Page:The history of Rome. Translated with the author's sanction and additions.djvu/25

Rh Mediterranean on the west, and the narrow one on the east; and in the close vicinity of the latter they attain their greatest elevation, which, however, scarce reaches the line of perpetual snow, in the Abruzzi. From the Abruzzi the chain continues in a southerly direction, at first undivided and of considerable height; after a depression which forms a hill-country, it splits into a somewhat flattened succession of heights towards the south-east, and a more rugged chain towards the south, and in both directions terminates in the formation of narrow peninsulas.

The flat country on the north, extending between the Alps and the Apennines as far down as the Abruzzi, does not belong, geographically, nor until a very late period, even historically, to the southern land of mountain and hill, the Italy whose history is here to engage our attention. It was not till the seventh century of the city, that the coast-district from Sinigaglia to Rimini, and not till the eighth, that the basin of the Po became incorporated with Italy. The ancient boundary of Italy on the north was not the Alps, but the Apennines. This mountain-system nowhere rises abruptly into a precipitous chain, but, spreading broadly over the land and enclosing many valleys and tablelands connected by easy passes, presents conditions which well adapt it to become the settlement of man. Still more suitable in this respect are the adjacent slopes and the coast districts on the east, south, and west. On the east coast the plain of Apulia, shut in towards the north by the mountain-block of the Abruzzi, and only broken by the steep isolated ridge of Garganus, stretches in an uniform level with but a scanty development of coast and stream. On the south coast, between the two peninsulas in which the Apennines terminate, extensive lowlands, poorly provided with harbours, but well watered and fertile, adjoin the hill-country of the interior. The west coast presents a far-stretching domain, intersected by considerable streams, in particular by the Tiber, shaped by the action of the waves and of the once numerous volcanoes into manifold variety of hill and valley, harbour and island, and forming, in the regions of Etruria, Latium, and Campania, the very flower of the land of Italy. South of Campania, the land in front of the mountains gradually diminishes, and the Tyrrhenian Sea almost washes their base. Moreover, the island of Sicily adjoins Italy, as the Pelopon-