Antiquity is to a city what noble blood is to an individual. The _former_ may fall into decay, and the _latter_ into poverty; but the pride of ancestry supports them both in their fallen greatness. The Romans had excellent olfactories, and a keen scent for steam or sulphuretted hydrogen gas, wherever these issued through cracks or fissures of the earth, in their wide domains. They were very fond of warm baths—and very wisely made frequent use of them with no small advantage, considering that these Lords of the Creation had no linen shirts, and wore thick woollen, and probably somewhat greasy garments next the skin. The boiling cauldron under Aix poured forth its nauseous and malodorous broth as freely when Cæsar was mustering his legions on the banks of the Rhine, or when Charlemagne, many a century afterwards, was uniting his Franco-German subjects in the same place, as now, when the “DAMPSCHIPPE” and “CHEMIN DE FER” are daily bringing hundreds of customers and guests from the distant shores of Albion and Erin. Innumerable Roman relics are here found—and actual baths were discovered, where the brother of Nero probably bathed. Aix is situated in latitude 50° in the midst of a gentle valley, environed, at some distance, by well-wooded hills. The substratum is calcareous, but there are unequivocal marks of volcanic agency in the neighbourhood. The town, like London, presents an old city environed by a new one—especially towards the Borcette. The old town, in which almost all the hotels, and indeed the baths are situated, is very irregular, and cedes to few continental cities in the roughness of its pavements.