1830.] a Tale of the Ancient Britons. 



<f Oh, fear me not," interrupted Manlius, with a smile, " I am no 

 assassin, believe me ; but having long since heard of your great military 

 abilities, admiration, as well as a desire to ensure my own safe escort to 

 Rome, induces me to make this request." 



The youth spoke apparently with sincere emotion ; and Sergius, 

 influenced by that universal vanity which, when adroitly appealed to, 

 reduces the sage and the fool, the soldier and the statesman, the peer 

 and the peasant, to one common level ; attracted also by an indefinable 

 prepossession in favour of a youth whose whole bearing, though cold 

 and somewhat stately, was yet fearless, unassuming, and spoke him of 

 patrician descent influenced, we repeat, by such feelings, Sergius 

 made no further objection to his request ; and long before the small 

 detachment of troops which was permitted to accompany him had 

 reached the place of embarkation, the stranger had established an inte- 

 rest in his heart, for which the rough, but simple-minded Dacian, could 

 in no wise account. 



Arrived at Dover, Sergius found the gallies which had conveyed his 

 successor and suite to Britain, awaiting to carry him back to Rome. A 

 sigh escaped him as he resigned his credentials of office to the new sub- 

 lieutenant; but when he had entered his galley, and thence watched the 

 receding shores of Britain, which he had once flattered himself would 

 have been the sole boundaries to his conquest, he could scarcely restrain 

 his tears. 



In a short time, after an unusually prosperous voyage, the vessels 

 entered the Tiber. Sergius and his young companion stood at the prow 

 of their galley, gazing with lively interest on scenes to which their 

 protracted absence lent all the splendour of novelty. From the harbour 

 of Ostia to the immediate environs of the imperial city, every succeed- 

 ing mile elicited some new object for their admiration. The summer 

 retreats of the wealthier patricians, with their costly marble terraces, their 

 olive gardens and vineyards stretching in some places for miles along 

 the river's bank, flush of blossoms, musical with bees, and redolent of the 

 choicest perfume, first broke on the view, drenched in the glowing tints of 

 sun-set. To these succeeded the palace of the second Caesar, at the base 

 of whose broad terrace, against which the Tiber broke in whispers, the 

 imperial gallies were moored, glittering with the emblasoned standards 

 of victory, and alive with the martial swell of music. A fresh bend of 

 the river brought in full view the stately Mausoleum of Augustus, the 

 pride of the Campus Martius, surmounted with an effigy of that emperor, 

 and fronted with Egyptian obelisks. Next rose the Fabrician Bridge, 

 where stood that matchless four-faced statue which, fixing its stern gaze 

 on the north, the south, the east, and the west, seemed to imply that all 

 quarters of the globe were alike subject to Roman supremacy. 



Day fell before the gallies reached the Aventine wharfs j but though 

 the mists stealing up from the river were fast closing in the view on all 

 sides, enough light still remained to display its unequalled grandeur. 

 In front rose the Tarpeian rock, with its dread exhibition of power ; to 

 the right in distance, the Sallustian palace, its expansive market-place, 

 its gardens the pride of ancient Rome and its sparkling fountains, 

 with their quaintly tesselated cupolas propped by Cdrinthian columns, 

 spread out in ample space along the brow of the Quirinal Hill ; nearer 

 to the left, the grand Temple of Jupiter Stator towered in serene sub- 



