The National Register.
London, England, 1818-02-09 00:00:00

ON THE PRESENT STATE OF ROME.

We have been solicitous to learn from our friends who :Ave lan[ by
travelled to :tome, in what state the city appears at this time respect-
ing its original grandeur in buildings, culonule , pmticoes and arches
—and we rind diet ilia representattens search we have in prints. i.e.
very ill calculated to dim! m a eery clear idea of the real appear:air.,
Much those massy records of antiquity now present to the eye—f
they are made from drawings of crusts and ingenious men, wdo, de-
sirous of representing the whole in as complete a state as possible,.
assisted by their genius and alto by their labour, the pa se- rotund
by earth a 1..: many reel buried under ground, and capitals made out
ham cue ur two that remain pertiva„ and porticoes. catching as it
were, their only support from the angles of flights of steps which the
stwleot rather stir:ties at a secure distance. Fallen columns hate
bee.) not only disfigured. but purposely mutilated by the builders
of email lianitatioas, stables, and warehouses, who sought Mr mate-
rials near at hand, and at as cheap a rate as posAble—these are freely
affixed to the remnants of some high calanrade wi en en a Brutus
or a Gesur trod—these stem to have exercised the mind tic in, darn
men, of either letters or opulence, no primacy desire to preserve any
of these evidences of ancient antrafs in the same state a, their on •
ginal compilers relate them ; ranr minds have rather acted in unison
with the moulderng sleur.,,t, of fact, by yieldihg to the triumpn of
acrestime, the acres of Titus—toe palace of Adrian—the tbrum—atal de:
temple--athke declare Low little their modern possessors have regard-
ed their beauty or th. i: value, and whatev.r may be the vanity of
their po,eb-urn iii the admiration of their celebrated grandeur, they
cart have been actuated by very little zeal Mr the arts and for the
siniplicity of Roman architecture, whale the best of these renia:tis are
disfigured by modern abutments and adjuncts of the meanest dwell-
im,n, arid materials, and by die careless neglect of unobserved elecev.
aferli of tie mutilations has been occasioned by the rapacity or
avarice of traveller.: to Cll.lOl their own coll-ctions or those of tits
great of other nations; but tiles,: are for the mo.t part limited to
busts or statues—which is Lot -.he subject of our present remarks—
they are, though of infinite vahre, yet minor to the magnificence of
extensive buildings in a city. At Rome we find their htokes, pules •
tads which shew only the place where these ennuent proofs ofspleodirl
genius ones adorned the capital. It is the shameful perversion of
great buildings theimelves, of which we cannot help complaining—
we would reuedly admit of alterations in their interior to retuter Lb. :71
C0111111C110:11 for habitations in these times, but their extern,. should
have been sialuously pi ese mai in all their ancient glary. gning like
their prototypes at Ath.ms the law aim:Mier:are to all posterity.—
" States once distinguished for military prnwess„sonietrities lay doe a
their arms front lasisitade, and are weary of trunkss coatentions"—
the tame k is applicable to these once enalient as Anicita and
Rome, for sculpture and architecture, which in the modern lds:atiale
and luxury, shrink Dom the exertton of repairing and preservin4
what ilecaya around them. and who:: beauty fa.mhar to their daily
view, sites .st last into entire dissolution.

Sir Jamet. Mackintosh, M;'. latc RePorder of Flom-
bay, has t,„,1 appointed Professor cf Law in the East
India Col!c:,•e, Hefts, on the re.l.r.atitn of L.
Christian, EMI
From an official account printed by order of the
!louse of Commons, it appears, there are at preseat
confined in the of New4atc, under sentence of
death. 51 men and 10 women. Their crimes arc cithalt
robberies or fcrgeries, 3at no murder.