The Dickinson press., 1889-01-05
IN THE ETERNAL CITY.
A Disappo,ntca Tourist IN Ron

A Disappointed Tourist in Rome-The Ro-
man and tho Greek.
1t was not unlike a shock of pain or disap-
pointment when for the first time l threaded
my way through the Roman streets, passed
out into the Forum and wandered around the
Coliseum. So dingy and denuded did the
relics of old Rome appear to me that they
were more like the few brown bones which
the spade of the sexton has just thrown up
by the sideof u reopened grave. l have mover
seen n place where the remains were so few
and the suggestions of what was lost were SO
many. Rome looked like q place which first
nad been u cradle and afterwards had been
turned into n grave.
1t seemed as if everything had been born
there, everything had grown old there, every
thing had died there, and everything had
been buried there. Rome is the city Of the
Holy SepnlcAre. At Jerusalem pilgrims
visit the spot where Christ was once laid. At
Rome VIC seem to visit the shrine where old
Time himself had been buried. Under this
head | may briefly note dow q few first I'M
prcssions.
1t was said that Augustus found Rome Of
brick and left it of marble. 1t might be
added that the Cloths, the popes and the
mobiles found Rome of marble and left it of
',rici;, so completely have these despoiling
powers peeled off the beautiful white flesh
and left Rome like n body, brown, shapeless
and Invested Of every trace of her former
loveliness. But tho Romans themselves pre-
pared the way for this dcsolation. Their par
silmony brought its own punishment. For
parsimony, we must remember, is a sin fol-
lowed up by its special retribution, quite as
much as prodigality. The men of Rome
i,,l ,.,o &.,l -.l ,t;1:tn~:,,, ,,,,.o n o M
%nurious in all works of art as they were
shamcfully extravagant in oil pursuits
of physical enjoyment. Even in tho use
of the cheap travertine stone they were
ridiculously stlngy. But when it came
vel as by nature most economical i'll the use
of it. Athens had u whole mount of marble
ut her back door, and could hew out Of
Pcntclius all the shrines and statues she
wanted. Rome had almost the same advan-
tagcs; for it can hardly be urged us III apol-
osy for the city on tho Tibcr, that she was ut
Il distance from the mountains of luna and
the great quarries of Carrara, when VIC re-
member that an easy waterway was ever
o.ca between the shores of Liguria and tho
foot of the Palatine; and when we remember,
moreover, how no obstacles were allowed to
remain between the Roman and the object
of his ambition or his appetite-both Of
which he was ready to crafty at an UNI
bounded price.
But Wien it comes to works of taste the
Roman betrayed his true nature. With him
nothing was too much wheA lavished on bod
lily qualification, nothing was too little when
spent on art. The Athenian built his temples
w%orthily of the gods in solid blocks of mar
Die, i'll unneasured splcndor, giving to tho
deities what cost him something. The Roman,
when he came to raise his temples, was COIL
tent to make them of brick or stucco or cheap
stone. and then to slleathe these in a thin cas-
ing OF marble. When, therefore, the destroy
ing hands of Goth or the Gothic hands of later
Roman mobiles, such US tho Colonnas, the
Farnese and the Borghese families, were laid
upon the ancient edifices, it was all easy task,
as we'll as n great temptation, to cmove
t:ese light coats of marble and to invest
their rising palaces with such apparel of
many colors us the marbles of old Rome pre-
sentcd, ready made, to their rapacioush hands.
Had tho men of Rome followed the example
of tho men of Athens, md dedicated to their
divinities n few sanctuaries of solid marble,
they would AVE left behind them such mon
ulncnts as would nave deficd the assaults of
later generations, and would have COM
manded at this day the wonder of tho world.
H. Bernard Carpenter i'll Boston Globe.