. With
the inferior buildings, the market-places and the gardens attached to
them, they are sufficiently extensive to form the boundary of one side
of the immediate view. The appearance of monotony which might at other
times be remarked in the vastness and regularity of their white fronts,
is at this moment agreeably broken by several gaily-coloured awnings
stretched over their doors and balconies. The sun is now shining on
them with overpowering brightness; the metallic ornaments on their
windows glitter like gems of fire; even the trees which form their
groves partake of the universal flow of light, and fail, like the
objects around them, to offer to the weary eye either refreshment or
repose.

Towards the north, the Mausoleum of Augustus, towering proudly up into
the brilliant sky, at once attracts the attention. From its position,
parts of this noble building are already in shade. Not a human being is
visible on any part of its mighty galleries--it stands solitary and
sublime, an impressive embodiment of the emotions which it was raised
to represent.

On the side opposite the palace and the baths is the turf walk already
mentioned. Trees, thickly planted and interlaced by vines, cast a
luxurious shade over this spot. In their interstices, viewed from a
distance, appear glimpses of gay dresses, groups of figures in repose,
stands loaded with fruit and flowers, and innumerable white marble
statues of fauns and wood-nymphs. From this delicious retreat the
rippling of fountains is to be heard, occasionally interrupted by the
rustling of leaves, or the plaintive cadences of the Roman flute.

Southward two pagan temples stand in lonely grandeur among a host of
monuments and trophies. The symmetry of their first construction still
remains unimpaired, their white marble pillars shine in the sunlight
brightly as of old, yet they now present to the eye an aspect of
strange desolation, of unnatural mysterious gloom. Although the laws
forbid the worship for which they were built, the hand of reform has as
yet not ventured to doom them to ruin or adapt them to Christian
purposes. None venture to tread their once-crowded colonnades. No
priest appears to give the oracles from their doors; no sacrifices reek
upon their naked altars. Under their roofs, visited only by the light
that steals through their narrow entrances, stand unnoticed,
unworshipped, unmoved, the mighty idols of old Rome. Human emotion,
which made