XX.

1796.

vegetables. Olives shelter it from the rains; so that, CHAP. in the size of a very small garden, he obtains olives, figs, grapes, pomegranates, and melons. Such is the return which Nature yields under this admirable system of management, that half the crop of seven acres 1 Chateauis sufficient in general for the maintenance of a family 303. of five persons, being little more than the produce of Personal three-fourths of an acre to each soul; and the whole produce supports them all in rustic affluence.1

vieux, 209,

observa

Sismondi.

Agric. de

94. Young,

terraces go

Great part of the mountain region of Italy has Tosc. 89, adopted this incomparable cultivation; and this ex-ii. 152, 157. plains what, to a northern traveller, at first sight seems inexplicable, the vast population, which is Constant effort requifound not merely in the valleys, but over the greater site to prepart of the ridges of the Appenines, and the endless vent the succession of villages and hamlets which are perched ing to ruin. on the edge or summits of rocks, often, to appearance, scarcely accessible to human approach. Great care, however, and the constant labour of the husbandman, are required to uphold the little freeholds thus carved out of natural sterility, for, if his attention is intermitted for any considerable time, the violence of the rains destroys what it had cost so much labour to produce. Storms and torrents wash down the soil; the terraces are broken through; the heavy rains bring down a shapeless mass of ruins; every thing returns rapidly to its former state, and of so much laboured construction there soon remains only shapeless vestiges covered with briars. The sweet chestnuts, which grow luxuriantly in almost every part of the Appenines, contribute to uphold this dense population, by the subsistence which they afford in regions Chateauwhere the terrace-cultivation cannot be introduced: vieux, 30?, 303. Sisn. while, at the summit of all above this zone of wood,2 Agric. de where the frequent clouds nourish a short but sweet 100.

2

Tosc. 94,

1796.

Peculiar character

this gives to Italian

scenery.

CHAP. herbage, mountain-pastures are to be found, similar to XX. the dry and healthful downs of the South of England. Hence arises the romantic character of Italian scenery, the constant combination of a mountain outline, and all the wild features of an alpine country, with the rich vegetation of a southern climate: the intermixture of the wildest and most awful with the softest and most delicate features of nature.Hence, too, the rudeness, the pastoral simplicity, and the occasional predatory habits to be found in the population: for these rocky and crooked fastnesses render it almost impossible for any police, however vigilant, to track out robbers who are sheltered by their numerous inhabitants. The insalubrious air which still infects the plains, and the devastation which they formerly underwent from mutual warfare, or the plunder of the robber mountain chivalry, have still farther contributed to fix industry and population in the mountains: for the malaria does not rise above a certain level, generally as clearly defined as the surface of a lake, on the hills, and the feudal horsemen paused at the entrance of these mountain-asylums of industry. The effects of these causes are still conspicuous. To this day, you may travel for miles together in the plains and valleys, without meeting with a single town or village, or even a human habitation; while the towns cluster on the mountain sides, the houses nestling together on some scanty ledge, with cliffs rising above them, and sinking down abruptly below them, "the very congesta manu præruptis oppida saxis of Virgil's description, which he even then called antique walls." They had been the strongholds of the primeval inhabitants of the country, and which are still inhabited after the lapse of so many centu

7

XX.

ries; nothing of the stir and movement of other CHAP. parts of Europe having penetrated these lonely valleys, and tempted the people to quit their mountain 1796. fastnesses for the more accessible dwellings in the Arnold's plain.1

Lectures,

166.

region.

The third region comprises the plains which lie between the western declivity of the Appenines and Third the Mediterranean. This district comprehends the Marshes of Volterra, still as pestilential as when they all but proved fatal to Hannibal's army; the plain of the Clitumnus, rich as in ancient days in herds and flocks; the Campagna of Rome, once inhabited by numerous tribes, now an almost uninhabitable desert; the Pontine Marshes, formerly the abode of thirty nations, now a pestilential swamp; the Campagna of Pæstum, at one time inhabited by the luxurious Sybarites, now known only by its stately ruins and deserted thickets; the Campagna of Naples, still the scene of industry, elegance, and agricultural riches. The character of these plains is so different from that of the other great divisions of Italy, that it is hardly possible to believe that they belong to the same quarter of the globe. In the Campagna of Naples, indeed, still as in ancient times, an admirable cultivation brings to perfection the choicest gifts of nature magnificent crops of wheat and maize cover the rich and level expanse rows of elms or willows shelter their harvests from the too scorching rays of the sun, and luxuriant vines, clustering to the very tops of the trees, are trained in festoons from one summit to the other. The banks of the Clitumnus, too, in Tuscany, still, in some places, maintain their ancient character, of being "rich in men and the fertility of the soil."* But, with these * Divis viris atque ubere glebae.

XX.

1796.

CHAP. exceptions, these plains are covered only with grass, and exhibit the usual features of the pastoral character. After leaving the centres of elegance and refinement in Florence and Rome, the traveller is astonished to find himself in the midst of uninclosed and desolate plains, over which numerous herds of cattle wander at large, under the care of shepherds, mounted on horseback, and armed with lances, after the fashion of the Steppes of Tartary. Every thing in those immense pasture-fields is at variance alike with the plain of Lombardy and the peopled mountains of the Appenines: the farms are of great size, and entirely composed of grass: the inhabitants few and unhealthy; hardly any villages or hamlets are to be met with; the towns far distant, and declining; and were it not for the vestiges of a dense population, which still exist in the ruins, scattered at intervals 1 Personal over its surface, one would be led to believe they had never been tenanted by any other inhabitants but the wild-boar and the buffalo.1

observa

tion.

Unparalleled interest of Rome.

The cities of Italy have been celebrated since the very infancy of civilization, from the marvellous celebrity in arts and arms which their inhabitants have attained; but they are not so considerable in point of population, as might have been expected, from their long-established fame. Alone, of the whole countries in the world, Italy has twice risen to the highest eminence in literature and the arts: on the ruins of the Capitol, the former mistress of the world, a new empire has arisen, founded not on arms, but on religious reverence, and which at one period embraced a wider dominion than had ever been conquered by the arms of the Consuls. Rome in consequence possesses an interest, and exhibits a magnificence, which no other city in the world can boast;

XX.

1796.

for it contains the remains of genius, and the monu- CHAP. ments of art, alike in ancient and modern times; and is peopled with the shades equally of Cicero and Virgil, of Tasso and Alfieri, of Raphael and Michael Angelo. The Amphitheatre of Titus still remains in ruined grandeur, beside the Obelisk of Thebes; but it looks down on St John-Lateran, from whence so many laws have issued to the Christian world; the Horses of Praxilites yet adorn the eternal city, but they front the Palace of the Quirinal, the abode of the Supreme Pontiff; the ancient pavement of the Sacred Way, furrowed by the wheels of an hundred triumphs, again, after a burial of fourteen hundred years, is exposed to the light of the sun, but it leads only to the modern Capitol, where "bare-footed friars sing vespers in the remains of the Temple of Jupiter;" the Columns of Trajan and Antoninus still surmount the ancient plain of the Campus Martius, but they look down on the crowded and brilliant scene of the modern Corso; the Tomb of Adrian has been bespoiled, only to adorn the "fane of the Vatican; the Dome of St Peter's, the noblest monument which the hands of man have ever raised to the purposes of religion." Before a second Rome appears1 Gibbon. in the world, a second Republic must have been followed by a second Empire; a second Mythology by a second Popedom; a second Forum by a second St Peter's: and the genius of Modern Europe, drawn to a centre by one conquering State, must have been succeeded by another night of a thousand years, during which superstition has subjected the whole civilized world to its sway.

During the days of its greatness, Rome is said to have contained three millions of inhabitants; but it may be doubted whether it in reality ever was inhabited by so great a number of souls as modern