202 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



|[2""> S. IX. Mar. 17. 'GO. 



lent work, The Antiquities of Athens, In fact, it 

 is in a great measure owing to this Society that, 

 after the death of these two eminent architects, 

 the work was not entirely relinquished. A large 

 number of the plates were engraved from original 

 drawings in the possession of the Society. 



Upon a Report of the state of the Society's 

 finances in the year 1764, it appeared that they 

 were possessed of a considerable sum above what 

 their current services required. Various schemes 

 were proposed for applying part of this money to 

 tome purpose which might promote taste, and do 

 honour to the Society ; and after some considera- 

 tion it was resolved, " That a person or persons 

 properly qualified should be sent, with sufficient 

 appointments, to certain parts of the East, to col- 

 lect information relative to the former state of 

 those countries, and particularly to procure exact 

 descriptions of the ruins of such monuments of 

 antiquity as are yet to be seen in those parts." 

 The sum placed at their disposal was 2000/., but 

 eventually cost the Society about 2500/. 



Three persons were elected for this under- 

 taking. Mr. Chandler of Magdalen College, 

 Oxford, Editor of the Marmora Oxoniensia, was 

 appointed to execute the classical part of the plan. 

 The province of Architecture was assigned to 

 Mr. Revett, who had already given a satisfactory 

 specimen of his accuracy and diligence, in his 

 measures of the remains of antiquity at Athens. 

 The choice of a proper person for taking views, 

 and copying the bas-reliefs, fell upon Mr. Pars, 

 a young painter of promising talents. A com- 

 mittee was appointed to fix their salaries and 

 draw up their instructions ; in which, at the same 

 time that the different objects of their respective 

 departments were distinctly pointed out, they 

 were all strictly enjoined to keep a regular journal, 

 and hold a constant correspondence with the 

 Society. 



They embarked on the 9th of June, 1764, in 

 the "Anglicana," Captain Stewart, bound for Con- 

 stantinople, and were put on shore at the Darda- 

 nelles on the 25th of August. Having visited the 

 Sigean Promontory, the ruins of Troas, with the 

 Islands of Tenedos and Scio, they arrived at 

 Smyrna on the 11th of September. From that 

 city, as their head-quarters, they made several 

 excursions. On the 20th August, 1765, they 

 sailed from Smyrna, and arrived at Athens on the 

 30th of the same month, having touched at Sunium 

 and iEgina in their way. They staid at Athens till 

 the 11th June, 1766, visiting Marathon, Eleusis, 

 Salamis, Megara, and other places in the neigh- 

 bourhood. Leaving Athens, they proceeded by 

 the little Island of Calauria to Troezene, Epidau- 

 rus, Argos, and Corinth. From this they visited 

 Delphi, Patrag, Elis, and Zante, whence they sailed 

 on the 31st of August, in the "Diligence" brig, 

 Captain Long, bound for Bristol, and arrived in 



England the 2nd November following. The ma- 

 terials they brought home were thought not un- 

 worthy of the public ; accordingly, the Society of 

 Dilettanti requested them to publish a work en- 

 titled Ionian Antiquities, the plates to be en- 

 graved at their expence. Part I., fol., appeared 

 in 1769; Part II. in 1797; Part III. in 1840. The 

 results of the expedition were also the two popu- 

 lar works of Chandler's Travels in Asia Minor, 

 1775, and his Travels in Greece in the following 

 year ; also the volume of Greek Inscriptions, 1774, 

 containing the Siga?an inscriptions, the marble of 

 which has been since brought to England by Lord 

 Elgin, and the celebrated documents detailing the 

 reconstruction of the Temple of Minerva Polias, 

 which Professor Wilkins illustrated in his Prolw 

 siones Architectonics, 1837. 



In the festive gatherings of the Society we 

 meet with the names of the most celebrated 

 statesmen, wits, scholars, artists, and amateurs 

 of the last century. At their meetings between 

 1770 and 1790 occur the names of Sir Joshua 

 Reynolds, Earl Fitzwilliam. Charles James Fox, 

 Hon. Stephen Fox (Lord Holland), Hon. Mr. 

 Fitzpatrick, Charles Howard (Duke of Norfolk), 

 Lord Robert Spencer, George Selwyn, Col. Fitz- 

 gerald, Hon. H. Conway, Joseph Banks, Duke of 

 Dorset, Sir Win. Hamilton, David Garrick, George 

 Colman, Joseph Windham, R. Payne Knight, Sir 

 George Beaumont, Townley, and plenty more of 

 less posthumous notoriety, but probably of not 

 less agreeable companionship. Some of the fines 

 paid "on increase of income, by inheritance, 

 legacy, marriage, or preferment," are curious, viz. 

 51. 5s. by Lord Grosvenor on his marriage with 

 Miss Leveson Gower ; 11/. lis. by the Duke of 

 Bedford on being appointed First Lord of the 

 Admiralty; 10/. 10s. compounded for by Bubb 

 Doddington as Treasurer of the Navy ; 21. 2s. by 

 the Duke of Kingston for a Colonelcy of Horse 

 (then valued at 400/. per annum) ; 21/. by Lord 

 Sandwich on goinij out as Ambassador to the Con- 

 gress at Aix-la-Chapelle ; and 2|rf. by the same 

 nobleman on becoming Recorder of Huntingdon; 

 13s. 4d. by the Duke of Bedford on getting the, 

 Garter; and 16s. 8d. (Scotch) by the Duke of 

 Buccleugh on getting the Thistle; 21/. by the 

 Earl of Holdernesse as Secretary of State ; and 

 9/. 19s. 6d. by Charles James Fox as a Lord of the! 

 Admiralty. 



That entertaining gossip, Horace Walpole, in: 

 a letter to Sir Horace Mann, dated April 14,* 

 1743, says : — 



" There is a new subscription formed for an Opera next; 

 year, to be carried on by the Dilettanti, a club, for which 

 the nominal qualification is having been in Italy, and the 

 real one being drunk ; the two chiefs are Lord Middlesex 

 and Sir Francis Dashwood, who were seldom sober the 

 whole time they were in Italy." 



In 1814, another expedition was undertaken by. 



