DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61893#0230
202
CLASSICAL TOUR
Ch. N.
between them. On the nearest is a church and
hermitage, plundered by the French, and now
uninhabited and neglected. On the farthest, in
the midst of an olive grove, stand the walls of
an old building, said to be a Roman bath, and
near it is a vault, called the grotto of Catullus.
The extremity of this promontory is covered
with arched ways, towers, and subterranean pas-
sages, supposed by the inhabitants to be Roman,
but apparently of no very distant sera. At all
events, Catullus undoubtedly inhabited this spot,
and preferred it, at a certain period, to every
other region. He has expressed his attachment
to it in some beautiful lines.
Peninsularum Sirmio, insularumque
Ocelle, quascunque in liquentibus stagnis
Marique vasto fert uterque Neptunus:
Quam te libenter, quamque laetus inviso.
Catull. 32.
He could not have chosen a more delightful
retreat. In the centre of a magnificent lake,
surrounded with scenery of the greatest variety
and majesty, secluded from the world, yet be-
holding· from his garden the villas of his Vero-
nese friends, he might have enjoyed alternately
the pleasures of retirement and of society; and
daily, without the sacrifice of his connexions,
CLASSICAL TOUR
Ch. N.
between them. On the nearest is a church and
hermitage, plundered by the French, and now
uninhabited and neglected. On the farthest, in
the midst of an olive grove, stand the walls of
an old building, said to be a Roman bath, and
near it is a vault, called the grotto of Catullus.
The extremity of this promontory is covered
with arched ways, towers, and subterranean pas-
sages, supposed by the inhabitants to be Roman,
but apparently of no very distant sera. At all
events, Catullus undoubtedly inhabited this spot,
and preferred it, at a certain period, to every
other region. He has expressed his attachment
to it in some beautiful lines.
Peninsularum Sirmio, insularumque
Ocelle, quascunque in liquentibus stagnis
Marique vasto fert uterque Neptunus:
Quam te libenter, quamque laetus inviso.
Catull. 32.
He could not have chosen a more delightful
retreat. In the centre of a magnificent lake,
surrounded with scenery of the greatest variety
and majesty, secluded from the world, yet be-
holding· from his garden the villas of his Vero-
nese friends, he might have enjoyed alternately
the pleasures of retirement and of society; and
daily, without the sacrifice of his connexions,