Besides the Mamertine prisons and the Cloaca Maxima, there are other antiquities at Rome which belong to the early period. Among these are the foundations and great fragments of the ancient buildings of the CAPITOL. The Capitol-hill is said to form a link between the ancient city and the modern one.—“From an elevated station, about two hundred and fifty feet above the Forum,” says Simond, “the voice of Cicero might have been heard, revealing to the people, assembled before the Temple of Concord, (to which the ruins nearest to us probably belonged,) Catiline’s conspiracy. He might even have been heard in the Tribune of Harangues, situated on the other side of the Forum, and next to the Temple of Jupiter Stator,—of which there are three columns still standing,—taking the oath _that he had saved his country_, and all the people taking the same oath after him. But the gory head and hand of this saviour of his country might have been seen from our station soon after, nailed to the side of this same tribune, and the same people tamely looking on! Instead of the contending crowds of patriots, conspirators, orators, heroes, and fools, each acting his part, we now saw only a few cows quietly picking up blades of grass among the ruins; beggars, and monks, and asses loaded with bags of puzzolana, and a gang of galley-slaves lazily digging away for antiquities, under the lash of their task-masters.” The hill of the Capitol derived its name from the head of Tolus[174], and the prediction of universal empire to those who held it. It was famous for a temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, which was the effect of a vow made by Tarquinius Priscus in the Sabine war. But he had scarcely laid the foundations before his death. His nephew, Tarquinius the Proud, finished it with the spoils taken from the neighbouring nations. But upon the expulsion of the kings, the consecration was performed by Horatius the consul. The structure stood on a high ridge, taking in four acres of ground. The front was adorned with three rows of pillars, the other side with two. Its ascent from the ground was by one hundred steps. The prodigious gifts and ornaments, with which it was several times endowed, almost exceed belief. Suetonius tells us that Augustus gave at one time two thousand pounds weight of gold; and a precious stone to the value of five hundred sestertia. Livy and Pliny surprise us with accounts of the brazen thresholds, the noble pillars, that Sylla removed hither from Athens out of the temple of Jupiter Olympius; the gilded roof, the gilded shields, and those of solid silver; the huge vessels of silver, holding three measures; the golden chariot, &c. This temple was first consumed by fire in the Marian war, and then rebuilt by Sylla, who, dying before the dedication, left that honour to Quintus Catulus. This too was demolished in the Vitellian sedition. Vespasian undertook a third, which was burnt down about the time of his death.