658 EPHESUS, CYPRUS, AND MYGENM. 



lar mixture of personal narrative, description of objects, and antiquarian 

 conjectures, which we find in the volumes. By adding thereto a statement 

 of results, with impartial reference to the character of the objects discov- 

 ered, I may be able to turnish the reader with the necessary basis of fact, 

 and qualify him to examine, with some degree of independence, the con- 

 flicting theories which seek to establish themselves thereon. The spoils of 

 Cyprus and Mycenae, as will be seen, are too new and unexpected to be 

 readily disposed of, even by the most experienced scholars. In order to 

 make room for them, the old adjustment of epochs in the art and general cul- 

 ture of the ancients must be materially changed ; and the archaeologists are 

 almost as unwilling to accept such changes as are the theologians. Least 

 of all, have they the right to disparage the enthusiasm of the explorer, 

 over-credulous though it be; for to that enthusiasm they owe the achieve- 

 ments recorded in these three works. There are not many book-scholars 

 who would have labored at Ephesus for years before grasping the clew 

 which led Mr. Wood to the Temple of Diana: still fewer would have 

 dreamed of digging at Mycense, with the expectation of finding anything 

 ibeyond the foundations of Cyclopean walls; and in 1862, more than three 

 years before General di Cesnola reached Cyprus, the French archaeologist, 

 Count de Yogue, makes this report ot his researches : " Quant a I'exploration 

 exterieure de I'ile, jepuis le dire, elle a ete aussi complete que possible ; rien 

 d'apparent ri'a ete omis." It is, perhaps, not in human nature that a man of 

 distinguished learning shall find that a favorite theory, upon which he has 

 lavished years of thought, is jarred and in danger of being overthrown, 

 without jealously defending it; yet it is curious to notice what immediate 

 receptance any discovery obtains which seems to establish a point in what 

 is called sacred history, and how much doubt and discussion follow the evi- 

 dences of a fact underlying some episode of the semi-mythical age of pro- 

 fane history. *** >{<;ii^*>i<;i;>l; 



'No theory has been changed, nor any new question raised, by Mr. Wood's 

 success. He has worked upon purely historical ground, and the ancient 

 authorities are his best witnesses. No one has disputed the solid marble 

 evidence which he has brought to light; and the main lesson to be drawn 

 from his labor is that complete destruction is a more difficult task than has 

 heretofore been supposed — that the simple processes of Nature almost inva- 

 riably hide some fragment of that which war or fanaticism would annihi- 

 late, and protect it for the believing explorer who may come two or three 

 thousand years afterward. The only possible, contribution to a more 

 ancient period of art, which Mr. Wood may have famished, is found in some 

 fragments of sculpture, which Mr. Newton considers archaic, excavated 

 near the lowest stop of the temple. Their resemblance to some of the 

 objects found by Cxeneral di Cesnola in Cyprus is noticed by the distin- 

 guished archaeologist, but a more careful examination and comparison are 

 necessary before their character can be approximately determined. 



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