i6^ 9« taste in architecture. -^ug- 'if*- 



yet to be seen in the vicinity of Thebes, and I believe 

 in all the anciently inhabited regions of the earth.. 

 In various parts of Britain these Troglodytic villages 

 are to be seen, and particularly in Leicesterftiire, 

 where subterraneous accommodations have been dis- 

 covered fit to contain some hundred families ; and 

 such are not uncommoa in Scotland, though on a 

 smaller scale. These were the habitations of what 

 the Greeks would have called the Autochthonoi of 

 Britain ; a people who, by Scythian and Belgic inva- 

 sions, were driven into the fastnefses of Wales and 

 of Caledonia. 



In the obelifk and pyramid of Egypt, we behold 

 the hydrometer of the Nile, and the emblem of that: 

 luminary without which the waters would have been 

 fatal to the fruits of the earth. In the ruins of their 

 palaces and temples, we behold a rude magnificence,, 

 unsubjected to any elegance of taste ; nor are the ele- 

 ments of Egyptian architecture, any farther than as 

 they are founded on nature, discernible in the Greek; 

 It is not probable, therefore, that the Greeks copied 

 in their buildings the architecture of the Egyp- 

 tians. They had nothing to copy in the manners of 

 the savages whom they found in the country ; and, 

 therefore, we are to look for the elements of Greek 

 architectul-e in that beautiful nature which they saw 

 every where around them in that garden of Eu*. 

 rope. 



Mr Riou in treating of the Grecian orders of 

 architecture, has likewise very pertinently observed 

 that the Greeks " had scarcely the opportunity of 

 ^coming plagiarists of the Egyptians ; because be* 



