He had no temptation to remain in the North, for Cassiodorus was no longer here, having withdrawn a twelvemonth ago to his own country by the Ionian Sea, and there entered the monastery founded by himself; at Ravenna ruled the logothete Alexandros, soon to win a surname from his cleverness in coin-clipping.

So Basil journeyed to Rome, where his kinsfolk met him with news of deaths and miseries.

The city was but raising her head after the long agony of the Gothic siege.

He entered his silent home on the Caelian, and began a life of dispirited idleness.
Vast was the change produced in the Roman's daily existence by the destruction of the aqueducts.

The Thermae being henceforth unsupplied with water, those magnificent resorts of every class of citizen lost their attraction, and soon ceased to be frequented; for all the Roman's exercises and amusements were associated with the practice of luxurious bathing, and without that refreshment the gymnasium, the tennis-court, the lounge, no longer charmed as before.