rst in which the strange misconception, received with
unquestioning faith by earlier writers, that the catacombs were
exhausted sand-pits adapted by the Christians to the purpose of
interment, was dispelled, and the true history of their formation
demonstrated. Marchi's line of investigation was followed by the
Commendatore De Rossi, and his brother Michele, the former of whom was
Marchi's fellow-labourer during the latter part of his explorations; and
it is to them that we owe the most exhaustive scientific examination of
the whole subject. The Catacombs of Rome are the most extensive with
which we are acquainted, and, as might be expected in the centre of the
Christian world, are in many respects the most remarkable. No others
have been so thoroughly examined and illustrated. These may, therefore,
be most appropriately selected for description as typical examples.

Catacombs of Rome.

Our description of the Roman Catacombs cannot be more appropriately
introduced than by St Jerome's account of his visits to them in his
youth, already referred to, which, after the lapse of above fifteen
centuries, presents a most accurate picture of these wonderful
subterranean labyrinths. "When I was a boy," he writes, "receiving my
education in Rome, I and my schoolfellows used, on Sundays, to make the
circuit of the sepulchres of the apostles and martyrs. Many a time did
we go down into the catacombs. These are excavated deep in the earth,
and contain, on either hand as you enter, the bodies of the dead buried
in the wall. It is all so dark there that the language of the prophet
(Ps. lv. 15) seems to be fulfilled, 'Let them go down quick into hell.'
Only occasionally is light let in to mitigate the horror of the gloom,
and then not so much through a window as through a hole. You take each
step with caution, as, surrounded by deep night, you recall the words of
Virgil--

"Horror ubique animos, simul ipsa silentia terrent."[2]

[Illustration FIG. 1.--Plan of part of the Cemetery of Sant' Agnese.
(From Martigny.)

A. Entrance from the Basilica of St Agnes.
1, 2. Ancient staircases leading to the first storey.
3. Corridors from the staircases.
4. Two ruined staircases leading to the lower storey.
5. Steps of the rock.
6. Air-shafts, or luminaria.
7. Ruined vault.
8. Blind ways.
9. Passages built up or ruined.
10. Passages obstructed by landslips.
11. Unfinished