It matters little by what gate or from what quarter we enter.

On every side the scene is much the same.

The Campagna surrounds the city.

A wide, waste, broken, hillock-covered plain, half common, half pasture land, and altogether desolate; a few stunted trees, a deserted house or two, here and there a crumbling mass of shapeless brickwork: such is the foreground through which you travel for many a weary mile.

As you approach the city there is no change in the desolation, no sign of life.