IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 174, 28 July 1876, Page 15

IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

in. The Christian archaeologists of Rome are overjoyed at another discovery recently made in some excavations near the railway station. These excavations are being made by the municipal authorities, for what they call purely scientific reasons, among which ancient Christian art has no part. Anything that speaks of the Church and Christianity is not considered as appertaining to science by the liberali. It is the desire of these Pagans, then, to uncover, if possible, the so-called Mons Justitice — Mountain of Justice. Instead of the mountain, an ancient Christian oratory appears. In the apse of the edifice there is a large fresco, representing the Saviour and the Apostles. The Saviour is seated in the midst of the Apostles, also seated. He wears a striped tunic, and the pallium. The figure is juvenile, and the face beardless. The head is surrounded by the nimbus. Near his feet are two scrolls, symbolical of the volumes of the Old and New Law. In the lower ground there are painted marine scenes, boats, fishermen, and all manner of fishes. This is a well-known and much used allegory in ancient Christian art. The style of the frescoes is of the fourth century. Apropos of the mania for Pagan discoveries to the contempt of Christianity, a word about the Colosseum. It is now two years since the Vandalicßosa began his work of devastation in the arena, by first throwing down the Cross, and the Stations, and afterwards tearing up the whole arena. The water from a neighboring sewer came rushing in to interrupt his work of destruction. Two steam pumps, that worked night and day, were insufficient to keep the water out. At last they abandoned the Colosseum to its fate, and now the lower caverns are flooded with stagnant water, which emit a sickening effluvia, the effects of which are felt all over the neighborhood. The attention of the Board of Public Health being called to the matter, they have covered the water with planks. Still the sickening odor is felt, and, on an usually hot day, going to the Colosseum is extremely dangerous. Romantjs.