Modern writers, taking London and Paris for their measure of material civilization, seem unwilling to admit that Rome could have reached such a pitch of glory and wealth and power. To him who stands within the narrow limits of the Forum, as it now appears, it seems incredible that it could have been the centre of a much larger city than Europe can now boast of. Grave historians are loath to compromise their dignity and character for truth by admitting statements which seem, to men of limited views, to be fabulous, and which transcend modern experience. But we should remember that most of the monuments of ancient Rome have entirely disappeared. Nothing remains of the Palace of the Caesars, which nearly covered the Palatine Hill; little of the fora which, connected together, covered a space twice as large as that inclosed by the palaces of the Louvre and Tuileries, with all their galleries and courts; almost nothing of the glories of the Capitoline Hill; and little comparatively of those Thermae which were a mile in circuit. But what does remain attests an unparalleled grandeur,--the broken pillars of the Forum; the lofty columns of Trajan and Marcus Aurelius; the Pantheon, lifting its spacious dome two hundred feet into the air; the mere vestibule of the Baths of Agrippa; the triumphal arches of Titus and Trajan and Constantine; the bridges which span the Tiber; the aqueducts which cross the Campagna; the Cloaca Maxima, which drained the marshes and lakes of the infant city; and, above all, the Colosseum. What glory and shame are associated with that single edifice! That alone, if nothing else remained of Pagan antiquity, would indicate a grandeur and a folly such as cannot now be seen on earth. It reveals a wonderful skill in masonry and great architectural strength; it shows the wealth and resources of rulers who must have had the treasures of the world at their command; it shows the restless passions of the people for excitement, and the necessity on the part of government of yielding to this taste. What leisure and indolence marked a city which could afford to give up so much time to the demoralizing sports! What facilities for transportation were afforded, when so many wild beasts could be brought to the capitol from the central parts of Africa without calling out unusual comment! How imperious a populace that compels the government to provide such expensive pleasures! The games of Titus, on the dedication of the Colosseum, lasted one hundred days, and five thousand wild beasts were slaughtered in the arena. The number of the gladiators who fought surpasses belief. At the triumph of Trajan over the Dacians, ten thousand gladiators were exhibited, and the Emperor himself presided under a gilded canopy, surrounded by thousands of his lords. Underneath the arena, strewed with yellow sand and sawdust, was a solid pavement, so closely cemented that it could be turned into an artificial lake, on which naval battles were fought.