flints, and in some instances,
as at Pompeii, with wedges of iron and granite; so that they resembled on
a plane the vertical face of a Cyclopean or polygonal wall. Upon the
roads themselves were imposed the stately and sonorous epithets of
Consular and Praetorian; and had the records of the western Republic
perished as completely as those of its commercial rival, the Appian Road
would have handed down to the remotest ages one of the names of the
pertinacious censor of the Claudian house. To the Commonwealth,
perpetually engaged in distant wars on its frontiers, it was of the
utmost importance to possess the most rapid means of communicating with
its provinces, and of conveying troops and ammunition. To the Empire it
was no less essential to correspond easily with its vast circle of
dependencies. The very life of the citizens, who, long before the age of
Augustus, had ceased to be a corn-producing people, was sometimes
dependent upon the facility of transit, and the rich plains of Lombardy
and Gaul poured in their stores of wheat and millet, and of salted pork
and beef, when the harvest of Egypt failed through an imperfect
inundation of the Nile. But the convenience of travellers was as much
consulted as the necessity of the subjects of Rome. A foot-pavement on
each side was secured by a low wall against the intrusion or collision of
wheel carriages. Stones to mount horses (for stirrups were unknown) {10}
were placed at certain distances for the behoof of equestrians; and the
miles were marked upon blocks of granite or peperino, the useful
invention of the popular tribune Caius Gracchus. Trees and fences by the
sides were cut to admit air, and ditches, like ours, carried off the rain
and residuary water from the surface. The office of _Curator Viarum_, or
Road Surveyor, was bestowed upon the most illustrious members of the
Senate, and the Board of Health in our days may feel some satisfaction in
knowing that Pliny the Younger once held the office of Commissioner of
Sewers on the AEmilian Road. Nay, the ancients deemed no office tending
to public health and utility beneath them; and after his victory at
Mantinea, Epaminondas was appointed Chairman of the Board of Scavengers
at Thebes.

We close this part of our subject, which must not expand into an
archaeological dissertation, with the following extract from the most
eloquent and learned of the English historians who have treated of Rome.

"All these cit