The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-01-14

Evidences of the Grandest City in tho world-The Celebrated Orange Tree.
 Dresden, Dec. 24, 1895. To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER; Niebuhr once remarked "As the streams lose themselves in the mightier ocean, so the history of the peoples once distributed along the Mediterrane- an shores is absorbed in that of the mighty mistress of the world"
 Byron in a perfect rapture of ecstasy exclaimed:
 Thou art the garden of the world, the
 home
 Of all are yields, and nature can decree, Even in thy desert what is like to
 thee?
 Thy very weeds are beautiful"
 Of all the countries of Europe, I con- sider Italy the most interesting in eve ny way.
 History, beauty of scenery and art form a grand trio which have fairly glorifed Italy, and thus she beckons to her fairy shores pilgrims and scholars from every quarter of the globe. Italy possesses many cities of deep historic interest and fountains and sources of lovely art; but the most interesting of her cities and the powerful loadstone which attracts so many throngs is the glorious city of Rome.
 A visit to this grand center comes as the inspiration of a life time, and the scholar or appreciative tourist who thirsts for knowledge and visits Rome minds me of the ocean rovers pn the deep sea, forever sounding and sdiving for pearls. The knowledge seeker casts his eager plummet deep into this sea at Rome, and if he so desires he can sat isfy himself with what Rome furnishes so richly as evidences of the mediaeval era. Let the plummet sink deeper and the remains of the early Christian epoch to be seen in Rome are astound- ing in their grandeur; go even lower to the period when the Palatine hill fairly gleamed in every direction with tenn ples and abodes of the rich. The gor- geous palaces of the Roman emperors, to judge even from the ruins to be seen to-day on this wonderland, the Pala- tine must have been magnificent and beyond the power of description. The house of Clodius, Cicero's bitter enemy cost over six hundred and fifty thou sand dollars at that distant day, and it was but one of scores of magnificent mansions. Even in the days of the old republic, orators often spoke of "the good old times of their fathers and if you desire evidences of remote civiliza- tion open your eyes and look carefully about, and you will behold the wonder { ful remains of the Roma Quadrata," So Intimately associated with the name of Romulus. When we behold this grand Roma Quadrata' we; are car ried back to a very remote period in history. Just think for a moment, a few feet from this wonderful wall of Romulus, where we are now standing and studying very old Roman history, ''Lupercal," where the she-wolf hid herself when the shepherds drove her from the twins which she was suck ling. Oh! but is not that very long time ago? Certainly it is, but history ante-dates the period of Romulus and Remus, and clearly indicates time when the Palatine Hill was mantled with green pastures, and where stately and majestic edifices afterwards arose as if by the hand of magic shepherds pastured their f1ocks, little dreaming of the future glory of the place. Sink thy pIllmmet to far deeper depths than we have hitherto obtained and we find in- timately connected with ancient tradi- tions certain relics of the flint period which point to an epoch more ancient than any written history; should we sound deeper, no answer comes back to our eager ear, for we have penetrated into an ocean which is bottomless, an abyss which is infinite, which possesses no relics by which we can judge of the great age of Rome or rather of the towns or abodes which were construct ed long previous to her fabled exist ence.
 Rome sprang into life amid the fogs and mists of antiquity and her exist ence, like Tyrus of old "is of ancient days"
 Let us spend an afternoon on the ssAventine Hill," one of the seven clas- sic hills of old Rome. We drive down the Corso and turn off towards the Ro- man Forum, passing the Forum of Tro- ian with it's world-renowned column; q little further on we drive by the half- buried Forum of Nero and shortly pass an old church. beneath which is the Mamnertine prison, one of the most ancient structures in Rome; we now traverse the Roman Forum and behold abundant evidences which prove that Rome was the grandest city in the world: the ruins of triumphal arches, temples, Basilicas and trophies are crowded closely together here and it is estimated that more than one thousand million dollars were expended in this locality to beauty the grandest Forum known in history. Let us pass the
 'sNameless column with the buried
 base"
 and the "Cloaca Maxima," that great seine which still faithfully performs its task. having been built nearly twenty five hundred years ago; we pass be- tween the Palatine and Aventine Hills over the street which is still called the Via di Cerchi from the fact that in this vicinity was situated the "Circus Maxi mus" fbuilt 800 B. O. where no less