The next morning we pulled ashore to the ruins. The amphitheatre was close upon the sea, and to my surprise and pleasure, there was no cicerone. A contemplative donkey was grazing under the walls, but there was no other living creature near. We looked at its vast circular wall with astonishment. The Coliseum at Rome, a larger building of the same description, is, from the outside, much less imposing. The whole exterior wall, a circular pile one hundred feet high in front, and of immense blocks of marble and granite, is as perfect as when the Roman workman hewed the last stone. The interior has been nearly all removed. The well-hewn blocks of the many rows of seats were too tempting, like those of Rome, to the barbarians who were building near. The circle of the arena, in which the gladiators and wild beasts of these then new-conquered provinces fought, is still marked by the foundation of its barrier. It measures two hundred and twenty-three feet. Beneath it is a broad and deep canal, running toward the sea, filled with marble columns, still erect upon their pedestals, used probably for the introduction of water for the naumachia. The whole circumference of the amphitheatre is twelve hundred and fifty-six feet, and the thickness of the exterior wall seven feet six inches. Its shape is oblong, the length being four hundred and thirty-six feet, and the breadth three hundred and fifty. The measurements were taken by the captain’s orders, and are doubtless critically correct.
We loitered about the ruins several hours, finding in every direction the remains of the dilapidated interior. The sculpture upon the fallen capitals and fragments of frieze was in the highest style of ornament. The arena is overgrown with rank grass, and the crevices in the walls are filled with flowers. A vineyard, with its large blue grape just within a week of ripeness, encircles the rear of the amphitheatre. The boat’s crew were soon among them, much better amused than they could have been by all the antiquities in Istria.
We walked from the amphitheatre to the town; a miserable village built around two antique temples, one of which still stands alone, with its fine Corinthian columns, looking just ready to crumble. The other is incorporated barbarously with the guard-house of the place, and is a curious mixture of beautiful sculpture and dirty walls. The pediment, which is still perfect, in the rear of the building, is a piece of carving, worthy of the choicest cabinet of Europe. The thieveries from the amphitheatre are easily detected. There is scarcely a beggar’s house in the village, that does not show a bit or two of sculptural marble upon its front.
At the end of the village stands a triumphal arch, recording the conquests of a Roman consul. Its front, toward the town, is of Parian marble, beautifully chiselled. One recognises the solid magnificence of that glorious nation, when he looks on these relics of their distant conquests, almost perfect after eighteen hundred years. It seems as if the foot-print of a Roman were eternal.
We stood out of the little bay, and with a fresh wind, ran down the coast of Dalmatia, and then crossing to the Italian side, kept down the ancient shore of Apulia and Calabria to the mouth of the Adriatic. I have been looking at the land with the glass, as we ran smoothly along, counting castle after castle built boldly on the sea, and behind them, on the green hills, the thickly built villages with their smoking chimneys and tall spires, pictures of fertility and peace. It was upon these shores that the Barbary corsairs descended so often during the last century, carrying off for eastern harems, the lovely women of Italy. We are just off Otranto, and a noble old castle stands frowning from the extremity of the Cape. We could throw a shot into its embrasures as we pass. It might be the “Castle of Otranto,” for the romantic looks it has from the sea.
We have out-sailed the “Constellation,” or we should part from her here. Her destination is France: and we should be to-morrow amid the [[6]]Isles of Greece. The pleasure of realising the classic dreams of one’s boyhood, is not to be expressed in a line. I look forward to the succeeding month or two as to the “red-letter” chapter of my life. Whatever I may find the reality, my heart has glowed warmly and delightfully with the anticipation. Commodore Patterson is, fortunately for me, a scholar, and a judicious lover of the arts, and loses no opportunity, consistently with his duty, to give his officers the means of examining the curious and the beautiful in these interesting seas. The cruise, thus far, has been one of continually mingled pleasure and instruction, and the best of it, by every association of our early days, is to come.
| [6] | It was to this point (the ancient Hydrantum) that Pyrrhus proposed to build a bridge from Greece—only sixty miles! He deserved to ride on an elephant. |