On a part of these downs overgrown with briars was situated the Roman Municipium, a colony founded after the subjugation of Veii.  It did not cover more than a third of the area of the ancient city.  Several excavations were made here, which resulted in the discovery, among other interesting relics of the imperial period, of the colossal heads of Augustus and Tiberius and the mutilated statue of Germanicus now in the Vatican Gallery.  On this spot were also found the twelve Ionic columns of white marble which now form the portico of the post-office in the Piazza Colonna at Rome, and also a few of the pillars which adorn the magnificent Basilica of St. Paul’s on the Ostian Road.  No one looking at these grand columns, so stainless in hue and so perfect in form, would have supposed that they had formed part of the Roman Forum of Veii more than two thousand years ago.  Those in front of the post-office look newer than the rest of the building, which is not more than sixty years old.  They owed their perfect preservation doubtless to the fact that they were buried deep under the dry volcanic soil for most of the intervening period.  It seems strange to think of these ancient columns, that looked down upon the legal transactions of Roman Veii, now standing in one of the busiest squares of modern Rome, associated with one of the most characteristic and important of our modern institutions, of which ancient Rome had not even the germ.

Passing through a beautiful copse wood, where cyclamens grew in lavish profusion, forming little rosy clusters about the oak-stools and diffusing a faint spicy smell through the warm air, we came out at one of the gates of the city into open ground.  This gate is simply a gap in a shapeless mound, with traces of an ancient roadway passing through it and fragments of walls on either side.  Where the stones can be seen projecting through the turf embankment they are smaller than usual in Etruscan cities.  Sir William Gell found hereabouts a portion of the wall composed of enormous blocks of tufa—­three or four yards long and more than five feet in height—­based upon three courses of thin bricks three feet in length, that rested upon the naked rock.  Such a mode of wall construction has no resemblance to anything remaining in Rome or in any Etruscan city.  It indicates a still higher antiquity; while the brick foundations remind us of the fame which the Etruscans and particularly the people of Veii had acquired on account of their skill in works of terra cotta.  The famous Quadriga or brick chariot which adorned the pediment of the great temple of Jupiter on the Capitol at Rome was made at Veii, and was a remarkable proof of the superiority of its people in this species of art.  Indeed the name of Veii is supposed to have been derived from its skill in the manufacture of terra cotta chariots.  The old gateway through which we passed out of the wood was probably the principal entrance into the city, and the one over which Tolumnius King of Veii appeared, standing on the wall, during the famous siege when he was challenged to mortal combat by Cornelius Cossus, as graphically described by Livy.