A Years Journey through France and Part of Spain | Page 3

rather than be overthrown themselves; and they rather promoted the massacre of their fellow-citizens, than a reconciliation and union of parties,"--THUS FELL ROME--Take heed, BRITAIN!

LETTER XXXV.
ARLES.
I left Nismes reluctantly, having formed there an agreeable and friendly intimacy with Mr. _D'Oliere_, a young gentleman of Switzerland; and an edifying, and entertaining acquaintance, with Mons. Seguier. I left too, the best and most sumptuous lodgings I had seen in my whole tour; but a desire to see Arles, Aix, and Marseilles, &c. got the better of all. But I set out too soon after the snow and rains, and I found part of the road so bad, that I wonder how my horse dragged us through so much clay and dirt. When I gave you some account of the antiquities of Nismes, I did not expect to find Arles a town fraught with ten times more matter and amusement for an antiquarian; but I found it not only a fine town now, but that it abounds with an infinite number of monuments which evince its having once been an almost second Rome. There still remains enough of the Amphitheatre to convince the beholder what a noble edifice it was, and to wonder why so little, of so large and solid a building, remains. The town is built on the banks of the Rhone, over which, on a bridge of barges, we entered it; but it is evident, that in former days, the sea came quite up to it, and that it was a haven for ships of burden; but the sea has retired some leagues from it, many ages since; beside an hundred strong marks at this day of its having been a sea-port formerly, the following inscription found a century or two ago, in the church of _St. Gabriel_, will clearly confirm it:
M. FRONTONI EVPOR IIIIIIVIR AVG. COL. JVLIA. AVG. AQVIS SEXTIIS NAVICVLAR. MAR. AREL. CVRAT EJVSD. CORP. PATRONA NAVTAR DRVENTICORVM. ET VTRICVLARIORVM. CORP. ERNAGINENSIUM. JULIA NICE VXOR. CONJVGI KARISSIMO.
Indeed there are many substantial reasons to believe, that it was at this town _Julius C?sar_ built the twelve gallies, which, from the cutting of the wood to the time they were employed on service, was but thirty days.--That it was a very considerable city in the time of the first Emperors, is past all doubt. Constantine the Great held his court, and resided at Arles, with all his family; and the Empress Faustina was delivered of a son here (Constantine the younger) and it was long before so celebrated for an annual fair held in the month of August, that it was called le Noble Marche de Gaules. And Strabo, in his dedication of his book to the Emperor, called it "_Galliarum Emporium non Parvum_;" which is a proof that it was celebrated for its rich commerce, &c. five hundred years before it became under the dominion of the Romans. But were I capable of giving you a particular description of all the monuments of antiquity in and near this town, it would compose a little book, instead of a sheet or two of paper. I shall therefore only pick out a few things which have afforded me the most entertainment, and I hope may give you a little; but I shall begin with mentioning what must first give you concern, in saying that in that part of the town called la Roquette, I was shewn the place where formerly stood an elevated Altar whereon, three young citizens were sacrificed annually, and who were fattened at the public expence during a whole year, for the horrid purpose! On the first of May their throats were cut in the presence of a prodigious multitude of people assembled from all parts; among whom the blood of the victims was thrown, as they imagined all their sins were expiated by that barbarous sacrifice; which horrid practice was put a stop to by the first Bishop of Arles, ST. TROPHIME. The Jews, who had formerly a synagogue in Arles, were driven out in the year 1493, when that and their celebrated School were demolished. There were found about an hundred after, among the stones of those buildings some Hebrew characters neatly cut, which were copied and sent to the Rabbins of Avignon, to be translated, and who explained them then thus:
Chodesh: Elvl. Chamescheth, lamech, nav. Nislamv. Bedikoth. Schradai.
i.e. they say,
"In the month of August five thousand and thirty--the Visitation of God ceased."
Perhaps the plague had visited them.--There was also another Hebrew inscription, which was on the tomb of a famous Rabbin called Solomon, surnamed the grandson of David.
The Amphitheatre of Arles was of an oval form, composed of three stages; each stage containing sixty arches; the whole was built of hewn stone of an immense size, without mortar, and of a prodigious thickness: the circumference