treatise _de Republica_, praised with genuine affection her "nativa
praesidia."[15] He says of Romulus, "that he chose a spot abounding in
springs, healthy though in a pestilent region; for her hills are open
to the breezes, yet give shade to the hollows below them." And Livy,
in the passage already quoted, in language even more perfect than
Cicero's, wrote of all the advantages of the site, ending by
describing it as "regionum Italiae medium, ad incrementum urbis natum
unice locum." It is curious that all these panegyrics were written by
men who were not natives of Rome; Virgil came from Mantua, Livy from
Padua, Cicero from Arpinum. They are doubtless genuine, though in
some degree rhetorical; those of Cicero and Livy can hardly be called
strictly accurate. But taken together they may help us to understand
that fascination of the site of Rome, to which Virgil gave such
inimitable expression.

On this site, which once had been crowded only when the Roman farmers
had taken refuge within the walls with their families, flocks, and
herds on the threatening appearance of an enemy, by the time of Cicero
an enormous population had gathered. Many causes had combined to bring
this population together, which can be only glanced at here. As in
Europe and America at the present day, so in all the Mediterranean
lands since the age of Alexander, there had been a constantly
increasing tendency to flock into the towns; and the rise of huge
cities, such as Antioch, Alexandria, Carthage, Corinth, or Rhodes,
with all the inevitably ensuing social problems and complications, is
one of the most marked characteristics of the last three centuries
B.C. In Italy in particular, apart from the love of a pleasant social
life free from manual toil, with various convenient resorts and
amusements, the long series of wars had served to increase the
population, in spite of the constant loss by the sword or pestilence;