This publication relates, that much has been performed by the exertions of Lord Elgin, in redeeming the specimens of sculpture and architecture which remained in Greece, and in transmitting them to England. On reading this splendid account, it is matter of some curiosity to know the name and character of the author. The publication is anonymous; yet, if the whole be not a fabrication, which incontrovertibly it is not, the writer, if not the hero, of the tale is some one mentally connected with his lordship; for he determines not only what Lord Elgin performed, but he presumes to specify what Lord Elgin " conceived." (p. 18.)

This folletto, or familiar of his lordship, begins by inform ing the public, that in the year 1799, when Lord Elgin was appointed his Majesty's . ambassador extraordinary to the Ottoman Porte, he happened to be in frequent intercourse with Mr. Harrison, an architect of eminence in the west of England; who had there given various very splendid proofs of his profes sional talents, especially in a public building of Grecian architecture at Chester. He proceeds to state that Lord Elgin wished to be informed by Mr. Harrison, in what manner the study of the architecture and sculpture of ancient Greece might be made most useful to the arts in England. Mr. Harrison answered, that the most exact measurement of Grecian buildings could never excite, in the young artist's mind, an adequate conception of the details, combinations, and general effect, with out having before him some such sensible representation of them as might be conveyed by casts.

Mr. Harrison might better have said, that neither casts, nor even the originals in their unconnected state, could afford to an artist an adequate conception of the combinations or general effect of Grecian, or, indeed, of any other buildings.

Lord Elgin, in conformity to Mr. Harrison's advice, has executed, as far as circumstances would permit, all that was possible in this respect to serve the artists of Great Britain. When the originals could not be transmitted, he has produced the best evidence the nature of the case would admit; he has brought before the tribunal of artists attested copies-sensible representations of the works themselves. "Most of the basreliefs, and nearly all the characteristic features of architecture in the various monuments at Athens, have been moulded, and the moulds of them have been brought to London." (p. 6.)

*Why expressed as a casualty?

The entire charge of this undertaking was defrayed by Lord Elgin; this we think necessary to mention, for such was not his lordship's design at the commencement: as preparatory to his own actual proceedings, he applied to government to send out English artists of known ability, capable of collecting information concerning the existing specimens of architecture and sculpture in Greece (p. 3). This the government prudently declined. We make this remark emphatically, because we have heard that application has been again made to government, to purchase the relics of the arts gleaned by Lord Elgin's industry from ruined Greece; and that the request has been partly acceded to, though the parties differ considerably respecting the equivalent-government having offered 30,000l. and Lord Elgin requiring to be paid only what they cost him, that is, double or treble that sum. Whether this report be true or not, we cannot determine; but a suspicion arises, that though the professed motive for publishing this "Memorandum" be to promote a subscription to have engravings and casts made of the various articles brought from Greece, and thus to multiply their means of serving the artists and the arts in England, the latent purpose is to excite a popular feeling in favour of Lord Elgin's claims to remuneration. That Lord Elgin should be repaid, if his fortune will not permit him to enjoy the independent glory of presenting gratuitously these riches to his country, is undoubted; but this should be performed by hist opulent countrymen, who delight in contemplating works of art, or who apply them to add loveliness to luxury.

We have heard it said, indeed, that the riches of England depend on the arts; and, therefore, such collections are of public import* ance. The opulence of England depends, in some measure, on the arts; and all things connected with them are of public importance. But, it may be doubted whether the arts of painting and statuary, to which the epithet liberal' has, perhaps, been too exclusively applied, are of such political consequence, that those at the head of state-affairs can be justified in diverting a portion of the national revenue to their indirect or probable advancement. Surely he must be a dilletante of the first water, to borrow the phrase of a great man and auctioneer, now no more,' who would have the produce of taxes, so hardly spared by the labourer and the mechanic, applied, in these times of debt and difficulty, to purchase fragments even of Grecian

art.

6

For these spoils of Greece, not wrested by war and vio lence, but fairly gained by industry and barter, the English are

greatly obliged to Lord Elgin. Without his exertions, many of the most precious specimens would have been transferred to France, whose agents had already removed some portions of Grecian magnificence to that country; and who remained at Athens, waiting the return of French influence at the Porte, to renew their operations.

Europe at large is indebted to Lord Elgin; for his efforts were not merely directed to a contest between England and France on this occasion, but between ignorance and art, between philosophy and superstition. The zeal of the early Christians in this respect co-operated with the triumphs of Mahomet; and the arms of his followers, in obedience to their religion, directly attacked every artificial resemblance of animate or inanimate nature. The iconoclastic fury of the Mahometans has not been extinguished after ten centuries of profligaté indulgence in destruction. This, with other causes, has tended to make every succeeding age more deficient in the remains of ancient sculpture and architecture. To mention a single instance. When Wheler and Spon visited Athens in 1676, the temple of Minerva, called Parthenon, was entire; but in the year 1687, says Stuart (vol. ii. p. 5), "Athens was besieged by the Venetians under the Proveditore Morisini and Count Koningsmark; when an unlucky bomb falling on this admirable structure, reduced it to the state in which we saw it." Stuart reached Athens in 1751. Let us however observe, that hostility to the arts is not among the crimes of the descendants of the ancient Greeks; they rejoice in their ancestry, and in many respects show themselves not unworthy of their progenitors. They cannot sing with Pindar, nor paint with Apelles, nor carve with Phidias; yet they cherish the arts with such fondness, that it is customary with the peasants to place, in a niche over the door of their cottages, any fragment of sculpture they discover in cultivating their lands. The same retrospective affection is declared in more important matters; for though they cannot make war on the Great King, or repel the aggressions of his successor, they talk familiarly of the exploits of their ancestry in the heroical ages. Here our fleet lay, said a Greek to Guy, a French traveller; alluding to the confederate armament that sailed to Troy in Homer's song. The spirit of Greece is not dead, it sleepeth. May it be England's glory, under God's providence, to complete the miracle; and rescue from their abasement that people, whose fathers, by their celebrity in every art, exalted humanity.

it is reasonable to suppose that the account of Lord Elgin's pursuits is favourably given by the author; and though we de

not wish to detract from his lordship's merits, some remarks are made in the "Memorandum" with such extravagance, that we cannot avoid making a few strictures upon them.

We are told that Canova deprecated restoring some mutilations of the figures, saying, " that it would be sacrilege in him, or any man, to presume to touch them with a chisel." (p. 40.) From the works of that great artist, as well those that are finished, as those that are now in progress, which we have seen, we would say it was a compliment in the Asiatic lapidary style, and should not have been reported to the world. We are also told, that one of the groups of female statues so rivetted and agitated the feelings of Mrs. Siddons, as actually to draw tears from her eyes!" We admit that the stage-effect of such a display of tears would have been good; but if our author witnessed them, we would venture to ask him, whether he ever heard of Cicero's censure of one, who said he saw with his eyes?

66

The author seems to be unreasonably offended with those who have called certain vases Etruscan. He asserts, that they are referable to the Grecians who colonised Italy. To substantiate this he writes, that "those (vases) found by Lord Elgin at Athens, Ægina, Argos, and Corinth, will prove the indubitable claim of the Greeks to the invention and perfection of this art: few of those, in the collections of the King of Naples at Portici, or in that of Sir William Hamilton, excel some which Lord Elgin has procured, with respect to the elegance of the form, the fineness of the materials, the delicacy of the execution, or the beauty of the subjects delineated on them." (p. 30.) This we conceive is no proof; as those in Lord Elgin's possession, known to be Grecian, are admitted, by this statement, to be inferior to those in the possession of others, and hitherto called Etruscan. Besides, where is the necessity for believing that the Etrurians derived this art through Greece? Strabo states, that Etruria was colonised by the Greeks as early as the Trojan war; a period of time when no one, we suppose, imagines that the Grecians excelled in forming ornamental vases of any kind; yet, shortly after this event, the same geographer speaks of Pisa, a town in Etruria, in the following terms, which we give in the Latin version:

"Civitas autem ipsa felix quondam fuisse videtur, neque hoc tempore sane ignobilis, aut obscura est propter frugum copias, sanorum opera, navalem materiam, quæ priscis armis ad maritima utebantur discrimina." (Lib. v. vol. ii. p. 405.)

A more favourable account could not be given of Athens, considering the age to which this description refers. There are also other reasons to support the propriety of the common

opinion. It is notorious that the Greeks learned the rudiments of the arts from the Egyptians; and it is reasonably proved by Count Caylus (Recueils d'Antiquités, tome i. p. 78), that the Egyptians traded with the Etrurians. If, therefore, the vases called Etrurian are to be attributed to the Grecians, because the Etrurians learned this art from the Grecians, the merit of the manufacture should be attributed to the Egyptians, who gave the first design of them to the Greeks. But it is quite whimsical to ascibe the whole merit of any production to those from whom an art may be originally derived. How absurd would it be to refer the reputation of the Silesian weavers to the Spaniards, because some of the terms of their manufacture are of Spanish derivation; or that of our silk-weavers to the Italians, for the same reason; or the tapestry of the Gobelins at Paris to the Saracens, because those formerly employed in that fabric were so denominated.

As an Appendix to the Memorandum, two Letters are added, from the President of the Royal Academy; who hints, that in consequence of Lord Elgin's endeavours, Athens has been transported to Piccadilly. The president also hopes that these specimens of the arts brought from Greece "will be the means of enlightening the public mind, and correcting the national taste to a true estimation of what is really valuable and dignified in art." That this hope will not be gratified, we suspect; and one reason for our suspicion is the use that Mr. West has made of them. It is as follows:

"From the centaurs in alto-relievo (says he), I have taken the figures of the most distinguished eminence, and formed them into groups for painting; with these, and female figures of my own, I have composed the Battle of the Centaurs.

"From the equestrian statues in relievo, I have formed the composition of Theseus and Hercules in triumph over the Amazons, having made their queen Hippolita prisoner.

"From the large figure of Theseus, I have drawn a figure of that hero. Before him, on the ground, I have laid the dead body of the Minotaur, &c.

"From the figure of Neptune, I have composed Neptune reclining, with his left arm upon the knees of Amphitrite; and with his right he strikes the earth with his trident, and creates the horse, &c."

This summary he concludes with an account of his composition of Alexander and his horse Bucephalus. We trust the president will introduce himself, according to the story of Sextus Empiricus (Pyrr. Hypot. lib. i. p.), in the character of Apelles in a rage, composing the foam with a sponge!