is evident that the Lucanians did not fear the tears and lamentations of this unhappy subject state, for this custom continued to be observed throughout the whole period of Samnite oppression, and survived even till Roman times—perhaps to the very end of the city’s existence,—although in the course of passing generations there could have been but few persons of pure Greek descent left in the place. With the advent of Alexander of Epirus, who had been called into Italy by the Greeks of Tarentum in order to assist the sorely-pressed colonies of Magna Graecia, Epirot troops were landed at the mouth of the Silarus. Under the very walls of Paestum there now took place a stubborn fight wherein the army of the Samnites was completely routed, and its survivors driven in confusion from the coast into the wild woods and rocky valleys of the Lucanian hills. For a brief interval of years Poseidonia regained its lost liberty and its Hellenic name, but with the overthrow and death of Alexander of Epirus, the scattered hordes pressed down once more from their mountain fastnesses upon the rich plain, and the city was for the second time enslaved by the ruder conquering race. Forty years later, after the Pyrrhine war, all Lucania fell under the rising power of Rome, a change that was by no means unacceptable to the Greek cities, which were groaning under the rude tyranny of the Samnites. A Latin colony was now planted at Paestum, to form a convenient centre whence the neighbouring district could be kept in order and peaceably developed according to Roman ideas. These Roman colonists, although they did not restore the lands and buildings held by the expelled Samnites to their rightful owners, yet lived on terms of amity with the Greek population, with whom they must have freely intermarried. The original Hellenic inhabitants, relieved of the bonds of servitude, were now placed on an equal footing with the new colonists, partaking of political rights in the city thus freshly re-created under the supremacy of Rome, and soon they grew to imitate the speech and manners of their new masters, so that as an immediate result of the expulsion of the barbaric Samnites and the entry of the progressive Romans, Paestum began to recover a considerable portion of its ancient splendour.