o as to include the
Basilica, by San Stefano Rotondo, and out by the Navicella to the now
closed Porta Metronia. The remainder of the circuit is completed by the
Aurelian wall, which is the present wall of the city, though the modern
Electoral Wards extend in some places beyond it. The modern gates
included in this portion are the Porta Salaria, the Porta Pia, the new
gate at the end of the Via Montebello, the next, an unnamed opening
through which passes the Viale Castro Pretorio, then the Porta
Tiburtina, the Porta San Lorenzo, the exit of the railway, Porta
Maggiore, and lastly the Porta San Giovanni.

The Region of the Hills takes in by far the largest area of the fourteen
districts, but also that portion which in later times has been the least
thickly populated, the wildest districts of mediaeval and recent Rome,
great open spaces now partially covered by new though hardly inhabited
buildings, but which were very lately either fallow land or ploughed
fields, or cultivated vineyards, out of which huge masses of ruins rose
here and there in brown outline against the distant mountains, in the
midst of which towered the enormous basilicas of Santa Maria Maggiore
and Saint John Lateran, the half-utilized, half-consecrated remains of
the Baths of Diocletian, the Baths of Titus, and over against the
latter, just beyond the southwestern boundary, the gloomy Colosseum, and
on the west the tall square tower of the Capitol with its deep-toned
bell, the 'Patarina,' which at last was sounded only when the Pope was
dead, and when Carnival was over on Shrove Tuesday night.

It must first be remembered that each Region had a small independent
existence, with night watchmen of its own, who dared not step beyond the
limits of their beat; defined by parishes, there were separate charities
for each Region, separate funds for giving dowries to poor girls,
separate 'Confraternite' or pious societies to which laymen belonged,
and, in a small way, a sort of distinct nationality. There was rivalry
between each Region and its neighbours, and when the one encroached upon
the other there was strife and bloodshed in the streets. In the public
races, of which the last survived in the running of riderless horses
through the Corso in Carnival, each Region had its colours, its right of
place, and its separate triumph if it won in the contest. There was all
that intricate opposition of small parties which arose in every mediaeval
city, when childr