temple, in which the Senate assembled to consult about wars and triumphs, and was surrounded with porticoes in which the statues of the most eminent Roman generals were placed, while on each side were the triumphal arches of Germanicus and Drusus. More extensive and magnificent than either of the old fora was the one which Trajan erected, in the centre of which was the celebrated column of the emperor, so universally admired, while the sides were ornamented with a double colonnade of gray Egyptian marble, the columns of which were fifty-five feet in height. This was one of the most gigantic structures in Rome, covering more ground than the Flavian Amphitheatre, and built by the celebrated Apollodorus of Damascus. It filled the whole space between the Capitoline and Quirinal. The Basilica Ulpia was only one division of this vast edifice, divided internally by four rows of columns of gray granite, and paved with slabs of marble. [Sidenote: Beauty of the Roman Forum.] Nothing in Rome, or perhaps any modern city, exceeded the glory and beauty of the Forum, with the adjoining basilica, and other public buildings, filled with statues and pictures, and crowded with people. The more aristocratic loungers sought the retired promenade afforded by the porticoes near the Circus Flaminius, where the noise and clamor of the crowded streets, the cries of venders, the sports of boys, and the curses of wagoners, could not reach them. The Forum was the peculiar glory of the republican period, where the Gracchi enlightened the people on their political rights, where Cato calmed the passions of the mob, where Cicero and Hortensius delivered their magnificent harangues. [Sidenote: Works of Augustus.] [Sidenote: Temple of Apollo.] [Sidenote: Theatre of Marcellus.]