The Pantheon is generally admitted to be the most noble of the ancient edifices of the city. It was erected by Agrippa 27 B.C., and sumptuously adorned with fine marbles. The dome is vast and nobly planned, and the building truly merits Shelley's designation, "sublime."
Keats was buried in the Protestant cemetery in Rome, in a tomb bearing the inscription: "Here lies one whose name was writ in water." His loyal and admiring friend, Shelley, wrote a truer memorial of the young poet:
"Go thou to Rome--at once the paradise, The grave, the city, and the wilderness; And where its wrecks like shattered mountains rise, And flowering weeds, and fragrant copses dress The bones of desolation's nakedness Pass, till the spirit of the spot shall lead Thy footsteps to a slope of green access, Where, like an infant's smile, over the dead A light of laughing flowers along the grass is spread."
In 1850 Robert Browning and his wife were in Rome, and it was then that Browning wrote the beautiful love poem, "Two in the Campagna," telling of the joy of roaming in:
"The champaign with its endless fleece Of feathery grasses everywhere! Silence and passion, joy and peace An everlasting wash of air----"
Poets and painters have through the centuries drawn inspiration from this wondrous city of splendid monuments and ancient grandeur. How true was Goethe's statement that wherever you turn in Rome there is an object of beauty and arresting interest.
The appeal of the city is strong, the variety bewildering, whether you elect to muse upon the remains of the imperial days, or to study the Renaissance art of the Christian churches. It is well, if possible, to make a survey of the antiquities in chronological order, beginning with an inspection of the ruins of the Romulean wall and the traces of the oldest gates. Then the Forum should be visited in its valley, and the art of the temple of Saturn, the Basilica Julia, and the Arch of Fabius examined. The Temple of Vespasian, the Palace of Caligula, Trajan's Column, and the numerous arches will all arouse memories of the emperors and the splendid purple days.
The Campagna is not only a wilderness, but it is rich in historic memories. Here lived the cultured Cynthia, the friend of Catullus, the poet, and of Quintilius Varus. Numerous villas dotted the Campagna in the days of the emperors, and here, during the summer heats, retired many of the wealthy citizens of Rome. Valuable antiquities, vases, urns, and figures, have been unearthed from this classic soil.