Eustace, John Cretwode: A classical tour through Italy An. MDCCCII (Vol. 3): 3. ed., rev. and enl (London: J. Mawman, 1815)

Ch. VI.

THROUGH ITALY.

233

home, or as ambassadors, represented their royal
relatives abroad. They either generally resided
or frequently assembled at Rome, not only to dis-
charge their duties about the person of the Pon-
tiff, but to support the interests of their respective
courts; and in order to attain this object the
more effectually, they displayed a splendor and a
magnificence nearly royal. The officers of their
household were often nobles of high rank ; their
secretaries and chaplains were men of talents, and
business ; a long train of guards, servants, and
retainers attended their persons when they ap-
peared in public, and the blaze of the purple in
itself so dazzling, was heightened by all the ad-
ventitious circumstances of birth, power, and opu-
lence. The union of so many illustrious person-
ages, vying with each other in talents and mag-
nificence, gave Rome the appearance of an uni-
versal court, where all the sovereigns of Europe
were assembled to discuss the general interests of
Christendom, and to display their rival glories in
peace and security. Such indeed was its state
under the Pontiffs of the Borghese, Barberini and
Panfili families, as it had been before under
those of the Medicean and Farnesian houses ; nor
is it wonderful if at such periods of glory it should
have recalled to the memory of the spectators
the republican era, when Pompey and Csesar,
Crassus and Lucullus were seen to parade the