to one side, and so fond of fame on the other, as Pliny seems to have been, may be supposed to look down with complacency on the honours thus zealously paid in his beloved Comum his memory so many ages after his decease. However, these honours are justly due, not to his reputation only but to his public spirit, as few citizens seem to have conferred so many solid benefits upon their country as he did on Comum. In the first place he established, or at least, he contributed largely both by his example and munificence, to the establishment of a school with an able teacher at its head. In the next, he provided a fund for the support of free children; built a temple to contain the busts of the Emperors, which he had presented to his fellow citizens‡; adorned the temple with a bronze statue of exquisite workmanship, dignum templo, dignum Deo donum §; voluntarily resigned a legacy in favour of Comum; and, in short, seized every occasion of manifesting his affection for the town and for its inhabitants. Few characters in truth appear more accomplished and more amiable than that of Pliny the Younger. Indefatigable both in the discharge of his duties and in the prosecution of his studies, frugal in the management and generous in the disposal of his fortune, gentle in the private intercourse of society, but firm and intrepid in his public capacity, grateful and affectionate as a husband and friend, just as a magistrate, and high-minded as a senator, he seems to have possessed the whole circle of virtues, and acted his part in all * Tuæ meæque delicia, says he to his friend, speaking of this town, their common country.-1. 3. + IV. Ep. 13. + x. 24. § III. 6. the relations of life with grace and with propriety. Nothing can be more pleasing than the picture which he gives of his domestic occupations, and few lessons are more instructive than the transcript which we find in his epistles, of his sentiments and feelings on every occasion where friendship, merit, virtue, and patriotism are interested. It is true, that the picture is drawn by Pliny himself, and both it and the transcript confessedly intended for the public; but the intimacy of such men as Tacitus, Suetonius, and Quintilian, and the countenance of an Emperor like Trajan, who knew so well how to appreciate merit, are sufficient guarantees that the author's life and writings were not in opposition. One reflection however occurs not a little derogatory to the real substantial virtue of Pliny, and that is, that its motive was, or to speak more tenderly seems to have been vanity*, a mean principle that makes virtue the handmaid of self-love, and instead of the noble object of ambition, degrades her into its tool and instrument. But, Christianity alone can correct this depravity, and we can only deplore the misfortune of Pliny, who never opened his eyes to its heavenly light. But to return to our subject.-We may collect from Pliny that Comum was in his time a rich and flourishing city, adorned with temples, statues, porticos, and pillared gates, and encircled with large and splendid villas; that it was governed by decurions, inhabited by opulent citizens, and endowed with rich lands. In most of these respects modern Como does not perhaps yield to the ancient city. The cathedral, in materials, magni tude, and probably in decoration though not in style, equals the temple of Jupiter, and ten or fifteen other churches, four or five of which are remarkable for some peculiar excellence or other, may be deemed as ornamental to the city as half the number of temples. One of these churches, that of St. Giovanni, is adorned by several pillars, which are supposed to have belonged to a portico which Pliny mentions, as erected by Fabatus, his wife's grandfather *. Three colleges of reputation, and as many public libraries are advantages, which Pliny would have extolled with rapture, and far superior, it must be owned, even to the collection of imperial statues, and to the temple erected for their receptacle. To complete the resemblance or the equality, Como is now (was lately, I should have said) as anciently, governed by Decurions of birth and property; to which I must add, that it contains a population of nearly twenty thousand souls. Pliny therefore might still behold his beloved country with delight and exult in its prosperity after so many centuries of revolution, as well as in its gratitude after so many ages of barbarism and oblivion. Next morning we embarked at nine o'clock. The view of the lake from the town is confined to a small bason that forms the harbour of Como, but the view of the town from the lake, taken at the distance of a mile from the quay, is extremely beautiful. The expanse of water immediately under the eye, the boats gliding across it; beyond it the town with its towers and domes, at the foot of three conical hills all green and wooded, that in the * V. 12. + The curious reader may see a description of a temple which Pliny was about to erect, though probably on his Tuscan property, not at Comum.-1x. 40. middle crowned with a crested castle extending its rampar t down the declivity; on both sides bold eminences chequered with groves and villas, form altogether a varied and most enchanting picture. On passing the little promontory that forms the harbour, we discovered a fine sheet of water of seven miles, with the pretty little town of Carnobio full before us; and on our left, an opening between the hills, through which we discovered some glacieres, and in particular Mount St. Bernard, covered with perpetual snows. The mountains on both sides rose to a great elevation, sometimes ascending abruptly from the lake itself, and sometimes swelling gradually from its borders, always shaded with forests of firs and chesnuts, or clad with vines and olives. But whether steep or sloping, the declivities are enlivened by numberless villas, villages, convents, and towns, seated sometimes on the very verge of the water, sometimes perched on craggs and precipices; here imbosomed in groves, and there towering on the summits of the mountains. This mixture of solitude and of animation of grandeur and of beauty, joined with the brightness of the sky, the smoothness of the lake, and the warm beams of the sun playing upon its surface, gave inexpressible interest to the scene, and excited in the highest degree our delight and admiration.` We next doubled the verdant promontory of Torno on the right, and bending towards the eastern bank landed at a villa called the Pliniana. It owes this appellation, as the reader will easily guess, to the intermittent fountain so minutely described by the younger Pliny. It is situated on the margin of the lake, at the foot of a precipice, from which tumbles a cascade, amid groves of beeches, poplars, chesnuts, and cypresses. A serpentine walk leads through these groves, and discovers at every winding some new and beautiful view. The famous fountain bursts from the rock in a small court behind the house, and passing through the under story falls into the lake. Pliny's description of it is inscribed in large characters in the hall, and is still supposed to give an accurate account of the phænomenon. It is rather singular that the intervals of the rise and fall of this spring should be stated differently by the elder and by the younger Pliny; both of whom must have had frequent opportunities of observing it. The former represents it as increasing and decreasing every hour-In Comensi juxta Larium lacum, fons largus, horis singulis semper intumescit, ac residet*; the latter thrice a day only-ter in die statis auctibus ac diminutionibus crescit, decrescitque. According to some modern observers, the ebb and flow are irregular; but the greater number, with the inhabitants. of the house, assure us, that now, as in Pliny's time, it takes place usually thrice a day; usually, because in very stormy and tempestuous weather, the fountain is said to feel the influence of the disordered atmosphere, and to vary considerably in its motions. This latter circumstance leads to the following conjectural explanation of the cause of this phænomenon. The west wind, which regularly blows upon the lake at twelve o'clock or mid-day, begins at nine in the upper regions, or on the summits of the mountains; upon these summits, and particularly that which rises behind the Pliniana, there are several cavities that penetrate into the bowels of the mountain, and communicate with certain internal reservoirs of water, the existence of which has been ascertained by various observations. Now, when the wind rushes down the cavities abovementioned and * Lib. 11. cap. 106. + IV. Ep. 30. 3 B VOL. II. |