lding, is undoubtedly very noble,
though, in my opinion, it corresponds but ill with the simplicity of
the edifice. With all my veneration for the antients, I cannot see in
what the beauty of the rotunda consists. It is no more than a plain
unpierced cylinder, or circular wall, with two fillets and a cornice,
having a vaulted roof or cupola, open in the centre. I mean the
original building, without considering the vestibule of Agrippa. Within
side it has much the air of a mausoleum. It was this appearance which,
in all probability, suggested the thought to Boniface IV. to transport
hither eight and twenty cart-loads of old rotten bones, dug from
different burying-places, and then dedicate it as a church to the
blessed Virgin and all the holy martyrs. I am not one of those who
think it is well lighted by the hole at the top, which is about nine
and twenty feet in diameter, although the author of the Grand Tour
calls it but nine. The same author says, there is a descent of eleven
steps to go into it; that it is a hundred and forty-four feet in
heighth, and as many in breadth; that it was covered with copper,
which, with the brass nails of the portico, pope Urban VIII. took away,
and converted into the four wreathed pillars that support the canopy of
the high altar in the church of St. Peter, &c. The truth is, before the
time of pope Alexander VII. the earth was so raised as to cover part of
the temple, and there was a descent of some steps into the porch: but
that pontiff ordered the ground to be pared away to the very pedestal
or base of the portico, which is now even with the street, so that
there is no descent whatsoever. The height is two hundred palmi, and
the breadth two hundred and eighteen; which, reckoning fife palmi at
nine inches, will bring the height to one hundred and fifty, and the
breadth to one hundred and sixty-three feet six inches. It was not any
covering of copper which pope Urban VIII. removed, but large brass
beams, which supported the roof of the portico. They weighed 186,392
pounds; and afforded metal enough not only for the pillars in St.
Peter's church, but also for several pieces of artillery that are now
in the castle of St. Angelo. What is more extraordinary, the gilding of
those columns is said to have cost forty thousand golden crowns: sure
money was never worse laid out. Urban VIII. likewise added two bellfrey
towers to the rotunda; and I wonder he did not cover the central hole
with glass,