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


 harmonious ehorusses, for they all sing in unison. Far away to the right is the ruin of the "Pons Sublicius," that his- toric bridge which was built 6S9 B. C.. the oldest bridge in Rome, the same which Horatlus Coccles and Spurius Lartius undertook ito hold so bravely against the Etruscans under Lars Por- sena. The contest seems to be really waging as we look out upon that local ity.
 And as they passed, beneath their feet They heard the timbers crack,"-
 a
 ''But with a crash like thunder
 Fell every loosened beam."
 
 And long shout of triumph
 Rose from the walls of Rome,
 As to the highest turret tops
 Was splashed the yellow foam,'
 The historic localities to be viewed from this garden are too numerous to be mentioned in a short letter.
 I was greatly interested in my visit to Saint Sahbas," very ancient church of unknown origin, for I once spent a night in the convent of Mar Sabba near Bethlehem of Judea; this is built like an immense bird-cage cling ing to the rugged sides of precipice overhanging the river Kidron; in the garden is a great cave from which St, Sabbas drove huge lion, and in this same den or cave he dwelt for over six ty years; here he died in s5S2 at the age l of ninety-seven. In vineyard near where this church stands on the Aven- | tine, Flamminius Vacca claimed to have unearthed a chamber with neither door nor window; it's pavement was of agate and comedian; the walls were gilded copper
 The Garden of the Jesuits" is wild, weird spot, but the view to be seen from this point is very lovely and will not attempt to describe it.
 | Many fragments of marble are scat tered broadcast among the flowers and vines which abound here.
 l The "Alban" Mountains stand out boldly in the distance with beautiful background of the bluest of Italian skies, and the Pyramid of Caius Ces- tius stands as silent and glorious as on the early mon when St. Paul passed by it on his way to execution beyond the city walls.
 Very near us are the ruins of the wall l of Servius Tullius, which once enclosed all the seven hills of Rome, and this was nearly twenty-seven hundred | years ago, One more church remains to be mentioned on the Aventine. I re- fer to the Church of St. Prisca; it is an ugly looking church, but when call to mind what this ancient church com nlenorates, feel overcome with rever- | ence and amazement. It was built in l the year 2S0, and covers the very spot ! where once stood the home of Aqulla I and Priscilla, and at this dwelling St. I Peter visited when he first came to Rome.
 I Do some of my readers smile and ask for proof that St. Peter ever came into Italy or to Rome? reply that my un- \ bounded reverence and respect for the unbroken tradition of nearly nineteen centuries, which declares that apostle did come there, leads me to believe I such to be the fact. There is little to take the eye in this church, but one is ! absorbed with the thought that this is I the old home of Aquila and Priscilla, the intimate friends of St. Peter and St. Paul, and does not this thought l transcend every emotion caused by I sculptures and marble columns and l grand Mosaics to be seen in so many l churches of Italy?
 | St. Paul writes in Romans, Greet Priscilla and Aauila my helpers ? Luke tells us that Apollos sat in the house of Aquila and Priscilla at Ephe- Esus, and from the mother of the house received sweet lessons of salvation. We read in Acts they expounded to him the way of God more perfectly"
 And this little obscure church God bless it) stands right over the old home where Aquila and Priscilla learned their own divine lessons so well.
 They were working people, nearly all who dwelt upon the Aventine were and always had been working people, The good couple were tent makers and l made their living just as St. Paul did by the same work. In the days of the great suffering the Emperor Claudius drove the Jews out of Rome, and they were obliged to leave their Aventine home, for we know Aquila was a Jew from Pontus in Asia Minor Paul met them after they had removed to Co., rinth; little later they went over to Ephesus, and after the obnoxious law was repealed they returned to their former home on the Aventine A Latin inscription in this very ancient church no doubt is responsible for the tradi- ton, and If the tradition be right the house of Aquila and Priscilla was in its turn built on the remains of a Temple of Diana, and that again upon the site of an altar to Hercules, which the Ar cadian King Evander had built hun- dreds of years before the time of Rom- ulus.
 What a train of memories which carries us though with uncertain stepe back into the very night of antiquity, And as the sun sinks and the wall of St. Prisca casts a lengthening shadow let us finger moment and dream in si- lence and solitude of what the stories and memories may be, with which com ing ages shall lengthen out the chain of those which the past has linked to this deserted and melancholy spot"
 How thankful should we be to the church for preserving so many holy places and for keeping alive the names of so many silent martyrs to their faith in the Saviour.
 For very much that we know of the way of salvation we owe the greatest thanks to the church which has been established at Rome for nearly nine