f
the principal reasons that determined Diocletian in the choice of his
retirement. Fortis, p. 45. The same author (p. 38) observes, that a
taste for agriculture is reviving at Spalatro; and that an experimental
farm has lately been established near the city, by a society of
gentlemen.]

Though Constantine, from a very obvious prejudice, affects to
mention the palace of Diocletian with contempt, [118] yet one of their
successors, who could only see it in a neglected and mutilated state,
celebrates its magnificence in terms of the highest admiration. [119] It
covered an extent of ground consisting of between nine and ten English
acres. The form was quadrangular, flanked with sixteen towers. Two of
the sides were near six hundred, and the other two near seven hundred
feet in length. The whole was constructed of a beautiful freestone,
extracted from the neighboring quarries of Trau, or Tragutium, and very
little inferior to marble itself. Four streets, intersecting each other
at right angles, divided the several parts of this great edifice,
and the approach to the principal apartment was from a very stately
entrance, which is still denominated the Golden Gate. The approach was
terminated by a peristylium of granite columns, on one side of which
we discover the square temple of Aesculapius, on the other the octagon
temple of Jupiter. The latter of those deities Diocletian revered as the
patron of his fortunes, the former as the protector of his health.
By comparing the present remains with the precepts of Vitruvius, the
several parts of the building, the baths, bed-chamber, the atrium, the
basilica, and the Cyzicene, Corinthian, and Egyptian halls have been
described with some degree of precision, or at least of probability.
Their forms were various, their proportions just; but they all were
attended with two imperfections, very repugnant to our modern notions
of taste and conveniency. These stately rooms had neither windows nor
chimneys. They were lighted from the top, (for the building seems to
have consisted of no more than one story,) and they received their heat
by the help of pipes that were conveyed along the walls. The range of
principal apartments was protected towards the south-west by a portico
five hundred and seventeen feet long, which must have formed a very
noble and delightful walk, when the beauties of painting and sculpture
were added to those of the prospect.

[Footnote 118: Constantin. Orat. ad Coetum