layer out of cities, and the planner
of harbours. In a word, the Roman made the solid and practical
foundation, and then set the Greek slave to beautify it. When he had
watched the slave at work for a century or two, he occasionally
attempted to imitate him. That was as far as Rome ever went in original
art.

But her love of the beautiful, though often indiscriminating and lacking
in taste, was profound and sincere. It does not appear that in all her
conquests her armies ever wantonly destroyed beautiful things. On the
contrary, her generals brought home all they could with uncommon care,
and the consequence was that in Horace's day the public places of the
city were vast open-air museums, and the great temples picture galleries
of which we have not the like now in the whole world. And with those
things came all the rest; the manners, the household life, the
necessaries and the fancies of a conquering and already decadent nation,
the thousands of slaves whose only duty was to amuse their owners and
the public; the countless men and women and girls and boys, whose souls
and bodies went to feed the corruption of the gorgeous capital, or to
minister to its enormous luxuries; the companies of flute-players and
dancing-girls, the sharp-tongued jesters, the coarse buffoons, the
play-actors and the singers. And then, the endless small commerce of an
idle and pleasure-seeking people, easily attracted by bright colours,
new fashions and new toys; the drug-sellers and distillers of perfumes,
the venders of Eastern silks and linens and lace, the barbers and
hairdressers, the jewellers and tailors, the pastry cooks and makers of
honey-sweetmeats; and everywhere the poor rabble of failures, like scum
in the wake of a great ship; the beggars everywhere, and the pickpockets
and the petty thieves. It is no wonder that Horace was fond of strolling
in Rome.

In contrast, the great and wonderful things of the Augustan city stand
out in high relief, above the varied crowd that fills the streets, with
all the dignity that centuries of power can lend. To the tawdry is
opposed the splendid, the Roman general in his chiselled corselet and
dyed mantle faces the Greek actor in his tinsel; the band of painted,
half-clad, bedizened dancing-girls falls back cowering in awestruck
silence as the noble Vestal passes by, high-browed, white-robed,
untainted, the incarnation of purity in an age of vice. And the old
Senator in his white cloak with its