rst is a temple of immense size, having a
portico of the largest columns of the most awful species of classic
architecture. The roof, which was composed of immense stones, was
destroyed, but there are remains of the Cella, contrived for the
sacrifices to which the priests and persons of high office were alone
[admitted].

A piece of architecture more massive, without being cumbrous or heavy,
was never invented by a mason.

A second temple in the same style was dedicated to Ceres as the large
one was to Neptune, on whose dominion they looked, and who was the
tutelar deity of Paestum, and so called from one of his Greek names. The
fane of Ceres is finished with the greatest accuracy and beauty of
proportion and taste, and in looking upon it I forgot all the unpleasant
feelings which at first oppressed me. The third was not a temple, but a
Basilica, or species of town-house, as it was called, having a third row
of pillars running up the middle, between the two which surrounded the
sides, and were common to the Basilica and temple both. These surprising
public edifices have therefore all a resemblance to each other, though
also points of distinction. If Sir William Gell makes clear his theory
he will throw a most precious light on the origin of civilisation,
proving that the sciences have not sprung at once into light and life,
but rose gradually with extreme purity, and continued to be practised
best by those who first invented them. Full of these reflections, we
returned to our hospitable Miss Whyte in a drizzling evening, but
unassassinated, and our hearts completely filled with the magnificence
of what we had seen. Miss Whyte had in the meanwhile, by her interest at
La Trinita with the Abbot, obtained us permission to pay a visit to him,
and an invitation indeed to dinner, which only the weather and the
health of Sir William Gell and myself prevented our accepting. After
breakfast, therefore, on the 18th of March, we set out for the convent,
situated about two or three miles from the town in a very large ravine,
not unlike the bed of the Rosslyn river, and traversed by roads which
from their steepness and precipitancy are not at all laudable, but the
views were beautiful and changing incessantly, while the spring
advancing was spreading her green mantle over rock and tree, and making
that beautiful which was lately a blighted and sterile thicket. The
convent of Trinita itself holds a most superb situation on the
proje