbers of the Roman poet.

The central portion of the Capitoline Hill is occupied by a large Square open on one side, and bordered on the other three by public buildings, designed by Michael Angelo, and erected by order of Pope Paul III. In approaching from the north, and ascending a flight of steps much less magnificent than those leading to the church of Aracoeli, the visitant finds on his right and left a line of statuary, with other antiquities, ranged along the balustrade of the Piazza. Castor and Pollux guard the head of the stairs, flanked among other objects, by the two sons of Constantine, rude images or more properly torsos, called the trophies of Marius, and a column which formed the first mile-stone on the Appian Way. In the centre of the square, and facing the north, stands an equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, finely mounted on an elevated pedestal. It is of bronze, (the only antique equestrian statue of the same material extant,) and was found near St. John Lateran. The head of the horse has been much praised for its spirit; but the body appeared to me quite too protuberant, looking as if the steed of the Emperor, instead of being comparisoned for war, had long

been turned out to pasture, in the red-clover fields of the Clitumnus.

From the south side of the Square, two streets wind down into the Roman Forum, and between them, upon the very brow of the Hill, stands what is termed the Senator's House, but which seems to be as much a shadow and a pageant, as the office itself; for the greater part of it is left vacant, and exhibits no traces of senatorial dignity. It occupies the site of the old Roman Tabularium, or depository of records, the ruins of which are still visible in the foundations of the modern building. One corner of this gloomy edifice is occupied as a prison, the inmates of which, as we ascended the steps, thrust through the grates little bags fastened to the end of a rod, (such as are used in making collections in churches,) and set up a yell like so many furies, in their importunate cries for charity. Through the rusty bars of their windows they may look out upon the glittering dome of St. Peter's, and the sumptuous palaces of the Vatican, enriched perhaps by a portion of their own contributions.

The front door opens directly into a large, empty, dreary hall, in which Petrarch received the laureate crown in his visit to Rome, and where Madame de Stael makes her Corinna act the part of an improvisatrice with so much eclat. If this lady had seen Italy, before she wrote her splendid work, I am sure she would have changed the scene, and never have attempted to wake the echoes of applause, or kindle the romance of feeling in this cheerless apartment. The perfect waste of floor, the stuccoed walls, and the heavy ceiling, struck a chill to my heart, and quenched every spark of enthusiasm, which the names of Petrarch and Corinna might otherwise have elicited. The building, inside and out, is entirely devoid of interest. Just under the double flight of steps in front, there is a copious and beautiful fountain, (a species of embellishment in which Rome infinitely surpasses all other cities I have seen,) ornamented with two river-gods pouring plenty from their cornucopiæ; the wolf and her regal boys, surmounted by an image of Roma herself, in the character of Victory, in a sitting posture. The latter figure is in bad taste, as it is of Parian marble, draped with porphyry. Red and white, or indeed any two colours, never appear well in a statue.

The two edifices flanking the square-the Museo Capitolino on the east, and the Palazzo de'Conservatori on the west

-in exterior much resemble the Senator's House. They extend nearly across the hill, two stories high, with arcades in front; and in any other situation, their architectural ornaments might perhaps be admired. But on this hill the name and the genius of even Michael Angelo have been unable to impart to them or to the Square much interest. The court

and the arcades of the Museum are filled with works of merit, yet not of sufficient interest to detain us from more valuable treasures. On the right is a suite of rooms in the basement, the first of which is filled with all the Egyptian gods and goddesses, idols and sacred utensils, in black antique marble. The collection is valuable chiefly, as illustrative of the religion of that nation. Isis bears the sistrum, a musical instrument made of brass, used in her mysteries, to call the people to the sacrifices. The priests of Egypt are also here found in their sacerdotal costumes. In the halls of the Lapidary and of the Urn, are some fine bas-reliefs; among others the battles of Achilles, on a colossal sarcophagus of Severus. Tablets containing the inscriptions of the several Emperors, cover the walls of these rooms.

The sides of the stairway are lined with the fragments of the ancient map of Rome, taken from the temple of Remus, as mentioned in a previous paragraph. On entering the Gallery, a long vista, lined on both sides with statues, busts, hermes,* and other antiquities without number, opens on the view, like the Corridors of the Florentine Gallery, or the Louvre at Paris, though less splendid in its furniture than either. Among the curiosities of the collection, is the ancient balance, made precisely like modern steelyards, with a tiny bust for a poise. Here also is the tripod, and a thousand other objects illustrative of the Greek and Latin Classics. But it would be endless to specify. The fable of Prometheus is beautifully illustrated in bas-relief. A metallic`urn, which belonged to Mithridates, so famous in the wars of the East, also attracted my attention.

One of the halls of the Museum is appropriated exclusively to the busts of the Emperors, arranged in chronological order. It is a fine study for history, as well as statuary and craniology. But who knows where the articles came from, and how much the subjects were flattered by the parasites of

* A hermes is a head, with all below the neck in a rude, unfinished block. The term was at first new to me, and an explanation may be acceptable to others.