To lave imperial Rome.”
The city to whose fountains and baths the aqueduct brought copious streams of fresh water from the hills has disappeared. A squalid little port fills some of its site, and entombs its marbles, but the aqueduct, situate too far from the habitations of subsequent man to serve his purpose as a quarry, and too threatening with its mass to encourage any hasty attempt at demolition, has survived.
A mile or two lower down are a few arches of a branch of the same aqueduct; perhaps more picturesque in their greater ruin, but less impressive in their situation and height. All around as we enter Cherchel are evidences of its ancient glory. The fashioning of the ground, the great squared stones which are built into the walls, the marble columns lying about in the town square, and the huge masses of shapeless brickwork on the shore prepare us for the collection of statues and other objects gathered together in a well-arranged museum.
The city of Cæsarea, renowned for its magnificence in the splendid Roman world of the first century, rose under the hand of a woman, as Carthage under Dido’s. To the loves of Antony and Cleopatra was born the Princess Selene. In her veins flowed the blood of the Ptolemies,—perhaps of the Pharaohs,—and of the paramount family of Rome. Truly, to adapt the language of the turf, was she bred for building. Possibly with the idea of providing for this inconvenient young lady at a safe distance from Rome, Augustus mated her to Juba, a descendant of that Masinissa, King of Numidia, who had been the staunch ally of the Romans in their long struggle with Hannibal. Juba, educated at Rome, had developed literary tastes. He is lauded by Pliny for his erudition, and we learn from Plutarch that he merited a place among “Royal and Noble Authors.” Save perhaps for the dark blood of his ancestry, he was a fitting match for Cleopatra’s daughter, especially as he was restored to the Numidian throne of his family, with all the power of Rome behind him. Retiring to the ancient Phœnician town of Iol, the Royal pair set to work to raise a noble city, which perhaps with a punning reference to its former name they called Julia Cæsarea; and to gather around them a circle representing the best culture of the time. Marble colonnades and porticoes, baths and theatres and temples sprang into being on the fair curve of the bay beneath the wooded hills. Great libraries enshrined the literary labours of the monarch and the learning of the age. The scholars of Greece found a comfortable and inspiring home at the court of the pedantic king, and the existence of a hundred thousand citizens attested the material wealth of the new city. Juba and Selene lived here in peace to old age. The king died in A.D. 19, and was succeeded by his son Ptolemy, who inherited none of his father’s good qualities. A debauched tyrant, he plunged his kingdom into anarchy and was summoned to Rome. He was received with every mark of honour, but was put to death by Caligula, because, as it was said, the splendour of his attire unduly excited the attention of the populace.
Ptolemy’s sister Drusilla was the wife of that Felix, Governor of Judæa, before whom Paul reasoned of righteousness, temperance and judgment to come, so that Felix trembled, and answered, “Go thy way for this time; when I have a convenient season I will call for thee.” Drusilla is described in the Acts of the Apostles as a Jewess, which she was not, by birth at any rate.
It is sad to learn that as late as 1840 much of the Roman city was still to be seen. The theatre, now marked by a mere depression in the ground, was almost perfect. Here we have a genuine grievance against the French conquest; but 1840 was in the dark ages. So Cæsarea has passed; the Vandals, the Arabs, the earthquakes, and the French have all done their worst: and between them they have made an end of it. Perhaps even a systematic excavation would not yield us much of value. The statues to be seen in the museum are for the most part copies of statues already found at Rome, and suggest that there was little originality in the artists employed by Juba and Selene. But nothing can impair the beauty of the site, and not even the presence of a banal Franco-Arab town can forbid us to dream of a white marble city beneath a deep blue sty and facing a purple sea.
So we turn homewards. For a while we follow the Marengo road by which we came; pass the great aqueduct again; but shortly turn to the left to reach Tipasa and the seaside road to Algiers. As we approach the coast traces of the Roman past are everywhere;—on every mound great shaped stones, “the splendid wrecks of former pride,” lie in confusion, and here and there a portico suggests the existence of a suburban villa,
“While oft some temple’s mouldering tops between
With memorable grandeur mark the scene.”
When we reach Tipasa itself the great stones lie in heaps, in most admired disorder. The ruins in their extent seem to indicate the existence of a greater town than the historians admit Tipasa to have been. It is said to have been founded by Claudius as a colony of veterans, and to have contained 20,000 inhabitants. It is rich in memories of the great Arian controversy which played so important a part in the history of North Africa after the triumph of Christianity. In A.D. 484 the Vandal king, Huneric, imposed an Arian bishop on the Catholic inhabitants. A great part fled to Spain; those who remained and refused to accept the heresy had their right arms lopped off and their tongues cut out. It would seem that different branches of Christendom have often been inclined to treat their erring brethren with more severity than they meted out to the unregenerate heathen. Perhaps the heathen has ever been a more likely convert.