An English,
An American, Town Which Should Have Such A Monu-
Ment, Such A Square, As This, Would Be A Place Of
Great Pretensions; But Like So Many Little _Villes De
Province_ In The Country Of Which I Write, Nimes Is
Easily Ornamental.
What nobler ornament can there
be than the Roman baths at the foot of Mont Cavalier,
and the delightful old garden that surrounds them?
All that quarter of Nimes has every reason to be
proud of itself; it has been revealed to the world at
large by copious photography.
A clear, abundant
stream gushes from the foot of a high hill (covered
with trees and laid out in paths), and is distributed
into basins which sufficiently refer themselves to the
period that gave them birth, - the period that has
left its stamp on that pompous Peyrou which we ad-
mired at Montpellier. Here are the same terraces and
steps and balustrades, and a system of water-works
less impressive, perhaps, but very ingenious and charm-
ing. The whole place is a mixture of old Rome and
of the French eighteenth century; for the remains of
the antique baths are in a measure incorporated in
the modern fountains. In a corner of this umbrageous
precinct stands a small Roman ruin, which is known
as a temple of Diana, but was more apparently a
_nymphaeum_, and appears to have had a graceful con-
nection with the adjacent baths. I learn from Murray
that this little temple, of the period of Augustus,
"was reduced to its present state of ruin in 1577;"
the moment at which the townspeople, threatened
with a siege by the troops of the crown, partly
demolished it, lest it should serve as a cover to the
enemy.
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