titles to the acclamations of the Roman people, sometimes presumed to approach the city in hostile array, and impose laws on its inhabitants.

The liberties of the Romans sunk under the genius and spirit of Sixtus V. and of Julius II. and were finally suppressed by the authority and arts of the two Pontiffs of the Medicean family, (to which literature owes so much and liberty so little), Leo X. and Clement VII. Since that period every circumstance has contributed to turn the attention of the Romans to the arts of peace, to the contemplation of religion, the study of antiquity, and the embellishment of the city. Few opportunities have occurred that could call their courage into action, or awaken their ancient magnanimity. The storming of the city by the Constable Bourbon, and the battle of Lepanto, are perhaps the only occasions. In the former, though taken by surprise and treachery, the Romans protected only by the ancient walls, resisted the attacks of a veteran and regular army, and were at length overpowered by the numbers of that truly barbarian horde; while Bourbon the General

perished, as is well known, in the very act of scaling the walls. In the battle of Lepanto the Roman gallies, commanded by the gallant Colonna, led the Christian fleet, and were acknowledged to be the principal agents on that glorious day, which checked the victorious career of the Sultan, and broke his naval strength for ever.

It may further be inquired, why the Romans made little or no resistance on the late invasion, which was accompanied with circumstances sufficiently insulting to rouse even the spirit and energies of a coward? The Romans themselves though undisciplined and unprepared, were ready to take arms, and even made a tender of their services to the government; but the Papal ministers, and perhaps the Pontiff himself, were duped by the declarations and solemn promises of the French generals, and in opposition to the wishes and suspicions of the people, consented to receive the hostile army within their gates. Yet when thus betrayed and enslaved, the people more than once rose upon the French troops, and the Trasteverini in particular, on one occasion, made considerable havoc, and excited the greatest alarm among them. Insomuch that the French had recourse to their usual arts of promises, protestations, appeals to liberty, to the genius of Brutus, and to the Roman name, to induce these generous patriots to quit the bridges, capitol, and other strong posts of which they had taken possession. Similar insurrections took place at Albano and in Sabina, where the peasants undisciplined and half armed, resisted and sometimes routed their enemies. These efforts, unavailing as they were, and as from the unfortunate situation of the papal territory, and indeed of all Italy at that time, must necessarily have been, are still so many proofs that the Romans are not, as has been so often asserted, a race of abject dastards.

The truth is, that want of courage is not the predominant vice either of the Romans or of the Italians, or indeed of any other nation: courage is a quality inherent in man, but its

exercise is the result of calculation. Give an individual that which is worth defending, and he will defend it; give a nation liberty with all its blessings, and it will fight for them; a bad government has no value, and excites no attachment-who then will expose his life to support it?

To proceed. The modern Romans are accused of habitual indolence, and a disposition to mendicancy; a reproach founded upon hasty and partial observation. To repose during the heat of the day is a custom established in all southern countries; is conformable to the practice of the ancients, and is both useful and wholesome, as by sacrificing hours when exercise is dangerous or oppressive, it leaves the morning and evening, that is, all the cool and delightful part of the day, with much of the night, open to business and amusement. The time given to labor and rest is in quantity the same as in northern regions, but divided in a different manner. As for mendicancy, I have already observed, that in countries and cities where the poor are supported by voluntary contributions, mendicancy is not easily avoidable; in favor of Rome I must add, that the number of beggars is not greater there than in other capitals of the same population, and that the wretches who infest the churches and public edifices are in general strangers, attracted by the facility of gathering alms in a city frequented by so many rich. travellers, and filled with so many convents and pious establishments. The extreme misery which we witnessed was owing to the entire spoliation of all the hospitals and asylums, to the ruin of public credit, the impoverishment of the clergy, nobility, and householders, by the exactions of the soldiery, and in short to the general system of plunder exercised by the French while in possession of the city.

I come now to the morals of the Romans, and must, in the first place, acknowledge that it would be presumption in a traveller who passed three months only in Rome, to pretend to speak upon this subject from his own observation. However from inquiries, and the statement of impartial and judicious strangers long resident in Rome, we collected, that among the higher classes there is less room for censure here than perhaps in any other Italian city; that cicisbeism, which in its most qualified practice is an insult to decency, is neither so common nor so flagrant; that the morals of the cardinals, prelates, and clergy, and even of the middling class of citizens, are pure and unimpeachable; and that the people in general are mild, open-hearted in their intercourse, and in their manners extremely decorous and even stately. This latter quality of the Romans cannot escape the notice of the most superficial observer; while the classic traveller sees, or seems to see, in this unaffected gravity and dignified deportment some traces of the majesty of the ancients, and fancies that he can still discover in their fallen descendants

Romanos rerum dominos gentemque togatam*.

Eneid, lib. 1.

But how far the tide of Roman blood has run pure and unmixed during the lapse of so many centuries, and the course of so many revolutions, it is difficult to determine. The capital of

* The Roman character, both ancient and modern, may be expressed with great precision by that beautiful antithesis of Lanzi, Vie un grande che si piega a ogni bello; vi e un bello che si solleva a ogni grande.

an empire including many nations in its pale, must necessarily be crowded with strangers, and perhaps half peopled by the natives of the provinces. Such is the state of the great British metropolis at present, and such was that of Rome anciently; in fact, the latter was more likely to attract strangers, or rather provincials, than the former, as many or most of the inhabitants of the great cities enjoyed the rights of Roman citizens, and were even admitted, as the Gauls were by Julius Cæsar, into the senate itself*. . Cicero who beheld the evil, if it deserve that name, in its origin, complains that even in his time the influx of foreigners had infected the purity of the Latin language; and if at a period when the honors and offices of the state were confined to the native Romans, the number of strangers was so considerable, what must it have been

* Religiosa patet peregrina curia laudi

Nec putat externos quos decet esse suos.

Rutil.

Aspice hanc frequentiam, cui vix urbis ímmensæ tecta sufficiunt; maxima pars illius turbæ ex municipiis, ex coloniis suis, ex toto denique orbe terrarum confluxerunt-nullum non hominum genus concurrit in Urbem-Seneca ad