use, except Sepretorum, which, says Nibby, is a proper

name, or nonsense.

Having found Mandela, knowing that there was a place called "Licenza," in the ninth century, which was the same, doubtless, as Digentia, a river, or rather a village which probably stood on the banks of that stream, it was no great audacity in an antiquary to decide that any remains of an ancient villa in the neighbourhood of Mandela and Digentia must belong to the far-famed Sabine Farm. Accordingly, a tesselated pavement, of which the Professor gives a detailed account, was discovered in a chesnut grove, the property of one Orazio Onorati (a happy coincidence), about half a mile from the sources of the Digentia; and although, as Nibby confesses," manchino documenti diretti per riconoscere questo pavimento come appurtenente alla villa Oraziana " (p. 37), yet considering the site thereof considering also that certain reticulated ruins were discovered close at hand, but were destroyed by "a great barbarian of a surgeon," as Nibby calls him, one Valentino de' Angelis, of Licenza-considering the style of the pavement itself, simple and elegant as it is, just suitable to the Augustan age, there is no reason to think that this pavement might not have belonged to the favourite retreat, and have been trodden by the very feet of the great poet.

That the Sabine Villa was somewhere in this secluded region may be safely admitted; but I am quite at a loss to know on what authority Professor Nibby decides at once that Bandusia was a fountain of the Digentia. The

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editors of Horace do, indeed, call it the Digentian fountain; but, I repeat, there is nothing in the famous Ode, nor in any other of his poems, which makes it certain that Horace meant to immortalize his Sabine rivulet, instead of the real Bandusia of his birthplace.

Unless the Bull of Pope Pasquale be a forgery, there can be no doubt where that fountain was to be found; and I am much pleased to see that Dr. Milman, in spite of the letter in his own beautiful Horace, adheres to the opinion of Chaupy.

CHAPTER XX.

NEMI-THE ALBAN LAKE AND TUNNEL. 1

NEMI, that is, the Arician grove, and the Alban hill, come within the tour commonly made by travellers; and a description, in the usual style, will be found in all the common guide-books. No one should omit to visit the two lakes. The tunnel, or emissary, cut nearly two miles through the mountain, from the Alban lake, is the most extraordinary memorial of Roman perseverance to be found in the world. An English miner would be at a loss to account for such a perforation made without shafts. It has served to carry off the redundant water from the time of the Veian war, 398 years before Christ, to this day, nor has received, nor is in want of, repairs.*

DISCOVERY OF ANCIENT TOMBS IN THE ALBAN HILL.

When the traveller has wandered amongst the ruins of villas and tombs, to all of which great names are

* All that Livy says of this great work, after mentioning that it had been prescribed by a Tuscan soothsayer and the oracle of Apollo, is "Jam ex lacu Albano aqua emissa in agros."-Lib. v. cap. liv. It was completed in a year. It is 3 feet wide, and 6 feet in height.