Ilia Veftalis (quid enim vetat inde moveri
Sacra lavaturas manè petebat aquas :
Fella refedit bumi, ventofque accepit aperto
Pectore; turbatas reftituitque comas.
Dum fedet; umbrofæ falices volucrefque canora
Fecerunt fomnos, et leve murmur aquæ.
Blanda quies victis furtim fubrepit ocellis,
Et cadit a mento languida facta manus?

Mars videt hanc, vifamque cupit, potiturque cupitâ:
Et fua divinâ furta fefellit ope.

Somnus abit: jacet illa gravis, jam fcilicet intra
Vifcera Romanæ conditor urbis erat.

Ov.de Faft. Lib. 3. Eleg. 1

As the fair Vestal to the fountain came,
(Let none be startled at a Vestal's name)
Tir'd with the walk, fhe laid her down to rest,
And to the winds expos'd her glowing breast.
To take the freshness of the morning air,,
And gather'd in a knot her flowing hair:
While thus fhe refted on her arm reclin'd,,
The hoary willows waving with the wind,
And feather'd choirs that warbled in the fhade,

t

And purling streams that through the meadow ftray'd,.
In drowfie murmurs lull'd the gentle maid.
The God of war beheld the Virgin lye,
The God beheld her with a lover's eye,

And by fo tempting an occafion prefs'd,

The beauteous maid, whom he beheld, poffefs'd:

Conceivings

Conceiving as fhe flept, her fruitful womb

Swell'd with the founder of immortal Rome.

I cannot quit this head without taking notice of a line in Seneca the

Tragedian.

Primus emergit folo

Dextra ferocem cornibus premens taurum
Zetus

First Zetus rifes through the ground,
Bending the Bull's tough neck with pain,
That toffes back his horns in vain.

Sen. OEdip. Act. 3.

I cannot doubt but the Poet had here in view the posture of Zetus in the famous groupe of figures, which represents the two brothers binding Dirce to the horns of a mad bull.

I could not forbear taking particular notice of the feveral musical instruments that are to be seen in the hands of the Apollo's, Mufes, Fauns, Satyrs, Bacchanals, and Shepherds, which might certainly give a great light to the difpute for preference between the ancient and modern mufick. It would perhaps be no impertinent defign to take off all their models in wood, which might not only give us fome notion of the ancient Musick, but help us to pleasanter Inftruments than are now in ufe. By the appearance they make in marble, there is not one String-inftrument that feems comparable to our Violins, for they are all played on, either by the bare fingers, or the Plectrum, so that they were incapable of adding any length to their notes, or of varying them by thofe infenfible fwellings, and wearings away of found upon the fame ftring, which give so wonderful a sweetness to our modern mufick. Besides, that the ftringinftruments must have had very low and feeble voices, as may be gueffed from the small proportion of wood about them, which could not contain air enough to render the strokes, in any confiderable measure, full and fonorous. There is a great deal of difference in the make, not only of the feveral kinds of instruments, but even among those of the fame name. The Syringa, for example, has sometimes four, and sometimes a more pipes, as high as the twelve. The fame variety of ftrings may be obferved on their Harps, and of stops on their Tibia, which fhows the little foundation that fuch writers have gone upon, who from a verse perhaps in Virgil's Eclogues, or a fhort paffage in a Claffic Author, have been fo very nice in determining the precife shape of the ancient musical instruments, with the exact number

of

of their pipes, strings and ftops. It is indeed the usual fault of the writers of Antiquities, to ftreighten and confine themselves to particular models. They are for making a kind of stamp on every thing of the fame name, and if they find any thing like an old description of the fubject they treat on, they take care to regulate it on all occafions, according to the figure it makes in such a single paffage: As the learned German author, quoted by Monfieur Baudelot, who had probably never feen any thing of a Houfhold-God, more than a Canopus, affirms roundly, that all the ancient Lares were made in the fashion of a jug-bottle. In fhort, the Antiquaries have been guilty of the fame fault as the Systeme-writers, who are for cramping their fubjects into as narrow a space as they can, and for reducing the whole extent of a science into a few general Maxims. This a man has occafion of observing more than once, in the feveral fragments of Antiquity that are still to be seen in Rome. How many dreffes are there for each particular Deity? What a variety of fhapes in the ancient Urns, Lamps, Lachrymary veffels, Priapus's, HoufholdGods, which have fome of them been represented under fuch a particular form, as any one of them has been described with in an ancient Author, and would probably be all fo, were they not still to be seen in their own vindication? Madam Dacier, from fome old cuts of Terence, fancies that the Larva or Perfona of the Roman Actors, was not only a vizard for the face, but had false hair to it, and came over the whole head like a helmet. Among all the statues at Rome, I remember to have seen but two that are the figures of Actors, which are both in the Villa Matthei. One fees on them the fashion of the old Sock and Larva, the latter of which answers the description that is given of it by this learned Lady, though I queftion not but several others were in ufe; for I have seen the figure of Thalia, the comic Mufe, fometimes with an entire head-piece in her hand, fometimes with about half the head, and a little frizze, like a tower, running round the edges of the face, and fometimes with a mask for the face only, like those of a modern make. Some of the Italian A&tors wear at present these masks for the whole head. I remember formerly I could have no notion of that fable in Phædrus, before I had seen the figures of these entire head-pieces.

Perfonam tragicam fortè vulpes viderat :
O quanta fpecies, inquit, cerebrum non habet!
As wily Renard walk'd the streets at night,
On a Tragedian's mask he chanc'd to light,
VOL. II.
Q

L. 1. Fab. 7.

Turning

Turning it o'er, he mutter'd with difdain,

How vaft a head is here without a brain!

I find Madam Dacier has taken notice of this paffage in Phadrus, upon the fame occafion; but not of the following one in Martial, which alludes to the fame kind of masks.

Non omnes fallis, fcit te Proferpina canum,
Perfonam capiti detrahet illa tuo.

Why should't thou try to hide thy felf in youth?
Impartial Proferpine beholds the truth,
And laughing at fo fond and vain a task,
Will ftrip thy hoary noddle of its mask.

L. 3. Ep.43

In the Villa Borghese is the Buft of a young Nero, which shows us the form of an ancient Bulla on the breaft, which is neither like a heart, as Macrobius describes it, nor altogether resembles that in Cardinal Chigi's cabinet; fo that without establishing a particular inftance into a general rule, we ought, in fubjects of this nature, to leave room for the humour of the artift or wearer. There are many figures of Gladiators at Rome, though I do not remember to have seen any of the Retiarius, the Samnite, or the antagonist to the Pinnirapus. But what I could not find among the ftatues, I met with in two antique pieces of Mofaic, which are in the poffeffion of a Cardinal. The Retiarius is engaged with the Samnite, and has had fo lucky a throw, that his net covers the whole body of his adverfary from head to foot, yet his antagonist recovered himself out of the toiles, and was conqueror, according to the infcription. In another piece is represented the combat of the Pinnirapas, who is armed like the Samnite, and not like the Retiarius, as fome learned men have fuppofed: On the helmet of his antagonist are seen the two Pinne, that stand up on either fide like the wings in the Petafus of a Mercury, but rise much higher, and are more pointed.

There is no part of the Roman Antiquities that we are better acquainted with, than what relates to their facrifices. For as the old Romans were very much devoted to their religion, we fee feveral parts of it entering their ancient Baffo Relievo's, Statues, and Medals, not to mention their altars, tombs, monuments, and thofe particular ornaments of Architecture which were borrowed from it. An heathen Ritual could not instruct a man better than these several pieces of Antiquity, in the particular ceremonies and punctilio's that attended the different kinds of facrifices.

.

crifices. Yet there is much greater variety in the Make of the facrificing
inftruments, than one finds in those who have treated of them, or have
given us their pictures. For not to infift too long on fuch a fubject, I
faw in Signior Antonio Politi's collection a Patera without any rifing in
the middle, as it is generally engraven, and another with a handle to it,
as Macrobius defcribes it, though it is quite contrary to any that I have
ever seen cut in marble; and I have obferved perhaps feveral hundreds.
I might here enlarge on the fhape of the triumphal chariot, which is dif-
ferent in fome pieces of fculpture from what it appears in others; and
on the figure of the Discus, that is to be seen in the hand of the cele-
brated Caftor at Don Livio's, which is perfectly round, and not oblong,
as fome Antiquaries have represented it, nor has it any thing like a fling
fastened to it, to add force to the tofs.

Protinus imprudens, actufque cupidine lufus
Tollere Tanarides orbem properabat-

De Hyacinthi difco.

Th' unwary youth, impatient for the caft,
Went to fnatch up the rolling orb in haste.

Ov. Met. L. 10.

Notwithstanding there are fo great a multitude of cloathed ftatues at Rome, I could never difcover the feveral different Roman garments, for 'tis very difficult to trace out the figure of a veft, through all the plaits and foldings of the drapery; befides, that the Roman garments did not differ from each other, fo much by the fhape as by the embroidery and colour, the one of which was too nice for the ftatuary's obfervation, as the other does not lye within the expreflion of the chiffel. I observed, in abundance of Bas Reliefs, that the Cinctus Gabinus is nothing else but a long garment, not unlike a furplice, which would have trailed on the ground had it hung loofe, and was therefore gathered about the middle with a girdle. After this it is worth while to read the laborious description that Ferrarius has made of it. Cinctus Gabinus non aliud fuit quàm cum toga lacinia lavo brachio fudducta in tergum ita rejiciebatur, ut contracta retraheretur ad pectus, atque ita in nouam necteretur; qui nodus five cinctus togam contrahebat, brevioremque et frictiorem reddidit. De re Veftiar. L. 1. C. 14. Lipfius's defcription of the Samnite armour, seems drawn out of the very words of Livy; yet not long ago a ftatue, which was dug up at Rome, dreffed in this kind of armour, gives a much different explication of Livy from what Lipfius has done. This Q 2

figure