loo Bath in its relation to Art. 



Literary Institution. What abundant treasures she had in 

 ■workmanship of various kinds has been shown in the illus- 

 trated volumes of successive antiquaries. Nor is the subject 

 exhausted ; year after year fresh discoveries are made ; 

 more and more beautiful things are found ; still the search 

 goes on and still the seeker is rewarded. There is an 

 anecdote that when someone just arrived in Rome inquired 

 for its antiquities, his companion, stooping down, presented 

 him with a handful of dust. And we, whenever we descend 

 below the surface in the neighbourhood of the springs, 

 rarely fail to find some relic of the refined, all-powerful 

 people who settled there. 



Even if it had been only known that Bath 

 Resuite' ^^^ '^"^ distinguished, it would have been 



interesting. We should have valued the 

 simple fact that a dreary swamp, with a few scattered huts, 

 had been transformed ' into an elegant city. But it is a 

 great practical advantage that the proofs of Roman skill 

 and taste, after being buried for more than a thousand 

 years, are available for the enjoyment and artistic educa- 

 tion of modern times. Students in Architecture come for 

 lessons in design and proportion to the pillars, friezes, and 

 pediment of the Temple of Minerva ; students in Sculpture 

 find a model of exquisite beauty and classical vigour in the 

 bronze head of the goddess ; and work which men like 

 Flaxman and Wedgwood did to improve the national taste 

 by copying objects brought from Italy, may now be done to 

 some extent by means of the lamps, cups, urns, vases, 

 ■medallions, and votive altars found here. 



Little can be said of Art in Bath during the 



isory. gj^jjQjj period. Through many years there 



were mints from which the National coins were issued. 



