survived the burning of the old edifice may be seen behind the high altar of the new.  Between the Curia and the Basilica AEmilia is supposed to have stood the celebrated Temple of Janus, built according to Livy by Numa Pompilius, the closing or opening of which was the signal of peace or war.  It was probably at first one of the ancient gates in a line of fortifications uniting the Capitol with the Palatine; and afterwards comprised, besides a passage-way through which a great part of the traffic of Rome passed, a diminutive bronze temple containing a bronze statue of the venerable deity of the Sabines, whose one face looked to the east, and the other to the west.  The bronze gates of the temple were closed by Augustus for the third time after the battle of Actium, and finally shut when Christianity became the religion of the empire.  Procopius saw the temple still standing in the sixth century; and he tells us that, during the siege of the city by the Goths, when it was defended by Belisarius, some of the adherents of the old pagan superstition made a secret attempt to open the shrine and set the god at liberty.

One gazes at the wall of earth and rubbish, fifteen feet deep, marking the present limit of the excavations in this direction, with a profound longing that the obstruction could be removed at once, and the rich antiquarian treasures lying hid underneath brought to light.  Few things in Rome appealed more powerfully to my curiosity than this huge bank of debris, behind and beneath which imagination was free to picture all kinds of possibilities.  On the part that has been uncovered, we see a row of brick bases on which had stood monuments of gilt bronze to some of the distinguished men of Rome; the remains of a line of shops of the third century demolished during the excavations; the pedestal of what is said by some to have been Domitian’s and by others Constantine’s gigantic equestrian statue; and farther down, rude heaps of masonry, belonging to the substructures of the Rostra and Temple of Julius Caesar.  Part of the curved wall of the Rostra may still be seen built of large blocks of travertine; and in front is a fixed platform, where a large number of people could stand and listen to the speaker.  This Rostra is specially interesting because it was constructed in the year of Caesar’s death, and was intended to mark the design of the great triumvir to destroy the memory of the old oligarchy by separating the rostra or “hustings” from their former connection with the senate and comitia, and make them entirely popular institutions.  The front of it was afterwards adorned by Augustus with the beaks of ships taken at Actium.  The small Herooen or Temple of Caesar behind the Rostra was erected on the spot where the body of Caesar was burned before the house which he had so long inhabited, and in a part of the Forum especially associated with his greatest political triumphs.  It superseded an altar and lofty column of Numidian marble, at which the people had previously offered sacrifices to the memory of their idol, the first mortal in Rome raised to the rank of the gods; an honour justified, they imagined, not only by his great deeds, but also by his alleged descent from Venus Anadyomene.