ITALY. 



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which the woman sits, and the man reclines. He is pouiing vvine into his mouth from a ves- 

 sel, which he holds at some distance, as is still done in Spain . The students at Eton, when 

 they undergo flagellation, may be certain that they suffer a classic punishment ; for there is a 

 picture of horsing at school, in which the sufferer is on the shoulders of another boy, while 

 his feet are held by others, and the master flogs. There are stamps for marking ; the nearest 

 possible approach to the art of printing. The familiar and common furniture, or ornaments, 

 found at Pompeii, are numerous, far beyond our limits even to name, and they throw much 

 light upon the domestic life of the Romans, and show the wonderful elegance of that polished 

 people. 



Herculaneum, being at the foot of the mountain, was covered with lava, and the town of 

 Portici stands directly over it. It is impressive to hear the noise of carriages, like distant 

 thunder, 80 feet above. Herculaneum is, therefore, a mere cavern, which has been partially 

 excavated. The statues, and other antiquities, are in the museum in Naples. The manu- 

 scripts were found carbonized, and nearly as hard as stone ; but a method has been invented, 

 by which they are unrolled, and several unimportant treatises have been published. 



Before describing the sculptures, it is proper to mention a few remains, that cannot well be 

 classed. At Rome, are still to be seen the consular Fasti, the bronze geese of the capital, 

 and the very she wolf, that was ancient in the time of Cicero ; it has the mark of the electric 

 fluid, which once struck it, and of the gilding, mentioned by Cicero. The Etruscan remains, 

 are the works of a people who were distinguished in the arts, long before the Romans attempt- 

 ed them. The most common, is a kind of Porcelain, or vases of baked earth, ornament- 

 ed with great elegance. The ancient walls of Rome are 14 miles in extent, though they 

 inclose, at present, much of the desert. In general, they are principally as built by 

 Aurelian. 



The sculptures are the most numerous and wonderful remains of the Romans, as well as 

 of the Greeks. Many of great excellence remain, though the best have been lost; and 

 it is certain that those which exist, are but an inconsiderable part of what once ex- 

 isted. They were the favorite ornaments of a people, devoted to elegance and art. The 

 sculptures, with the medals, coins, seals, &c., are, a great part of them, materials for history. 

 The long line of Roman emperors, the good and the worthless, have left their features, as well 

 as character and acts, to posterity. The series is complete. In them, as in the other busts 

 and statues, is every variety of countenance, that may be seen in the present age ; though, 

 perhaps the features that we call Roman, predominate. Julius, and Augustus Caesar, Tibe- 

 rius, Titus, Marcus Aurelius, are common. There are, however, few sculptures of the re- 

 public. Cicero yet lives in statuary, and the statue of Pompey remains ; the very marble, 

 before which Caesar fell, and which was found at the place where the great sacrifice was made 

 to patriotism, — on the spot 



" Where Brutus made the dagger's edge surpass 

 The conqueror's sword, in tJearing fame away." 



It is the statues, that embody the grand moral conception of the ancients. The best are of 

 Greek sculpture, of which many were carried to Rome. The greatest collection of sculp- 

 ture, as well as of all the arts, are in 3 vast museums ; the gallery at Florence, the Vatican at 

 Rome, and the Bourbon Museum at Naples. At the gallery, in the room called the Tribune, 

 stands the Venus de Medicis, which embodies every human conception of the graceful and 

 beautiful. It is the form of a female, of a woman rather than of a goddess, in an attitude of 

 the most shrinking modesty and grace. It is an era in the life of a person of taste and feeling, 

 to see it ; the impression it makes, is indelible and unrivaled. It marks its excellence, that 

 the most exact copies or casts cannot convey an adequate conception of the beautiful original, 

 though they are scattered over the world. It is above imitation. 



The Whetter, in the same room, is a statue much admired, representing a man stooping to 

 sharpen a knife on the floor; supposed to be the slave, that, while thus employed, overheard 

 Catiline's conspiracy. The Wrestlers form one of the best groups of ancient sculpture ; and 

 these, also, are in the Tribune ; they represent 2 men struggling on the ground, in a manner 

 that gave the sculptor an opportunity to show the greatest development of the muscles ; and 

 they make a study for painters, in drawing. The Niobe, in the gallery, is tragedy itself, and 

 shows the superiority to which the ancients attained in the ideal, above the natural. Her 



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