Epidaurus, in accordance with the advice of the Sibylline books,
to seek aid from AEsculapius. They returned with a statue of the god, but
as their boat passed up the Tiber a serpent which had lain concealed
during the voyage glided from the boat, and landing on the bank was
welcomed by the people in the belief that the god himself had come to
their aid. The Temple of AEsculapius, which was built after this plague
in 291 B.C., was situated on the island of the Tiber. Tradition states
that, when the Tarquins were expelled, their crops were thrown into the
river, and soil accumulated thereon until ultimately the island was
formed. In consequence of the strange happening of the serpent landing
from the ship the end of the island on which the Temple of AEsculapius
stood was shaped into the form of the bow of a ship, and the serpent of
AEsculapius was sculptured upon it in relief.

The island is not far from the AEmilian Bridge, of which one broken arch
remains.

Ovid represents this divinity as speaking thus:--

"I come to leave my shrine;
This serpent view, that with ambitious play
My staff encircles, mark him every way;
His form--though larger, nobler, I'll assume,
And, changed as gods should be, bring aid to Rome."

(Ovid, "Metamorphoses," xv.)

He is said to have resumed his natural form on the island of the Tiber.

"And now no more the drooping city mourns;
Joy is again restored and health returns."

It was the custom for patients to sleep under the portico of the Temple
of AEsculapius, hoping that the god of the healing art might inspire them
in dreams as to the system of cure they should adopt for their
illnesses. Sick slaves were left there by their masters, but the number
increased to such an extent that the Emperor Claudius put a stop to the
cruel practice. The Church of St. Bartholomew now stands on the ruins of
the Temple of AEsculapius.

Even in very early times, however, Rome was not without medical
practitioners, though not so well supplied as some other nations. The
Lex AEmilia, passed 433 B.C., ordained punishment for the doctor who
neglected a sick slave. In Plutarch's "Life of Cato" (the Censor, who
was born in 234 B.C.), we read of a Roman ambassador who was sent to the
King of Bithynia, in Asia Minor, and who had his skull trepanned.

The first regular doctor in Rome was Archagathus, who began practice in
the city 219 B.C., when the authorities received him favoura