To Return To The Museum At Portici, We Were Then Shewn Into A Room
Containing Curious Morceaux Of Antiquity Discovered At Pompeii:
A tripod
in bronze and various other articles of the same metal; tables, various
lamps in bronze, resembling exactly
Those used in Hindostan, wooden pens,
dice, grains of corn quite black and scorched, a skeleton of a woman with
the ashes incrusted round it (the form of her breast is seen on the crust
of ashes; golden armlets were found on her which were shewn to us), steel
mirrors, combs, utensils for culinary purposes, such as casseroles,
frying pans, spoons, forks, pestles and mortars, instruments of sacrifice,
weights and measures, coins, a carcan or stock, &c.
In the upper rooms are to be seen the paintings and fresques found in the
same place. The paintings are poor things, and in their landscapes the
Romans seem to have had little more idea of perspective than the Chinese;
but the fresques are beautiful: the female figures belonging thereto are
delineated with the utmost grace and delicacy. They consist of subjects
chiefly from the mythology. I noticed the following in particular, viz.,
Chiron teaching the young Achilles to draw the bow; the discovery of
Orestes; Theseus and the Minotaur (he has just slain the Minotaur and a boy
is in the act of kissing his hand as if to thank him for his deliverance;
the Minotaur is here represented as a monster with the body of a man and
the head of a bull); a Centaur carrying off a nymph; a car drawn by a
parrot and driven by a cricket:
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