, 1876-05-19
Old Rome and New Romans
BY JOAQUIN MILLER.

away, lies old Rome, lifting here and
there above the earth some broken bit of
the skeleton of her own mighty proper
tions. And down here by the Tiber,
Immediately under US as we stand on
the Spanish steps and look west we see
shafts of marble, old columns that lift
like messy tombstones on the grave of
the great dead city. There lies Rome on
the banks of the Tiber, old Rome dead,
very dead, and buried in the dust and
the debris of ten and fifteen centuries.
On the side of this dead city, out
of the side of its grave, as it were, even
out of the dust and bones and ashes of
this great dead city, has grown sort of
mushroom. The mushroom is modern
Rome.
New Rome is here, pushed back from
the Tiber, back on to the higher land, for
they could not build closer, because of
the immense ruins; and then the Tiber
overfowed, too. But here is new Rome
to-day-a very rickety town it is, too,
compared with the old one. You might
call it a toadstool grown up out of the
bones of the dead, and not be far wrong.
Here are shops, banks, saloons for re-
freshments, fashionable resorts for fash
ionable gamblers and fast women; fash
ionable modern improvements of civili-
zation.
Here are sidewalks and wide streets,
and well-paved drives, all giving the new
town an infinite advantage over the old
town there in the Ghetto where the Jews
are.
Here are also painted women, fast and
frivolous; gay young men, giving their
fortunes free rein; broken foreigners and
threadbare Romans; and many other
things which make man who is in earn
est with the world and himself infinitely
prefer the old town, even as it is now,
with all its rags and wretchedness, to the
new. New Rome is, in fact, kind of
imitation Paris. 1t may not be quite so
wicked, but it certainly does its best,
and is improving in that direction every
season. met with an artist my first
year in Rome, and / saw old Rome thor
oughly, and liked it far better than the
new.
In Rome ours was life of extremes.
We had been among the miserable all
winter. We had settled away down to
the very dregs from what was reckoned
about the fashionable world. This
had done by choice; but now that the
sun was out again, and winter nearly
gone in fact and in fancy, and new life
was being offered, we both chose to ac-
cept it. We had ranged society in all its
shades and grades with freedom and
facility that was amusing even to our
selves to think of.
81 have seen it ALL" said my friend,
from the open-air reception of the cross
ing-sweeper up to the first step Of the
throne. 1t is a little better than a COM
edy down about the bottom, but not
quite so good as a funeral as you get to
the top. Perhaps the best place ins the
whole range is a calling acquaintance
with those who are just little below or
a good distance above shop"
In mushroom Rome you always find
this Italian at the door. He is the faith
full sentinel. When Rome comes to be
destroyed like Pompeii, as it probably
will, It will be this man, this porter with
the military cap, with its gold band, and
military clothes with gold stripes, who
sits at every door Of fashionable Rome,
who will, centuries after, be found in the
ashes and ruins, dead at his postl
No, Il will not be the Roman soldier
this timel 1t will be the Italian porter
in the military cap and military clothes,
for be will be sound asleep and cannot
escape.
This porter of mushroom Rome seems
to never do anything whatever but sleep
but to take toll and sleep. He wakes
upjust long enough to take the payment
Of your franc, or half-franc, and then he
settles back in his coffin at the side of
the door, and peacefully sleeps right be.
fore your eyes.
What conscience he must havel
Down in old Rome, real Rome, thev
also have porters. But these porters are
shoemakers, and they sit either outside
the door or inside the hall. Thers Is no
house SO humble in Rome that 1t has not
its porter. And these porters Of the
Ghetto are great men. They sit there
all day, and talk and work, and work
and talk, and truly come to be very wise
and learned. They know even more
than the French barber, and, ii such a \
thing were possible, could even talk /
faster than he. There is always a crowd |
around the porter in the Ghetto. He Is |
sort OF bulletin-board, and the poor |
Jews, and the fishermen, and the chest
nut women come and stand before him.
and read the news as he prods, aud pegs,
and pokes, and pounds away al his
knees.
When you first visit this part Of old
Rome, you wonder why in the world I