Of the two other monuments of the ancient city, mere wrecks of their former selves, which have claimed the attention of architects, artists, and archæologists, one, the Temple of Diana, stands in the beautiful garden of the fountain on the site of a much older temple dedicated to the nymphs of the waters by the earliest Roman colonists, probably by Augustus himself. The ruined temple standing to-day was very likely erected about two centuries later, and the object of its presence on the spot has caused, as is usual with these early buildings, considerable difference of opinion; but it undoubtedly had something to do with the cult of the goddess of the fountain, notwithstanding the presence in it of niches reserved for the statues of other divinities. It is a solid structure containing a large hall with a barrel-vaulted roof in a bad state of repair. The worship of the goddess died out in the fourth century, and the deserted buildings falling, in the dark ages, into the hands of the Benedictines, it was given over to the female devotees of the new religion. These nuns continued in possession for some six hundred years, a long period during which little is known of it, except the facts stated. [Illustration: HOLY ORDERS NIMES] There is some kind of a record that a fire took place in it about the end of the nuns’ tenancy, and there seems to be a probability that it had at that time been turned into a hay store. Its later history is a long record of disaster, for it was used as a fortress, and war had its share in bringing about the ruin. But whatever troubles it may have come through, it has an honoured old age, and all the care and protection which the appreciative twentieth century can suggest is bestowed upon it. [Illustration: GATE OF AUGUSTUS--NIMES] The other early monument, dating from before the first century, is the Porte d’Auguste, which was built, 16 B.C., in the ramparts of the town. It was for defensive purposes, and but little remains of the original structure save two large arches and two smaller ones, which have still smaller niches above. In the stormy reign of Charles VI. by his orders a great fortress was erected over this gateway, and for nearly four hundred years this, perhaps the earliest piece of Roman architecture in Nîmes, was buried out of sight and out of ken. The other Roman gates of Nîmes have nearly vanished, portions only remaining of another fortified gateway that stood and guarded the southern entrance to the town.