N the year 1799, when Lord jesty's Ambassador Extraordinary to the Ottoman Porte, he happened to be in habits of frequent intercourse with Mr. Harrison, an architect of great eminence in the west of England, who had there given various very splendid proofs of his professional talents, especially in a public building of Grecian architecture at Chester. Mr. Harrison had besides studied many years, and to great purpose at Rome. Lord Elgin consulted him, therefore, on the benefits that might possibly be derived to the arts in this country, in case an opportunity could be found for studying minutely the architecture and sculpture of ancient Greece; and his opinion very decidedly was, that although we might possess exact measurements of the buildings at Athens, yet a young artist could never form to himself an adequate conception of their miqute details, combinations, and general effects, without having before him some such sensible representation of them as might be conveyed by casts. This advice, which laid the groundwork of Lord Egin's pursuits in Greece, led to the further consideration, that, since any knowledge which was possessed of these buildings had been obtained under the peculiar disadvantages which the prejudices and jealousies of the Turks had ever thrown in the way of such attempts, any favourable circumstances which Lord Elgin's embassy might offer should be improved fundamentally;

and not only modellers, but archi

'ployed, to rescue from oblivion, with the most accurate detail, whatever specimens of architecture and sculpture in Greece had still escaped the ravages of time, and the barbarism of conquerors.

"On this suggestion, Lord Elgin proposed to his Majesty's Government, that they should send out English artists of known eminence, 'capable of collecting this information in the most perfect manner; but the prospect appeared of too doubtful an issue for ministers to engage in the expense attending it. Lord Elgin then endeavoured to engage some of these artists at his own charge; but the value of their time was far beyond his means. When, however, he reached Sicily, on the recommendation of Sir William Hamilton, he was so fortunate as to prevail on Don Tita Lusicri, one of the best general painters in Europe, of great knowledge in the arts, infinite taste, and most scrupulously exact in copying any subject he is to represent, to undertake the execution of this plan; and Mr. Hamilton,who was then accompanying Lord Elgin to Constantinople, immedi ately went with Mr. Lusieri to Rome; where, in consequence of the late revolutions in Italy, they were enabled to engage two of the most eminent formatori to make the madreformi for the casts: Signior Balestra, the first architect there, along with Ittar, a young man of great talent, to undertake the archi

tecture

tectural part of the plan; and one Theodore, a Calmouk, who had distinguished himself during several years at Rome, in the capacity of figure painter.

"After much difficulty, Lord Elgin obtained permission from the Turkish Government to establish these six artists at Athens; where they prosecuted the business of their several departments during three years, acting on one general system, with the advantage of mutual control, and under the general superintendance of M. Lusieri. They at length completed Lord Elgin's plan in all its parts.

"Accordingly, every monument, of which there are any remains in Athens, has been thus most carefully and minutely measured; and, from the rough draughts of the architects, (all of which are preserved,) finished drawings have been made of the plans, elevations, and details of the most remarkable objects; in which the Calmouk bas restored and inserted all the sculpture, with exquisite taste and ability. He has besides drawn, with astonishing accoracy, all the bas-reliefs on the several temples, in the precise state of decay and mutilation in which they at present exist.

"Most of the bas-reliefs, 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.

"Besides the architecture and sculpture at Athens, all remains of them which could be traced through several other parts of Greece, have been measured and delineated, with the most scrupulous exactness, by the second architect, Ittar.

"And picturesque views of Athens, of Constantinople, of va

rious parts of Greece, and of the Islands of the Archipelago, have been executed by Don Tita Lusieri.

"In the prosecution of this undertaking, the artists had the mortification of witnessing the very wilful devastation, to which all the sculpture, and even the architecture, were daily exposed, on the part of the Turks and travellers. The Ionic Temple, on the Ilyssus, which, in Stuart's time, (about the year 1759,) was in tolerable preservation, had so completely disappeared, that its foundation can no longer be ascertained. Another temple, near Olympia, had shared a similar fate, within the recollection of man. The Temple of Minerva had bern converted into a powder magazine, and been completely destroyed, from a shell falling upon it, during the bombardment of Athens by the Venetians towards the end of the seventeenth century; and even this accident had not deterred the Turks from applying the beautiful Temple of Neptune and Erectheus to the same use, whereby it is constantly exposed to a similar fate. Many of the statues on the posticum of the Temple of Minerva, (Parthenon,) which had been thrown down by the explosion, had been absolutely pounded for mortar, because they furnished the whitest marble within reach; and the parts of the modern fortification, and the miserable houses where this mortar was so applied, were discovered. Besides, it is well known that the Turks will frequently climb up the ruined walls, and amuse themselves in defacing any sculpture they can reach; or in breaking columns, statues, or other remains of antiquity, in the fond expectation of finding within them some hidden treasures.

"Under

"Under these circumstances, Lord Elgin felt himself impelled, by a stronger motive than personal gratification, to endeavour to preserve any specimens of sculpture, he could, without injury, rescue from such impending ruin. He had, besides, another inducement, and an example before him, in the conduct of the last French embassy sent to Turkey before the Revolution. French artists did then remove several of the sculptured ornaments from several edifices in the Acropolis, and particularly from the Parthenon In lowering one of the metopes, the tackle failed, and it was dashed to pieces; but other objects from the same temple were conveyed to France, where they are held in the very highest estimation, and some of them occupy conspicuous places in the gallery of the Louvre. And the same agents were remaining at Athens during Lord Elgin's embassy; waiting only the return of French influence at the Porte to renew their operations. Actuated by these in ducements, Lord Elgin made use of all his means, and ultimately with such success, that he has brought to England, from the ruined temples at Athens, from the modern walls and fortifications, in which many fragments had been used as so many blocks of stone, and from excavations made on purpose, a greater quantity of original Athenian sculptore, in statues, alti and bassi relievi, capitals, cornices, frizes, and columns, than exists in any other part of Europe.

"Lord Elgin is in possession of several of the original metopes from the Temple of Minerva These represent the battles between the Cenfaurs and Lapithe, at the nuptials of, Pirithous. Each metope contains two figures, grouped in various actitudes; sometimes the Lapitha vic

torious, sometimes the Centaurs. The figure of one of the Lapitha, who is lying dead and trampled on by a Centaur, is one of the finest productions of the art; as well as the groupe adjoining to it, of Hyppodamia, the bride, carried off by the Centaur Eurytion; the furious style of whose galloping, in order to secure his prize, and his shrinking from the spear that has been hurled after him, are expressed with prodigious animation. They are all in such high relief, as to seem groups of statues; and they are in general finished with as much attention behind as before. They were originally continued round the entablature of the Parthenon, and formed ninetytwo groups. The zeal of the early Christians, the barbarism of the Turks, and the explosions which took place when the temple was used as a gun-powder magazine, have demolished a very large portion of them: so that, with the exception of those preserved by Lord Elgin, it is in general difficult to trace even the outline of the origi nal subject.

"The frize, which was carried along the top of the walls of the cell, offered a continuation of sculptures in low relief, and of the most interesting kind This frize being unbroken by triglyphs, had presented much more unity of subject than the detached and insulated groups on the metopes of the peristyle. It represented the whole of the solemn procession to the Temple of Minerva during the Panathenaic festival: many of the figures are on horseback; others are about to mount: some are in chariots; others on foot : oxen, and other victims are leading to sacrifice: the nymphs called Canephora, Skiophoræ, &c. are carrying the sacred offerings in baskets and vases; priests, magistrates, war

riors, &c. &c. forming altogether a series of most interesting figures, in great variety of costume, armour, and attitude. Some antiquaries, who have examined this frize with minute attention, seem to think it contained portraits of many of the leading characters at Athens, during the Peloponnesian war, particularly of Pericles, Phidias, Socrates, Alcibiades, &c. The whole frize, which originally was six hundred feet in length, is, like the temple itself, of pentelic marble, from the quarries in the neighbourhood of Athens.

"The tympanum over each of the porticoes of the Parthenon, was adorned with statues. That over the grand entrance of the temple from the west, contained the mythological history of Minerva's birth from the brain of Jove. In the centre of the group was seated Jupiter, in all the majesty of the sovereign of the Gods. On his left, were the principal divinities of Olympus; among whom Vulcan came promihently forward, with the axe in his hand which had cleft a passage for the goddess. On the right was Vice tory, in loose floating robes, holding the horses of the chariot which in troduced the new divinity to Olympus. One of the bombs fired by Morosini, the Venetian, from the opposite hill of the Museum, injured many of the figures in this tympanum; and the attempt of General Konigsmark, in 1697, to take down the figure of Minerva, fuined the whole. By purchasing the house of one of the Turkish janizaries, built immediately under and against the columns of the portico, and by demolishing it in order to excavate, Lord Elgin has had the satisfaction of recovering the great est part of the statue of Victory, in a drapery which discovers the fine form of the figure, with exquisite

delicacy and taste. Lord Elgin also found there the torsi of Jupiter and Vulcan, the breast of the Minerva, together with other fragments.

"On the opposite tympanum had been represented the contest between Minerva and Neptune for the bonour of giving a name to the city. One or two of the figures remained on this tympanum, and others were on the top of the wall, thrown back by the explosion which destroyed the temple; but the far greater part had fallen and a house being built immediately below the space they had occupied, Lord Elgin, encouraged by the succession of his former excavations, obtained leave, after much difficulty, to pull down this house also, and continue his researches. But no fragments were here discovered; and the Turk, who had been induced, though most reluctantly, to give up his house to be demolished, then exultingly pointed out the places in the mo dern fortification, and in his own buildings, where the cement employed had been formed from the very statues which Lord Elgin had been in hopes of finding. And it was afterwards ascertained, on incontrovertible evidence, that these statues had been reduced to powder, and so used. Then, and then only, did Lord Elgin employ means to rescue what still remained from a similar fate. Among these objects is a horse's head, which far surpasses any thing of the kind, both in the truth and spirit of the execution. The nostrils are distended, the ears erect; the veins swollen, one might almost say throbbing: his mouth is open, and he seems to neigh with the conscious pride of belonging to the Ruler of the Waves. Besides this inimitable head, Lord Elgin has procured, from the same pediment, two colossal groups, each consist

ing

ing of two feniale figures. They are formed of single massive blocks of Pentelic marble: their attitudes are most graceful; and the lightness and elegance of the drapery exquisite. From the same pediment has also been procured a male statue in a reclining posture, supposed to represent Neptune. And, above all, the figure denominated the Theseus, which is universally admitted to be superior to any piece of statuary ever brought into England. Each of these statues is worked with such care, and the finishing even carried so far, that every part, and the very plinth itself in which they rest, are equally polished on every side.

"From the Opisthodomos of the Parthenon, Lord Elgin also procured some valuable inscriptions, written in the manner called Kionedon or Columnar, next in antiquity to the Boustrophedon. The greatest care is taken to preserve an equal number of letters in each line; even monosyllables are separated occasionally into two parts, if the line has had its complement, and the next line then begins with the end of the broken word. The letters range perpendicularly, as well as horizon tally, so as to render it almost impossible to make any interpolation or erasure of the original text. The subjects of these monuments are public decrees of the people; accounts of the riches contained in the treasury, and delivered by the administrators to their successors in office; enumerations of the statues; the silver, gold, and precious stones, deposited in the temples; estimates for the public works, &c.

"The Parthenon itself, independently of its decorative sculpture, is so chaste and perfect a model of Doric architecture, that Lord Elgin conceived it to be of the highest importance to the arts, to secure

original specimens of each member of that edifice. These consist of a capital; assizes of the columns themselves, to show the exact form of the curve used in channelling; a triglyph, and motules from the cornice, and even some of the marble tiles with which the ambulatory was roofed: so that, not only the sculptor may be gratified by studying every specimen of his art, from the colossal statue to the basso-relievo, executed in the golden age of Pericles, by Phidias himself, or under his immediate direction; but the practical architect may examine into every detail of the building, even to the mode of uniting the tambours of the columns, without the aid of mortar, so as to give to the shafts the appearance of single blocks.

"Equal attention has been paid to the Temple of Theseus; but as the walls, and columns, and sculpture of this monument, are in their original position, no part of the sculpture has been displaced, nor the minutest fragment of any kind separated from the building. The metopes in mezzo-relievo, containing a mixture of the labours of Hercules and Theseus, have been modelled and drawn, as well as the frize representing the battle between the Centaurs and Lapithæ, some incidents of the battle of Marathon, and some mytho logical subjects. The temple itself is very inferior in size and decora➡ tive sculpture to the Parthenon; having been built by Cimon, the son of Miltiades, before Pericles had given to his countrymen a taste for such magnificence and expense, as he displayed on the edifices of the Acropolis.

The original approach to the Acropolis, from the plain of Athens, was by a long flight of steps; commencing near the foot of the Arco

pagus,