There was not probably at Aosta, there certainly was not at Timgad, any provision of open squares, of handsome facades, of temples seen down the vista of stately avenues; there were not even private gardens.

The one large unroofed space in Timgad was the half-acre shut within the Forum cloister.

This economy of room is no doubt due to the fact that the 'colonia' was not only a home for time-expired soldiers, but, as Prof.Cagnat has justly observed, a quasi-fortress watching the slopes of Mount Aures south of it, just as Aosta watched its Alpine valley.

As Machiavelli thought it worth while to observe, the shorter the line of a town's defence, the fewer the men who can hold it.

The town-planning of Timgad was designed on other than purely architectural or municipal principles.