seasons were
less propitious, the doubtful precautions of forming magazines of corn,
fixing the price, and prohibiting the exportation, attested at least the
benevolence of the state; but such was the extraordinary plenty which an
industrious people produced from a grateful soil, that a gallon of wine
was sometimes sold in Italy for less than three farthings, and a quarter
of wheat at about five shillings and sixpence. [75] A country possessed
of so many valuable objects of exchange soon attracted the merchants of
the world, whose beneficial traffic was encouraged and protected by the
liberal spirit of Theodoric. The free intercourse of the provinces by
land and water was restored and extended; the city gates were never shut
either by day or by night; and the common saying, that a purse of gold
might be safely left in the fields, was expressive of the conscious
security of the inhabitants. [Footnote 69: See an epigram of Ennodius
(ii. 3, p. 1893, 1894) on this garden and the royal gardener.]

[Footnote 70: His affection for that city is proved by the epithet of
"Verona tua," and the legend of the hero; under the barbarous name of
Dietrich of Bern, (Peringsciold and Cochloeum, p. 240,) Maffei traces
him with knowledge and pleasure in his native country, (l. ix. p.
230--236.)]

[Footnote 71: See Maffei, (Verona Illustrata, Part i. p. 231, 232, 308,
&c.) His amputes Gothic architecture, like the corruption of language,
writing &c., not to the Barbarians, but to the Italians themselves.
Compare his sentiments with those of Tiraboschi, (tom. iii. p. 61.)
* Note: Mr. Hallam (vol. iii. p. 432) observes that "the image of
Theodoric's palace" is represented in Maffei, not from a coin, but
from a seal. Compare D'Agincourt (Storia dell'arte, Italian Transl.,
Arcitecttura, Plate xvii. No. 2, and Pittura, Plate xvi. No. 15,)
where there is likewise an engraving from a mosaic in the church of St.
Apollinaris in Ravenna, representing a building ascribed to Theodoric in
that city. Neither of these, as Mr. Hallam justly observes, in the least
approximates to what is called the Gothic style. They are evidently the
degenerate Roman architecture, and more resemble the early attempts of
our architects to get back from our national Gothic into a classical
Greek style. One of them calls to mind Inigo Jones inner quadrangle
in St. John's College Oxford. Compare Hallam and D'Agincon vol. i. p.
140--145.--M]

[Footnote 72: The villas, climate