my feet through ruts of dark volcanic sand, and amid masses of rock
fallen from the cliffs, and stones whose artificial appearance showed
that they had formed part of the ramparts that once ran round the
whole circuit of the heights. The sunshine sparkled on the gray-green
waters, and followed them in bright coruscations for a short distance
into the mouth of the tunnel, the other end of which, diminished by
the distance, opened into the daylight like the eye-piece of an
inverted telescope. I found in the bed of the river fragments of
marble and porphyry, cut and polished, that had doubtless come from
the pavement of some palace or temple, and attested the truth of the
report that has come down to us, that the buildings of Veii were
stately and magnificent. To me there is something peculiarly
impressive in the presence of a stream in a scene of vanished human
greatness. Its eternal sameness contrasts with the momentous changes
that have taken place; its motion with the death around; its sunny
sparkle with the gloom; while its murmur seems the very requiem of the
past. In this giant sepulchre, into which, like the Gulf of Curtius in
the Forum, all the greatness of Etruscan and Roman Veii had gone down,
the abundance of life was most remarkable. The vegetation sprang up
with a rank luxuriance unknown in northern latitudes; lizards darted
through the long grass; one snake of considerable length and girth
uncoiled itself before me and crawled leisurely away; and the air, as
bright and warm as it is in July with us, was murmurous with the hum
of insects that danced in the April sunshine.

Beyond the Ponte Sodo the precipices disappear and the ground slopes
down gently to the edge of the river. Here the valley of the Formello
opens up--a quiet green pastoral spot rising on the right hand into
bare swelling downs, without a tree, or a bush, or a rock to diversify
their surface. On the sloping banks of the river the rock has been cut
into a number of basins filled with water, where Sir William Gell
supposes that the nymphs of Veii, like those of Troy, "washed their
white garments in the days of peace;" but they were in all likelihood
only holes caused by the quarrying of the blocks of stone used in the
construction of the walls and buildings of the city. The slopes of
this valley seem to have formed the principal Necropolis of Veii.
Numerous tombs were discovered in it; but after having been rifled of
their contents they were f