new
Jerusalem. [62] During a residence of six months, the fame, the person,
and the courteous demeanor of the Gothic king, excited the admiration of
the Romans, and he contemplated, with equal curiosity and surprise, the
monuments that remained of their ancient greatness. He imprinted the
footsteps of a conqueror on the Capitoline hill, and frankly confessed
that each day he viewed with fresh wonder the forum of Trajan and his
lofty column. The theatre of Pompey appeared, even in its decay, as a
huge mountain artificially hollowed, and polished, and adorned by human
industry; and he vaguely computed, that a river of gold must have been
drained to erect the colossal amphitheatre of Titus. [63] From the
mouths of fourteen aqueducts, a pure and copious stream was diffused
into every part of the city; among these the Claudian water, which
arose at the distance of thirty-eight miles in the Sabine mountains, was
conveyed along a gentle though constant declivity of solid arches, till
it descended on the summit of the Aventine hill. The long and spacious
vaults which had been constructed for the purpose of common sewers,
subsisted, after twelve centuries, in their pristine strength; and these
subterraneous channels have been preferred to all the visible wonders
of Rome. [64] The Gothic kings, so injuriously accused of the ruin of
antiquity, were anxious to preserve the monuments of the nation whom
they had subdued. [65] The royal edicts were framed to prevent the
abuses, the neglect, or the depredations of the citizens themselves;
and a professed architect, the annual sum of two hundred pounds of gold,
twenty-five thousand tiles, and the receipt of customs from the Lucrine
port, were assigned for the ordinary repairs of the walls and public
edifices. A similar care was extended to the statues of metal or marble
of men or animals. The spirit of the horses, which have given a modern
name to the Quirinal, was applauded by the Barbarians; [66] the brazen
elephants of the Via sacra were diligently restored; [67] the famous
heifer of Myron deceived the cattle, as they were driven through the
forum of peace; [68] and an officer was created to protect those works
of rat, which Theodoric considered as the noblest ornament of his
kingdom.

[Footnote 58: See his regard for the senate in Cochlaeus, (Vit. Theod.
viii. p. 72--80.)]

[Footnote 59: No more than 120,000 modii, or four thousand quarters,
(Anonym. Valesian. p. 721, and Var. i.