[Footnote 30: Magna Graecia was a name given by the ancients to that part of southern Italy which, before the rise of the Roman state, was colonized by Greeks. Its time of greatest splendor was the seventh and sixth centuries B.C.; that is, intermediate between the Homeric age and the Periclean. Among its leading cities were Cumae, Sybaris, Locri, Regium, Tarentum, Heraclea, and Paestum. At the last-named place imposing ruins still survive.] [Footnote 31: Empedocles, philosopher, poet, and historian, who lived et Agrigentum in Sicily, about 490-430 B.C., and wrote a poem on the doctrines of Pythagoras. A legend has survived that he jumped into the crater of Etna, in order that people might conclude, from his complete disappearance, that he was a god. Matthew Arnold's poem on this incident is among his better-known works.] [Footnote 32: Tarquinius Superbus, seventh and last King of Rome, occupied the throne for twenty-five years, and as a consequence of the rape of Lucretia by his son Sextus was banished about 509 B.C.] JULIUS CAESAR Born in 100 B.C.; assassinated in 44; famous as general, statesman, orator, and writer; served in Mitylene in 80; captured by pirates in 76; questor in 68; pontifex maximus in 63; propretor in Spain in 61; member of the First Triumvirate in 60; Consul in 59; defeated the Helvetii in 58; invaded Britain in 55 and 54; crossed the Rhine in 55; crossed the Rubicon and began the Civil war in 49; dictator from 49 to 45; defeated Pompey in 48; reformed the calendar in 46; refused the diadem in 44; assassinated in the senate house in 44.[33] I THE BUILDING OF THE BRIDGE ACROSS THE RHINE[34] Caesar, for those reasons which I have mentioned, had resolved to cross the Rhine; but to cross by ships he neither deemed to be sufficiently safe nor considered consistent with his own dignity or that of the Roman people. Therefore, altho the greatest difficulty in forming a bridge was presented to him, on account of the breadth, rapidity, and depth of the river, he nevertheless considered that it ought to be attempted by him, or that his army ought not otherwise to be led over. He devised this plan of a bridge: he joined together, at the distance of two feet, two piles, each a foot and half thick, sharpened a little at the lower end, and proportioned in length to the depth of the river.