remarkable except Augustus's bridge, that stands half a mile from the town, and is one of the stateliest ruins in Italy. It has no cement, and looks as firm as one entire stone. There is an arch of it unbroken, the broadest that I have ever seen, though, by reason of its great height, it does not appear so. The middle one was still much broader. They join together two mountains, and belonged, without doubt, to the bridge that Martial mentions, though Mr. Ray takes them to be the remains of an aque duct. Sed jam parce mihi, nec abutere, Narnia, quinto; Perpetuo liceat sic tibi ponte frui! Lib. vii. ep. 93. From Narni I went to Otricoli, a very mean little village, that stands where the castle of Ocriculum did formerly. I turned about half a mile out of the road to see the ruins of the old Ocriculum, that lie near the banks of the Tiber. There are still scattered pillars and pedestals, huge pieces of marble half buried in the earth, fragments of towers, subterraneous vaults, bathing-places, and the like marks of its ancient magnificence. In my way to Rome, seeing a high hill standing by itself in the Campania, I did not question but it had a classic name, and upon inquiry found it to be mount Soracte. The Italians at present call it, because its name begins with an S, St. Oreste. The fatigue of our crossing the Apennines, and of our whole journey from Loretto to Rome, was very agreeably relieved by the variety of scenes we passed through. For not to mention the rude prospect of rocks rising one above another, of the gutters deep worn in the sides of them by torrents of rain and snow-water, or the long channels of sand winding about their bottoms, that are sometimes filled with so many rivers: we saw, in six days' travelling, the several seasons of the year in their beauty and perfection. We were sometimes shivering on the top of a bleak mountain, and a little while after basking in a warm valley, covered with violets and almond trees in blossom, the bees already swarming over them, though but in the month of February. Sometimes our road led us through groves of olives, or by gardens of oranges, or into several hollow apartments among the rocks and mountains, that look like so many natural greenhouses; as being always shaded with a great variety of trees and shrubs that never lose their verdure. I shall say nothing of the Via Flaminia, which has been spoken of by most of the voyage writers that have passed it; but shall set down Claudian's account of the journey that Honorius made from Ravenna to Rome, which lies most of it in the same road that I have been describing: Antiquæ muros egressa Ravenna Signa movet: jamque ora Padi, portusque relinquit Prætereunt, tacito passu quem si quis adiret, Non procul amnis abest, urbi qui nominis auctor, De Sext: Cons. Hon. They leave Ravenna and the mouths of Po, While stately vaults and tow'ring piles appear, Silius Italicus, who has taken more pains on the geography of Italy than any other of the Latin poets, has given a catalogue of most of the rivers that I saw in Umbria, or in the borders of it. He has avoided a fault (if it be really such) which Macrobius has objected to Virgil, of passing from one place to another without regarding their regular and natural situation, in which Homer's catalogues are observed to be much more methodical and exact than Virgil's. Cavis venientes montibus, Umbri, SIL. ITAL. lib. 8. Since I am got among the poets, I shall end this chapter with two or three passages out of them, that I have omitted inserting in their proper places. Sit cisterna mihi, quam vinea, malo, Ravennæ : MARTIAL, lib. 3. Lodg'd at Ravenna (water sells so dear), Callidus imposuit nuper mihi copo Ravenna; Cum peterem mixtum, vendidit ille merum. Idem. By a Ravenna vintner once betray'd, Stat fucare colus nec Sidone vilior Ancon, SIL. ITAL. lib. 8. The wool when shaded with Ancona's dye, Fountain water is still very scarce at Ravenna, and was probably much more so when the sea was within its neighbourhood. FROM ROME TO NAPLES. UPON my arrival at Rome, I took a view of St. Peter's, and the Rotunda, leaving the rest till my return from Naples, when I should have time and leisure enough to consider what I saw. St. Peter's seldom answers expectation at first entering it, but enlarges itself on all sides insensibly, and mends upon the eye every moment. The proportions are so very well observed, that nothing appears to an advantage, or distinguishes itself above the rest. seems neither extremely high, nor long, nor broad, because it is all of them in a just equality. As on the contrary, in our Gothic cathedrals, the narrowness of the arch makes it rise in height, or run out in length; the lowness often opens it in breadth; or the defectiveness of some other particular makes any single part appear in great perfection. Though everything in this church is admirable, the most astonishing part of it is the cupola. Upon my going to the top of it, I was surprised to find that the |