showed Mr. Townley's opinion of its excellence. He used jocosely to call it his wife."-Townley Marbles. The Phigaleian saloon, adjoining the central saloon, obtains its name from the principal sculptures which it contains. These consist of a series of bas-reliefs, which once ran round the upper part of the temple of Apollo at Phigaleia; and they are extraordinary works of art, for their vigour and skill. Some of them relate to the battle between the Greeks and the Amazons, and the rest to the battle between the Centaurs and the Lapitha-both favourite mythological subjects among the Greeks. Let the visitor pause before these works; let him consider that all the figures are wrought out of the same piece of marble which forms the back or ground-work of each slab; and then let him consider how admirable must have been the skill which could give such life, such action, such intensity of expression, to the figures of the combatants! The two porticos at the sides of the saloon are filled with figures-not the original marble, but casts in plaster from the great temple of Jupiter Panhellenius at Ægina: figures which would command much attention, were not the Elgin marbles just at hand. The other bas-reliefs of this room, obtained from Selinus, Halicarnassus, and elsewhere, must also be looked at; and before the visitor passes into the Elgin Room, let him examine Mr. Lucas's two models of the Parthenon. This far-famed structure, the Temple of Minerva at Athens, is modelled by Mr. Lucas at two different periods of its history: the first when it was radiant in all its glory; and the second after it had been shattered by a siege in the seventeenth century. Mark the finished model: look well at the groups of figures in the pediments of each portico; at the metopes, or square alti-rilievi above the columns; at the Panathenaic procession, represented in bas-relief, round the upper part of the building within the columns-look at these, and then, with the subject fresh in your mind, go into the 'Elgin Room.' Why, it may be asked, is this called the Elgin Room? and what does it contain? It contains precious fragments of sculpture from the Parthenon; and it is called the Elgin Room because Lord Elgin was the means of bringing them over to this country. That nobleman was ambassador at Turkey in 1799; and seeing that the mutilated but still beautiful sculptures of the Parthenon were going to wreck more and more every year, he commenced an energetic system of operation, which, carried on indefatigably for twelve or fifteen years, at a vast expenditure of time and money, resulted in the transfer to the British Museum of the sculptures now contained in the Elgin Room, nearly the whole of which came from the Parthenon. A few over-scrupulous persons have objected to this removal of the Parthenon sculptures from Athens, as a sort of sacrilege; but if such a feeling had been allowed to prevail, few of the sculptures would have remained to be lamented over. Many of the statues, on one of the pediments, which had been thrown down by an explosion during the siege of Athens, had been actually pounded for mortar, because they furnished the whitest stone within reach! The Turks themselves frequently found amusement in climbing up the ruined wall, and defacing such of the sculptures as they could reach, or in making a target of the heads of statues, as seen from beneath! If ever there was a subject in which all competent judges agree, it is in admiration of these sculptures. Canova, Thorwaldsen, Flaxman, Chantrey, Westmacott, Lawrence, Payne Knight-all who have written about them, or talked of them-place them in the highest grade of the art. Every fragment is precious. A part of a head, a foot, a piece of an arm, a trunk without head or arms or legs-all are cherished as objects which, once destroyed, could never be replaced. The Theseus, the reclining male figure which faces you as you enter the room, has been valued at four thousand guineas; but in truth, it is impossible to name the real intrinsic value of such works; because the better they are known the more they are estimated; and if these works were now offered for sale, half-adozen crowned heads would at once compete for them; and it is idle to attempt to guess the sum that would be offered for them. Those magnificent draped female figures, placed on the pedestal facing the entrance, headless though they be, are full of life, and grace, and dignity: almost inconceivable, when we consider that they are wrought out of the mere cold marble. And so of the rest of the collection: every fragment has a story to tell, so much does expression reign among them all. By carefully comparing these sculptures with Mr. Lucas's models, the visitor will observe that the large figures on the two pedestals came from the pediments at the two ends of the temple; that the square altirilievi, about sixteen in number, placed in compartments high up against the wall, are a part of the ninety-two metopes which once adorned the entablature of the temple; and that the bassi-rilievi, placed at a lower level round the walls, are portions of the frieze visible within the columns. When perfect, the sculptures of one pediment related to the Birth of Minerva; and those of the other to the Contest between Minerva and Neptune for the government of Athens—both favourite mythological subjects among the Greeks twenty-three centuries ago, when those sculptures were wrought. The subjects of the metope sculptures were many; but those possessed by the Museum relate to the Contest between the Centaurs and the Lapitha-the Centaur being an imaginary animal, half-man, half-brute. The frieze, in bas-relief, relates to the Panathenaic Procession, which once in four years paraded through Athens, on the occasion of a religious festival. Whether the complete forms of the pediment figures, ("in the round," as sculptors call it), the exceedingly bold relief of the metope figures, or the flat relief of the frieze figures, be examined, the visitor will have nearly equal reason to be astonished at the results produced; and will, if he repeats his visit frequently, gradually educate himself to something like an appre ciation of these marvellous works. said that these sculptures were "as perfect representations of Nature as it is possible to put into the compass of the marble in which they are executed: and nature, too, in its most beautiful form ;"-when Chantrey spoke enthusiastically of "the exquisite judgment with which the artists of these sculptures had modified the style of working the marble, according to the kind and degree of light which would fall on them when in their places;"-when Lawrence said that, "after looking at the finest sculptures in Italy, he found the Elgin marbles superior to any of them;" —when Canova said, in reply to an application made to him respecting their repair or restoration, that "it would be sacrilege in him, or any man, to presume to touch them with a chisel❞—it must be evident that there is in these sculptures a mine of artistic wealth, which, though few may thoroughly appreciate, many (shall we say all?) may partially enjoy and share. When Flaxman | surface, cut into the substance of the stone; one in The Egyptian Gallery,' which next meets the view of the visitor to the Sculptures, (Cut, No. 5,) appeals to a different order of thought. Here magnitude takes the place of expression. And yet there is expression, too; for the vast heads of the Egyptian gods, or heroes, have in some instances a placid sweetness of features. The wondrous expenditure of time and patience in the production of these Egyptian sculptures strikes the mind more than the artistic beauties. Is it not astonishing that the black basalt and the dark granite should be wrought to such perfect smoothness as is exhibited in some of these specimens! The colossal head found by Mr. Salt at Carnak, wrought in red granite; the head and bust of Rameses; the dark granite statue of Amenoph; the black granite figure of Bubastis; the head and the colossal arm sculptured in hard syennite; the enormous dark granite Scarabæus, or sacred beetle-what labour must have been bestowed upon these, to bring them to their highly-wrought appearance! And then, again, the sarcophagi and mummy-tombs: the polished sarcophagus, made of arragonite, shaped like a mummy-case; the red granite sarcophagus; the black granite sarcophagus, brought from Cairo; and the others of green basalt, of black basalt, and of various hard kinds of stone, all covered with hieroglyphics cut into the substance of the material. How little must men's time have been valued, when such works were produced; and how little did the Egyptians allow physical difficulties to baffle them! There are two colossal statues at Western Thebes, each of which contains ten thousand cubic feet of stone, all in one piece; and the stone is of a kind not known within several days' journey of the place where they are deposited. Another of the Theban statues, weighing nearly nine hundred tons, was brought a distance of a hundred and forty miles! The Rosetta Stone,' in this saloon, ought not to be passed unnoticed. It is a thick black slab, somewhat broken at its edges, but level and smooth on its upper surface. There are three inscriptions on this One of the curious class of objects in this saloon is that of the fresco paintings, hung up against the wall, and protected by plate glass. Let the visitor recollect that these are the real Egyptian frescoes, which were painted perhaps three thousand years ago, and then he may well marvel at the freshness of the colours which they exhibit. The subjects, too, are highly curious. The musical parties, the ladies smelling at nosegays, the toilet, the slaves bringing in refreshments; the national differences in some instances observable between the ladies and the slaves; the luxuriant ornaments of the hair, the rich dresses of the ladies, and the almost undraped figures of the slaves, the chairs and couches-all illustrate most instructively the domestic manners of the Egyptians. We cannot perhaps, while looking at them, refrain from a smile at the formal outlines, the stiff attitudes, the odd way of representing the eye in profile, the entire absence of all attempts at perspective; but such pictures derive their value, not so much as works of art, as from the insight they give into a state of things long gone by; they are historical monuments, in the fullest sense of the term. We would suggest to the visitor not to extend his ramble into the Etruscan Room,' or the 'Mummy Room,' or the 'Bronze Room,' in this visit. It is true that the contents of those rooms belong in many instances to the Fine Arts; but the Greek, Roman, and Egyptian sculptures are quite enough for one time. Do not spoil your intellectual treat by overloading. A passing glance may perhaps be taken at the pictures, hung over the wall cases in the 'Eastern Zoological Gallery.' These pictures were mostly presented to the Museum during the last century, by various persons. They consist of portraits-all, with a very few exceptions of Englishmen. Most of the monarchs, from Henry | specimens of much interest. One is a Chinese bell, V. to George II.; many of our great philosophers about five feet in height, which was cast about seven and men of science-Sloane, Ward, Bacon, Newton, years ago, and was captured by the British troops from Ray, Wallis; many of our great writers, and poets- a temple at Ningpo, in 1844. The figures of Buddha, Usher, Burnet, Spelman, Dugdale, Prior, Camden, on the upper part; the Buddhist inscriptions beneath; Speed, Cranmer, Shakespere, Buchanan, Locke, the handle formed of a crouching dragon-all are Algernon Sidney, Pope, Baxter. It is something to worthy of close inspection, as a very creditable spebe able to look at the faces of such men. The cimen of Chinese manufacture in metal. The other pictures are in few cases eminent as works of art; article on the floor-stands is a model of a gaudy movbut as portraits they are a memento of great men dead able temple, such as would excite the reverence of the and gone-dead in the flesh, but living in the minds inhabitants of the Carnatic, in the southern part of of later generations. India. THE FOURTH VISIT.-ANTIQUARIAN COLLECTION. tures. The Elgin marbles are antiquities, and so are the Æginetan, and the Phigaleian, and the Selinuntine, and the Halicarnassian, and the Xanthian; and so, in a still more eminent degree, are the vast Egyptian sculpWhy, then, do we talk here of the Antiquarian Collection' distinct from these? Simply as a matter of convenience. Those sculptures, we have found, and every intelligent visitor will find, quite enough for one visit; and there remain many rooms filled with objects of high interest, some belonging to the Fine Arts, but all deserving the name of antiquarian curiosities. Let us, then, devote another day or another visit to their examination. At the head of the grand staircase, on the right hand as you enter, is a long gallery, called the Ethnographical Room.' Now it would not be amiss if the superintendents of the Museum would condescend a little to the wants of their visitors, in respect to such a 'hard word' as this. The word is a rare puzzle to many an unlearned person. The Chinese bell, and the bows and arrows, and the skin dresses, and the grotesque figures-how do they become 'ethnographical,' and what does it mean? It might be worth while to adopt some secondary inscription, to denote that ethnos is the Greek name for nation or tribe, and that national manners and customs, arts and implements, are illustrated by the specimens deposited in this room. The room is divided into nations, and in that sense it becomes ethnographical. The nations whose productions are here exhibited to us, have certainly displayed very curious and varied ingenuity. Look at the Chinese department, with its little figures of beggars, mandarins, gods and goddesses; its trinkets in ivory and hard wood. Look in succession at the Burmese, the Hindoo, and the Japanese departments. There is the gilt image of Guadma, the Burmese idol, in all its hideous glitter; the Hindoo deities, in wood and bronze; the Hindoo measures, and vessels, and arms; the Chinese and Japanese matchlocks, bows, arrows, shoes, mirrors, screens, musical instruments, inlaid boxes; the collection of half-clothed little figures, six or eight inches in height -all, if not beautiful, are at least curious specimens of the things which meet with admiration in the East. The stands in the middle of the room, too, contain two Pass on from thence to the compartments containing the African, the North American, the Peruvian, the Guianian, the Chilian, and the Mexican antiquities; and see the numerous illustrations there afforded of the religion, the arts, and the industrial occupations of those nations. How creditable to the weavers of Central Africa is that richly-decorated piece of cloth, woven in narrow strips; and the Foulah cloak, from Sierra Leone; and the striped specimens from Ashantee! Then the Ashantee loom, by which such fabrics are wrought, is worth looking at. As for the other Ashantee curiosities-the umbrellas, the padlocks, the tobacco-pipes, the fly-flappers, the sandals, the musical instruments-they meet the eye by scores. The stone and terracotta figures of the Mexican collection, mostly purchased from Mr. Bullock's museum, carry the thoughts back to a period in the history of America long anterior to the time of Columbus; and so likewise do the Aztec vases, idols, and ornaments; the Peruvian mummies, silver ornaments, vessels, silver images; and Chilian antiquities of a similar kind. Nations once flourished where now forests abound; and large portions of the human family have passed away in America, with hardly any relics left behind to say who or what they were. How strange must have been the sight which met the eye of Mr. Stephens, when, roaming through the unexplored regions of Yucatan, he came to a temple in the midst of an Indian forest! "We saw," he says, "at some distance before us, a great tree-covered mound, which astonished us by its vast dimensions; and, but for our Indian assistants, would have frightened us by the size of the trees growing upon it. The wood commenced from the road-side. Our guides cut a path, and, clearing away the branches over-head, we followed on horseback, dismounting at the foot of the Casa Grande. It was by this name that the Indians called the immense mound of white stone buildings which, buried in the depths of a great forest, added new desolation to the waste by which they were surrounded." Nearly fifty ruined cities and towns were discovered and visited in this way, all of which are supposed to have seen their days of prosperity long before Columbus appeared; and our Museum collection affords us a few links to connect the thoughts with those times. Thus may the visitor go round the Ethnographical Room, cultivating acquaintance with each nation in succession. The Esquimaux of North America, the Friendly and Sandwich Islanders, the Australians, wrappers; while others have had many layers of and our own British ancestors-all are presented to our view. The fur dresses, the whalebone nets, and the fishing implements of the Esquimaux; the winter and summer dresses, the ornaments and implements and vessels of the Tahitians; the New Zealand weapons and cordage and carvings; the tortoiseshell bonnet, from one of the Polynesian islands—all have their points of interest to those who regard them as a sort of book, in which to read the social history of distant and rude nations. The models of the ancient Druidical cromlechs, in the centre of the room, and some of the metal and earthenware specimens in the northern wall-cases, belong to the early curiosities of our own country. A long range of rooms and galleries separates the 'Ethnographical Room' from the others devoted to antiquities. The visitor should go straight ahead, looking neither to the right nor the left, along the southern and eastern and northern galleries; forgetting the brilliant birds, and the gorgeous shells, and the glittering minerals; and remembering that he is on a tour in search of the antique and the curious-the works of Art, and not those of Nature. In the western wing of the building are three rooms-the Egyptian Room,' the 'Bronze Room,' and the Etruscan Room;' opening one into another, and containing an immense assemblage of curious productions. Who that has entered the Egyptian Room' can fail to be struck with the strange appearance of the mummies and mummy-cases? Who can resist the impulse to carry the thoughts back to the time reckoned by an interval of thousands instead of hundreds of years-when Kebhsnauf and Sioumautf, Menka-re and Oukhsnope, Iriouirooui and Khousmos, and the other heroes and heroines, whose unpronounceable names are recorded-were among the walking and talking inhabitants of Egypt! Great, indeed, must have been the pains taken to prepare the dead bodies so as to remain uncrumbled for three, or perhaps four, thousand years. The cleaning and embalming of the body, the wrapping in bandages of fine linen covered with gum, and the enclosure in a profusely-painted wooden caseall show how much care was taken to prevent the destruction of the body. Some of the mummies, which are filled with aromatic resins, present an olive-coloured tint; their skin is dry, flexible, and contracted, like tanned leather; the features are distinct, and appear to be like those that existed in life; and the teeth, hair, and eyebrows are generally perfect. It is certainly calculated to give rise to an interesting train of thought, when we reflect that the mummies placed in this room (some of them at least) were mummies so far back as the period when Moses and the Israelites were in Egypt; and that they have remained undestroyed and unrotted throughout all the busy scenes of the intervening period. These curious remains of antiquity are very well placed in the Egyptian Room for examination. Some are in the outer wooden cases; some are in the outer bandages removed; in one instance the ankle-bones can be seen through a tattered part of the linen envelope. These envelopes are composed of numerous linen bands, each several feet long, applied one over the other fifteen or twenty times, and surrounding first each limb and then the whole body. They are applied and interlaced very accurately, as if the intention had been to restore to the dry shrivelled body its original form and size. When each limb was bandaged, the legs were stretched out side by side, and the arms crossed over the chest; and other bandages of linen were then wrapped repeatedly round the whole body. These last bandages were painted all over with hieroglyphic characters, and were fastened by long bands, which crossed and re-crossed in a very ingenious manner. There is scarcely a branch of art or industry but is illustrated by the contents of this room. They are all worthy of close attention; for in some cases the material, in others the form, in others the colour, and in others the uses, furnish instructive evidence of the arts of the ancient Egyptians. The wooden figures brought from tombs; the bronze offerings of private worship; the porcelain figures, perforated for attachment to the network or necklaces of mummies; the painted, gilt, stone, bronze, silver, and porcelain deities, from one inch to twenty inches in height-these relate to religious notions on the part of the Egyptians. So likewise do the figures of sacred animals, such as the jackal, the hippopotamus, the baboon, the lion, the cat, the ram; and also the strange compounds of half-man, half-brute, in which ancient paganism so much delighted. The articles of household furniture, or models of them on a small scale, are interesting in another point of view, as carrying the imagination to the homes of the ancient dwellers on the banks of the Nile. The stools and chairs; the couches and pillows; the keys, locks, hinges, bolts, and handles; the tables, and salvers, and baskets; the models of a house, a granary, and a yard; then, again, the articles of the toilet, such as the black wig, the caps, aprons, tunics, sandals, shoes, combs, pins, studs, cases for containing the eye-lid paint, and painting implements-all are deserving of a little examination. Numerous, too, are the vases and lamps, the bowls and cups, the agricultural implements, the warlike weapons, the writing and painting implements, the working tools and weaving looms, the toys and the musical instruments. One of the cases in the room contains a vast number of amulets, and scarabæi, or sculptured beetles; they once formed portions of necklaces, bracelets, rings, or other articles of personal adornment; and, whether in the form of beetles, hogs, or other animals, and whether formed of amethysts, cornelians, basalt, serpentine, marble, or porcelain, they were all intended as charms to avert evil from the wearer. The Bronze Room,' next adjoining the Egyptian Room,' obtains its name from the chief of the Museum bronzes being there placed; but it contains many other articles formed of other materials. The beautiful, the grotesque, the ingenious-all meet with illustration among the bronzes which occupy the table-cases in this room. Many of the small figures were Penates, or family and domestic deities of the Romans: some of them tiny specimens not above an inch in height, and few of them reaching to the height of twelve inches. Roman weights and trinkets, and metal mirrors, tripods and candelabra and lamps-are among the articles of metal. The Etruscan Room,' the last of the series at present opened, is one of the most interesting in the Museum, in respect to the passion (for it seems almost to have amounted to such) which the Etruscans showed for vases. Who were these Etruscans, and when and where did they flourish? Until within the last few years, our English scholars and artists and antiquaries knew much less of this people than of many nations of far inferior import. When we consider that the Etruscans or Etrurians were a cultivated nation before Rome or the Romans existed; that arts and literature were fostered in the Etruscan part of Italy (nearly the same as modern Tuscany) when central and southern Italy were but little removed from barbarism; and that Rome is supposed to have acquired no small share of its love for and patronage of art from the Etruscans -when these things are considered, it seems almost marvellous that so little should have been preserved for posterity to know and judge this people. In truth, the Romans so utterly and completely subdued the country, that all national feeling seems to have died away: the cities were either destroyed or wholly remodelled on a Roman basis; and nothing remained but the tombs of the dead to tell of a past age and a past nation. The Etruscan tombs were long known to contain relics of the departed race; but it is only within the last few years that attention has been forcibly directed to the matter. Subterranean tombs have been opened, and sarcophagi and vases found in them. Many of the sarcophagi, so obtained, are now deposited in the central saloon of the Museum; and hundreds of the vases are placed in the Etruscan Room. Mrs. Hamilton Gray, in an interesting work relating to this subject, thus illustrates the mode in which these Etruscan antiquities are frequently found: Signor Campanari, a Roman collector of such objects, who was in the habit of employing men to dig among the ruins of what were once Etruscan cities and burial-grounds, "was excavating as usual in a rough but quiet-looking spot, when suddenly he heard a great crash; the earth fell in, and he found himself standing in the centre of twelve figures, all, with their raised and ornamental heads, staring at him. He said he really felt frightened at the time, and inclined to run away; for, on whichever side he looked, there were the red and fiery faces, and the peculiarly stern expression of these reproachful figures. Their bodies were all covered with earth, and their heads only were raised above the soil, so that they looked like beings from beneath come to sit in judgment upon him for violating their repose. The effect, however, was momentary. The living among the dead is a substance among shadows. Campanari ordered his men to fall to work, and the soil was cleared away. He then saw that the tomb was circular-rather an uncommon form at Toscanella-with one or two ledges all round it; and twelve or more coffins of baked clay, each with a portrait figure of a man on the lid, in the dress of the ancient nobles." The tomb here spoken of seems to have contained no vases; it was occupied by such sarcophagi and sculptured coffins as are to be seen in the lower rooms of the Museum. But many of the tombs were almost filled with vases; and of the character of these vases the contents of the Etruscan Room will afford us a very sufficient notion. The shelves and cases exhibit a variety of elegant forms, from the flat salver to the tall and slender vase. Some of these vases are made of heavy black ware with figures on them in bas-relief; others have pale back-grounds, with figures of a deep reddish maroon colour; then come others with black figures upon red or orange back-grounds. The figures are for the most part in an early and formal style of art, many of them grotesque, and all less remarkable for artistic taste than as illustrations of the mythology and train of thought at that period. And now, if the visitor has not found this antiquarian collection quite enough for one mental feast, we will venture to say that he has sped over it too rapidly, and has left many nice pickings which he will do well to gather at another visit. The plan marked out in this sheet, of dividing the inspection of the Museum into separate and distinct visits, is merely to illustrate a mode in which the inspection can be most instructively made. If you can spare a dozen visits, so much the better: the classification may be carried yet further: if you can make but one visit, so much the worse; but even then you will advance more favourably if you previously put your thoughts into a little systematic order. When we next hear and read of the Parliamentary estimates for the annual support of the British Museum, for the purchase of more books and more specimens, and for the construction of a building worthy to receive them-let us not regard it as a narrow question of pounds, shillings, and pence; but as a support given by the nation for the nation to an object which is calculated to raise the tone, both moral and intellectual, of all; and to make us by degrees a community to which even the jealousy of the foreigner shall not venture to apply the reproach of a 'nation of shopkeepers.' The occasional Parliamentary inquiries into the state and management of the Museum, so far from being dictated in a narrow spirit, ought to be regarded as wholesome supervisions, having for their object to render that which is already a benefit and an honour, still more beneficial and still more honourable to the country. |