"cation; which speech, however, Cicero found so flat and "lifeless, that he declined meddling with it. Yet such were "the best confederates whom Cicero could command to

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fight the battle for the liberties of Rome. It was, in fact, "from the first, a contest between the unarmed and the "armed; of eloquence against power; of the orator who "exercised a doubtful sway over a timid and feeble audience, "and one who gave the word of command to legions of "veterans." QUARTERLY REVIEW.

Behold the arch of Titus:

The Arch of Titus was erected in honour of his conquest of Jerusalem; and, although the least of the arches, by far the most graceful of them all. On either side beneath the arch, are bas-reliefs; on the left, one distinguishes Titus, seated in a quadrigal chariot, which Rome, embodied as a female, leads by the reins: Victory crowns the Emperor, and a troop of soldiers closes the scene. On the right is represented the most interesting part of the triumph; the Jewish captives, the table of gold and sacred vessels, the trumpets, the seven-branched candlestick, which soldiers, crowned with laurel, bear on their shoulders; beneath the vault of the arch, the figure of Titus is represented, supported by an eagle-image of his apotheosis. This circumstance, and the epithet of "divus," which, if he had been living, they dared not have added, are proofs that it was erected after his death; probably under the reign of Domitian.

It is Suetonius who records the single fact which, of itself, has immortalised the name of Titus :

for

"Once, while at supper, reflecting that he had done nothing

any one on that day, he broke out into that memorable and justly admired saying

"Friends-I have lost a day!"

Yet the saying more illustrated the life of Trajan than his own. That not yrant could be more remorseless than Titus, when before Jerusalem, the records of even a partial historian testify wood, and even space, were found wanting to crucify his captives on; five hundred of whom were nailed up at a time, alive, whose only crime consisted in an heroic and hopeless resistance.

XCVIII.

On those proud columns once where heroes stood,
Stand martyrs.

The triumphal columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius, originally crowned with statues of those illustrious Emperors, are now surmounted by those of St. Peter and St. Paul; to be re-surmounted, perhaps, some centuries hence, by the statues of the heroes of redeemed and regenerated Italy.

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CANTO IV.

I.

Hold of the despot, refuge of the slave.

Various uses to which the Colosseum has been applied. It may be borne in mind that the word Arena signified, also, the Amphitheatre generally; and he who fought thereon was called Arenarius. Nero, according to Pliny, often covered it with vermilion and chrysocolla.

II.

Great Colosseum, at thy mighty shrine :

The venerable Bede first gave it this term from its gigantic magnitude. After having been used during three centuries for different spectacles, and, even up to the year A. D. 523, for shows of wild beasts, it served, from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, as a stronghold for many noble families, particularly for those of the Frangipani and the Annibaldi. To this epoch all its chief depredations are referred. "It "would be a weary and sickening task," says Hobhouse, "to enumerate half the despoilers who turned the Colosseum

G G

"into a quarry. Pope Adrian I. worked a whole year at it; "Pope II. built from it his palace. Paul III. was more assi"duous, but he divided his attentions, also, between the "theatre of Marcellus, the Forum of Trajan, and the arch of “Titus. The inferior clergy, it is probable, were more "guilty than their Pontiffs, for, considering it a fair wreck, "we may suppose little scruple was used in appropriation. "In the year 1332 a grand tournament was held therein, " and half a century afterwards, it was changed into an hospital. Since that age, an everlasting mark of pillage, it "has furnished materials for many of the finest palaces at "Rome. It was only since the commencement of our era "that the Popes (seeing, no doubt, its Mecca sort of attrac"tion for Pilgrims from all parts of the world) have begun "taking pains to preserve it."

VI.

Such were their morning hopes of happiness:

Every nation has its vices-cruelty was the prevailing vice of the Romans. Vainly is it said: the brave are never cruel the Colosseum bore fearful testimony to the contrary; "for," as Forsyth observes, "here sat the conquerors of the "world coolly to enjoy the tortures and the death of men "who had never offended them. Two aqueducts hardly "sufficed to wash off the human blood shed in these imperial "shambles. Twice in a day came the senators and matrons "of Rome to the butchery; and a Virgin always gave the signal for slaughter."

VIII.

Infinity within each particle.

There is not a mould or mildew so insignificant that is not able to give birth to some parasite less than itself: that may not become the soil and parent of animalculæ, of which thousands may crowd to its surface . . . Some are so small, that to them a drop of lymph, or blood, is an ocean, where they swim in shoals through every duct and channel. HOPE'S PROSPECTS OF MAN.

XI.

So stretches that Titanic Skeleton:

Mindful of the enormous losses which the Colosseum has sustained, of the wholesale, private and public, pillaging which has been going on within it, for ages; mindful of the united influences of war, time, and the elements-no man can stand in the centre of that vast Arena, and look around and above him, without feeling lost in wonder, that so much of what is grand, and perfect, and immovable, should still remain.

Titus first opened the doors of this Titanic Edifice, begun by his father, finished by himself; the number of beasts then slaughtered, from the elephant to the gazelle, amounted to five thousand. Sylla," says the historian, " gave, at once, "five hundred lions to his Amphitheatre: the blood ran "in streams round the Arena; but the roar of the wild