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THE BRITISH MUSEUM:
ITS HISTORY AND TREASURES

BY THE SAME AUTHOR
CŞ33
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L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
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BRITISH MUSEUM - ENTRANCE HALL.
From Photograph by Donald



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A View of the Origins of that Great Institution,
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pal Officers, and a Survey of the Priceless
Objects preserved within its Walls.
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L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
BOSTON > 3. MDCCCCXI







Copyright 1911 f
BY L. C. PAGE & CoMPANY
[INCORPORATED]
All rights reserved
Entered at Stationers' Hall, London
First Impression, September, 1911
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•..
Electro type d and Printed by
T H E CO L O N IA I, P. R. E. S. S
C. H. Simonds & Co., Boston, U. S. A.


PREFACE
NoTWITHSTANDING the large additions to the lit-
erature of learning which have been made in exposi-
tion of the rich and varied stores of the British
Museum, and the interesting sidelights which have
been thrown on the history of that famous institu-
tion by such writers as Edward Edwards, Robert
Cowtan, and others, the ensuing pages represent the
first attempt to combine within the scope of a single
volume an ordered history of the museum and a
conspectus of its contents. -
With regard to the first section, it is hoped that
the narrative of the origins, foundation, and growth
of the British Museum will give the reader a clear
and sequent view of events, based, as it is, upon the
evidence offered before Parliamentary Commis-
sions, and upon careful research among other au-
thoritative printed and original sources of infor-
mation. Of course it would not have been difficult
to amplify those historical chapters, and especially
to have dealt at greater length with the careers of
the earliest benefactors of the museum; but the
porch had to bear some proportion to the house.
Consequently the larger share of the volume is
devoted to the treasures of the museum, and than
V
227882
vi Preface
the writer no one can be more conscious of the in-
adequacy of the Space so apportioned. Seeing that
the official guide-books already exceed thirty in
number, and that these are but prefatory to a
library of exhaustive treatises and catalogues the
mere titles of which extend to twenty-four pages
larger than this, it will be obvious that the eight
chapters describing the various departments cannot
make any pretence to completeness in detail. That
is to say, the reader must not expect to find specific
mention of every object in the different depart-
ments. Instead of attempting the impossible, the
method adopted has been to give the reader a point
of view, useful alike, it is hoped, either for a visit
to the museum or for an arm-chair understanding
of its contents. In pursuit of this plan the vari-
ous departments have been frequently visited and
closely studied, while for factual knowledge reliance
has of course been placed upon the official publica-
tions, supplemented where necessary by reference
to other authorities. By this method the reader is
provided with such a concise outline of the phase
of knowledge represented by each of the depart-
ments as will enable him to appreciate the interest
and educational value of the objects displayed in
those departments.
Among the volumes which have been useful in the
preparation of these pages special mention should
be made of Edward Edwards’s “Lives of the
Preface Vii
Founders of the British Museum; ” Robert Cow-
tan’s “Memories of the British Museum; ’’ numer-
ous reports of the Historical Manuscripts Commis-
Sion; and the Dictionary of National Biography.
It is too late in the day to eulogize the last-named
invaluable work of reference, but the writer would
fain avail himself of this opportunity to offer his
tribute of sincere gratitude to the memory of
George Smith for the rare prescience and noble
liberality which he displayed in the inception and
publication of that greatest of all biographical dic-
tionaries.
One other considerable debt remains to be ac-
knowledged. Upwards of forty of the illustrations
in this volume are from the official guides to the
British Museum, and it follows that for permission
to use them the author has to thank, which he does
in the heartiest manner, the public-spirited Trus-
tees of that institution. Nor can he conclude these
prefatory sentences without expressing his sense of
gratitude to Dr. Frederic G. Kenyon, the Director
and Principal Librarian, for his unfailing courtesy
in connection with the preparation of this book.
IH. C. S.
;
|*
|
CONTENTS
CHAPTER, PAGE
PREFACE . . . . . . . . . . v.
I. THE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM
I. ORIGINS . . . . . . . . . . 3
II. THE EARLIEST BENEFACTORS . . . . . 12
III. THE MUSEUM FoundED . . . . . . . 48
IV. LANDMARKS IN GROWTH . . . . . . . 71
W. Some, NoTABLE OFFICIALS . . . . . . 95
II. THE TREASURES OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM
I. THE PRINTED BOOKS . . . . . . . 121
II. AMONG THE MANUSCRIPTs . . . . . . . 144
III. RELICS OF GREECE AND ROME . . . . . 171
IV. EGYPTIAN ANTIQUITIES . . . . . . . 207
W. BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN ANTIQUITIES . . . 240
VI. PREHISTORIC MAN . . . . . . . . 272
VII. CIVILIZATION IN THE MAKING . . . . . 299
VIII. THE ARTs of LIFE . . . . . . . . 326
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . 349
— --------—---------—-----|-- -

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
BRITISH MUSEUM: ENTRANCE HALL . . . Frontispiece
SIR ROBERT B. COTTON . . . . . . . . 12
ROBERT Hariry, EARL OF OXFORD . . . . . . 22
Edward HARLEY, EARL OF OXFORD . . . . . 30
SIR HANS SLOANE . . . . . . . . . 38
MonTAGU HousB . . . . . . . . . . 56
BRITISH MUSEUM IN COURSE OF ERECTION BEHIND MONTAGU
HOUSE . * te gº e ſº sº * º cº . 64
BRITISH MUSEUM: KING's LIBRARY . . . . . . 72
Gowin KNIGHT . . . . . . . . . . 99
DR. MATTHEW MATY . . . . . . . . . 100
Jose,PH PLANTA – SIR HENRY ELLIS . . . . . 105
SIR ANTHONY PANIZZI . . . º . . . . . 108
PLAN of THE GROUND FLOOR . . . . . . . 120
BRITISH MUSEUM: READING ROOM . . . . . . 122
THE TEMPTATION TO IMPATIENCE FROM THE “ARS MORI-
ENDI’” — A PAGE FROM CAxTON’s “AESOP '' . . . 140
PRAYER Book OF CHARLES II . . . . . . . 142
BEowULF . . . . . . . . . . . 152
ARTICLES OF MAGNA CHARTA . . . . . . . 155
OLIVER CROMWELL's LETTER – ENGLISH CoMMANDERS
AGAINST THE ARMADA . . . . . . . . 159
NELSON'S LAST LETTER . . . . . . . . 160
JoHN KEATs’ “EvK, of ST. MARK" . . . . . 165
CODEX ALEXANDRINUS . . . . . . . . . 166
APOCALYPSE OF FourTÉENTH CENTURY . . . . . 169
THE DEMETER OF CNIDos . . . . . . . . 181
ELGIN MARBLEs: THE THREE FATES . . . . . 185
xi
xii List of Illustrations
BRITISH MUSEUM: MAUsolEUM ROOM
FIGURE OF NEREID — THE BUST OF “CLYTI; ”
GREEK TERRACOTTAs . .
THE PORTLAND WASE & e º 'º
SARCOPHAGUS OF ANKH - NES - NEFER - AB – RA
THE SKY - GODDESS NUT g
BRITISH MUSEUM: EGYPTIAN GALLERY e
HEAD OF A PRIESTESS OF THE XVIIITH DYNASTY
SARCOPHAGUS OF UAH - AB – RA . &
CoLOSSAL WINGED LION – ColoSSAL WINGED BULL
ASHUR - BANI - PAL PouriNG OUT A LIBATION
STELE WITH CHARTER OF NEBUCHADNEZZAR I.
BAKED CLAY CYLINDER OF SENNACHERIB . .
PLAN OF THE UPPER FLOOR tº º gº tº e
NEOLITHIC FLINT IMPLEMENTS – NEOLITHIC LANCE AND
ARROW HEADS
HOARD OF BRONZE e & © tº º º sº tº
BRITISH SEPULCHRAL POTTERY iº tº ſº tº
WooDEN FIGURE OFTANGAROA – ContFMPORARY PortRAIT-
FIGURE FROM THE Congo . . . . . .
CLUBS AND DANCING - SHIELD FROM NEw GUINEA — WooDEN
DANCING - RATTLE FROM QUEEN CHARLOTTE ISLANDS
BRONZE HEAD OF GIRL FROM BENIN
BRONZE HANDLE OF LITTER tº tº gº
ENGLISH AND OTHER CHALICES — SARACENIC EwBRs .
CLOCK MADE FOR THE EMPEROR RUDOLPH II
ITALIAN CASKET . . . . . . . . . .
OSTRICH - EGG CUP 9 @ 9: Q Q & º e e
PAGE
194
197
201
202
212
218
221
232
234
250
262
269
270
274
288
296
298
319
322
324
327
334
337
341
344
I
THE BRITISH MUSEUM:
ITS HISTORY
THE BRITESH MUSEUM:
ITS HISTORY AND TREASURES
CHAPTER I
ORIGINS
IF it be true that “a man is known by the friends
he keeps,” it follows that the letters he receives are
an infallible index to his character. That was espe-
cially the case with Edward Harley, second Earl of
Oxford. His mail-bag in the third and fourth dec-
ades of the eighteenth century was always heavily
laden, and his correspondents numbered many of
the most notable men of the age, including William
Oldys, Richard Mead, Allan Ramsay, Richard Bent-
ley, Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift.
Social news and political happenings, common-
places of courtesy and details of business were not
lacking from my lord’s correspondence, but the bur-
den of many letters was wholly different. Here is
one announcing the sale of the books and curiosities
of a certain antiquary and offering to procure any
items the Earl might fancy; in near company is a
broadside catalogue of a sale of pictures; cheek by
jowl is a receipt for money received for copying
famous paintings; Swift, in another, laments that
8
4. The British Museum: Its History
he cannot find the “old Irish coins '' desired by his
friend, and later regrets that the medals he sent
him “are perfect trash; ” William Oldys offers an
ancient manuscript as “a small instance ’’ of his
sincere gratitude; and so the story goes on. These
letters tell what manner of man Edward Harley
was; they reveal him as the friend of poets and
men of letters, an encourager of learning, a lover
of the arts, and an eager connoisseur.
Hardly, then, is it surprising to find among his
papers three letters dispatched from London hard
upon each other’s heels, all relating to one partic-
ular catastrophe. The first bears the date of 23rd
October, 1731, and tells how,
“This morning about four o’clock a fire broke
out at Ashburnham House and consumed the great-
est part of the Cottonian Library. I was present
the whole time and saw a few cases preserved and
some few books which were flung out of the window;
but the whole house may be said to be consumed.
The fire began, as Dr. Bentley told me, in a stove
chimney, which had a wooden jamb in it, and was
first discovered by himself, who being waked by his
lady's coughing perceived a smell of wood smoke.”
Three days later another letter reached the Earl.
This was from Dr. Richard Mead — who as Pope’s
physician placed that poet on a diet of asses’ milk
— and gave a more reassuring report. The doctor
had not trusted to hearsay, but had visited the
Origins 5
scene of the fire and learned that “half the manu-
scripts '' had been destroyed. “A great loss this,”
he added, “ and I cannot but reflect, with how much
concern, I have heard your Lordship’s great father
complain that care was not taken to maintain and
keep in due repair the Cotton House, that the li-
brary might have been perpetually kept there. Dr.
Bentley says that this calamity is the Nemesis of
Cotton's ghost to punish the neglect in taking due
care of his noble gift to the public.”
And then a third letter completed the story, much
as the successive editions of a modern newspaper
tone down the alarms of earlier reports. The wri-
ter was Dr. Robert Freind, headmaster of West-
minster School, who was able to assure the Earl
of Oxford that “four parts in five ’’ of the manu-
scripts had been saved. Still, it was a “ sad calam-
ity,” sufficiently grave to warrant him in offering
the new dormitory of his school as a temporary
home for the “relics '' of Cotton’s great library.
He had given refuge, too, to Bentley himself, not-
withstanding that his conversation was “not the
most polite ’’ and “made the women stare
strangely.” Excuses might be made for a man
who had been driven from home by a disastrous fire.
Out of the ashes of that fire arose the British
Museum. -
But the curious in origins may go back to a period
antedating by many years the lifetime of Sir Robert
6 The British Museum: Its History
Cotton. In fact such an inquirer might claim un-
limited license in his backward glance, arguing
that if Washington Irving was justified in making
his mysterious Knickerbocker commence his history
of New York with the creation, there is no reason
why the pedigree of the British Museum should
stop short of that event. On the Darwinian hy-
pothesis the birds of the air preceded the advent of
man, and even the record in Genesis gives them a
day’s start, all of which is of moment when the
collecting predilections of the Jackdaw and the con-
noisseurship of the Bower-Bird are kept in mind.
Darwin argued that the gayly-ornamented playing
passages of the Bower-Bird imply a sense of beauty,
and even if those feathered collectors of shells and
feathers and bones and leaves indulge their whim
with a view to amorous victories, how are they
different from those human bipeds who have been
known to frequent museums for the purpose of
courtship?
Surely, however, the serious investigator is on
solid ground when he pleads that the existence of
a museum postulates many things. It assumes, for
example, that there are manuscripts and books, and
curiosities and works of art; that men have grown
cultured enough to appreciate them; that some of
those men have the wealth necessary for their ac-
quisition; and that, as life draws to a close, the
owners of these treasures are dowered with suffi-
Origins 7
cient altruism to bequeath them for the enjoyment
of others.
Museums, in fact, are possible only when a nation
has reached a high state of civilization. That such
an institution should have existed in England in,
say, the fifteenth century is unthinkable. “These
English,” reported the Spaniards who visited the
country with Philip II, “ have their houses made of
sticks and dirt, but they fare commonly as well as
the king.” The body rather than the spirit held
supremacy then. Not until the reign of Henry VI
did brick come into general use for building pur-
poses; prior to that time houses were constructed
of wood, without chimneys, and with either lattice-
work or oiled linen or horn for windows. “The
walls were commonly bare,” says Hallam, “with-
out wainscot or even plaster; except that some
great houses were furnished with hangings, and
that perhaps hardly so soon as the reign of Ed-
ward IV. It is unnecessary to add, that neither
libraries of books nor pictures could have found a
place among furniture. Silver plate was very rare,
and hardly used for the table. A few inventories
of furniture that still remain exhibit a miserable
deficiency.” Save for the satisfying of gross appe-
tites, life centred in the fields rather than in the
home; hunting and hawking were the theme of song
and the prime object of existence.
One exception must be made. The protest made
8 The British Museum: Its History
to Haggai, “Is it time for you, O ye, to dwell in
your cieled houses, and this house lie waste? '' could
not justly have been addressed to the Englishman
of the dark ages; however poor and comfortless
his own dwelling, he lavished all his skill and much
of his wealth on the house of prayer. The churches
of his villages and the cathedrals of his cities pro-
vided him with objects for the exercise of such aes-
thetic taste as he possessed; and that fact should
lessen the surprise which is sometimes expressed
when those sacred buildings are found to contain
such articles as the modern mind usually associates
with a museum. The fact is, the parish church was
not only the store-house and armory of the fifteenth
century, where corn and wool were deposited in
unsettled days and weapons hoarded, but it was also
the only museum. “Its shrines were hung with the
strange new things which English sailors had begun
to bring across the great seas — with ‘horns of
unicorns,” ostrich eggs, or walrus tusks, or the rib
of a whale given by Sebastian Cabot.”
All this, however, might have counted for little
had not some new and potent factor come into ex-
istence. That factor was provided by the Renais-
sance. Wisely has Sidney Lee insisted that the
Renaissance was far more than a literary revival;
“it was a regeneration of human sentiment, a new
birth of intellectual, asthetic, and spiritual aspira-
tion. Life throughout its sweep was invested with
Origins 9
a new significance and a new potentiality. While
sympathy was awakened with the ideas and forms
of Greek and Latin literature, other forces were
helping to kindle a sense of joy, a love of beauty,
a lively interest in animate and inanimate nature —
of an unprecedented quality. The past fails to ac-
count for all the new growth of artistic sensibility,
of intellectual and spiritual curiosity.” It is a
commonplace that the era of the Renaissance was
not the same in all countries; that its influence was
first felt in Italy, and that it then passed to France
and Southern Germany, and, finally, at the opening
of the seventeenth century, reached England. Not
until about the middle of Elizabeth’s reign did it
become the fashion for the young Englishman of
rank and wealth to complete his education by travel
on the Continent and the study of the antiquities and
ruins, the libraries and picture galleries of France
and Italy. Prior to that time he had kept on ‘‘ his
dunghill ” and grown “stubborn and churlish; ”
travel “sweetened ” him and made him acquainted
with the graces of life and “treasuries of jewels
and robes, cabinets and rarities.” In short, as the
seventeenth century drew near, the Englishman was
unconsciously preparing for the foundation of the
British Museum.
To pick and choose among the men who contrib-
uted to that preparation is a difficult task. Some,
perhaps, would be disposed to give prominence to
10 The British Museum: Its History
Sir Philip Sidney, for did not his friend declare
that there was not an approved painter, or skilful
engineer, or excellent musician, or any other famed
artificer that refrained from seeking his patronage?
No doubt that illustrious soldier and poet was a
zealous friend of learning, but for the purpose im-
mediately in view it seems more just to lay empha-
sis upon the influence of William Camden. That
influence appears to have been overlooked by all his-
torians of the British Museum. Yet there is no
denying the fact that Camden was exceedingly sen-
sitive to the spirit of the Renaissance, and that he
was a principal cause in fostering in others “ar-
tistic sensibility '' and “intellectual curiosity.”
He has told us that as a boy he had a natural
*inclination towards antiquities, and that while a
young man at Oxford he devoted all his spare time
to his favourite pursuit. Now it should be remem-
bered that for eighteen years he was second master
of Westminster School, that for six years he held
the position of headmaster there, and that a tutor
cannot fail to impress upon his pupils the predom-
inant trait of his own character. When it is added
that Robert Cotton was a scholar at Westminster
in Camden’s time it becomes obvious that, so far
as the British Museum is concerned, the famous
antiquary has a title to remembrance in any dis-
cussion of the origins of that institution. But Cam-
den's influence accounted for far more than the
Origins 11
collecting passion of Robert Cotton; it is impos-
sible to examine the manuscript records of the late
sixteenth and early seventeenth century without
coming to the conclusion that the Westminster
schoolmaster inspired many another pupil with that
“intellectual curiosity '’ which made the British
Museum possible. One example only need be cited
— the case of Thomas Howard, second Earl of
Arundel, who received his earliest education at
Westminster, and is credited with having formed
the first large collection of works of art in England,
and was honoured by Walpole by the appellation of
“ the Father of Vertu in England.” Such illustra-
tions of the influence of Camden might be multi-
plied, but it is sufficient to emphasize the fact that
it was from him Robert Cotton acquired that appe-
tite for rare manuscripts which was to give him an
enviable position among the founders of the British
Museum.
CHAPTER II
TELE EARLIEST BENEFACTORS
OF the three names which are mentioned in the
Act of Parliament which resulted in the British
Museum taking definite form, that of Sir Robert
Cotton is the last. It ought to have been first. For
his famous library had already been the possession
of the nation for half a century.
Cotton himself had been in his grave more than
seventy years before his unique collection passed
into official keeping. Born in 1571, at Denton in
Huntingdonshire, within a few miles of the family
seat at Connington, he, as has been noted in the
previous chapter, received his earliest education at
Westminster School under the tuition of William
Camden. From Westminster he passed to Cam-
bridge, where, as his earliest biographers gravely
stated, he “took the degree of B.A. in 1575.” At
that date he would not have been much more than
four years old! The facts are that he entered Jesus
College in 1581 and proceeded to his degree four
years after. Some six or seven years later he set
up his own establishment, marrying an heiress, and
settling in a Thames-side house in Westminster, the
site of which is now covered by a part of the House
12
º
r- º º- ~~
- - * - - -
SIR ROBERT B. COTTON. . . . . * * * * *
-- r - - " - -
- -


The Earliest Benefactors 13
of Lords. This building, Cotton House, was to be
the antiquary's town abode for the remainder of
his life.
That the proximity of Cotton House to Westmin-
ster School allowed its young master to renew and
develop his boyhood friendship with Camden may
be taken for granted; in fact it is hardly exceeding
probability to conclude that Cotton's decision to
make his London home at Westminster may have
been influenced by Camden’s presence there. In
1600, when Cotton was in his thirtieth year, he kept
the author of “ Britannia '' company on a long tour
through the north of England, devoted to the exam-
ination of battlefields, the exploration of abbeys,
and an industrious gleaning of all kinds of anti-
Quarian lore. The comradeship of the two knew no
break; as Cotton gradually acquired his manuscript
treasures they were always freely placed at the
disposal of his whilom master; and in one of the
last letters Camden dictated, to which his feeble
hand could contribute nothing more than a tremu-
lous signature, there is a reference to Cotton as
“the dearest of all my friends.”
Exactly when and under what circumstances the
founder of the Cottonian library acquired his first
manuscript, and the subject of that manuscript, are
unknown. It is plain, however, that he had not long
taken up his abode at Cotton House before he began
collecting manuscripts and coins, and all kinds of
14 The British Museum: Its History
antiquarian curiosities. In the last decade of the
sixteenth century he became a member of the Anti-
quarian Society, which had been founded about
1572, and so widened his acquaintance among such
kindred spirits as John Selden, Richard Carew of
Antony, and John Speed. The second, indeed, ap-
pears to have been a member of Cotton’s own pro-
posing; hence Carew's reference to that “sweete
and respected Antiquarian Society, into which your
kyndenesse towardes mee and grace with them
made mee an Entrance.” Another remark made by
Carew is illuminating. He had lately seen a book
dedicated to one named Cotton, and was convinced
that the one so honoured was none other than his
correspondent, for, he added, “A man shall hardly
fynde any other to concurre so jumpe with you both
in name and affeccion to Antiquities.” These are
not mere compliments; Cotton had indeed by now
— the date is 1605 — won ‘‘grace ’’ with all learned
men and fame for his devotion to the lore of the
past. If proof is demanded, two convincing wit-
nesses can be cited. The first is Thomas Bodley,
the founder of Oxford’s famous library, who, in
1601, is discovered soliciting the help of Cotton in
carrying out his plan to furnish the University with
‘‘ bookes; ” the second is Richard Verstegan, that
zealous Catholic who became an exile rather than
subscribe to reformed religion, and from his retreat
at Antwerp owned, in 1609, to being well acquainted
The Earliest Benefactors 15
with Cotton’s “worthynesse.” He sent him,
though a “woorthelesse token,” the tongue of a
fish, “which tyme hath converted into a stone,”
thus paying what tribute he could to Cotton’s col-
lecting zeal.
Several years, however, before Carew's eulogies,
and Bodley’s flattering request, and Verstegan’s
tribute from across the North Sea, Cotton’s grow-
ing reputation for curious lore had been recognized
in a conclusive manner. His services had been
requisitioned by Queen Elizabeth herself. In con-
nection with the arrangement at Calais of a treaty
between the English queen and the king of Spain,
the ambassadors of the two sovereigns had fallen
into dispute as to which should have precedence
over the other. Cotton was already so well known
for his intimacy with ancient records and old-time
state ritual, that he was commanded to search into
the matter, which he did in an exhaustive manner,
advancing seven reasons why precedence belonged
to Elizabeth’s representative.
That royal commission led to the greatest sorrow
of Cotton’s life. It took him from his library to
the steps of the throne, from the abstract study of
ancient precedents to their application to contem-
porary affairs, from the peaceful retirement of the
scholar to the turbulent publicity of the statesman.
Surely it is significant that in the year following
Elizabeth’s commission he became a member of
16 The British Museum: Its History
Parliament, and that by the time James I succeeded
to the throne he was in close relations with the
leading statesmen of the day. His antiquarian
tastes commended him to the new sovereign, who
’’ in recognition of his descent
from the Bruces. Nor would James be indifferent
to the fact that Cotton had secured for his new
country house at Connington the complete timbers,
panelling, and ceiling of the room in which Mary
Stuart had been executed at Fotheringay. One way
and another Cotton was confirmed in his divided
allegiance; he entered Parliament a second time;
undertook to re-apply more antiquarian knowledge
to modern instances; accepted an appointment to
inquire into the state of the navy; discussed with
the king how the royal revenues might be increased;
and generally gave up to the state what should
have been devoted to learning. In one respect his
intimacy with the king made for the enrichment of
his library. So much pleasure did James take in
discussing antiquarian subjects with Cotton that, in
a fit of amazing generosity, he issued a special order
empowering him to collect manuscripts.
Yet, could he have foreseen the end of all this
royal favour and interference in politics, it is prob-
able that Cotton would have kept away from court
and Parliament and been content to add to his
treasures with the unaided power of his own purse.
Once mixed up with statecraft, however, he was led
called him “cousin
The Earliest Benefactors 17
on and on until he found himself the companion of
Eliot, Pym, and the rest, and reached the usual goal
— a prison cell. There is no occasion in such a con-
nection as the present to tell in detail the story of
Cotton’s political activities; it is sufficient to note
that in due time they led to his falling under the
suspicions of Charles I and the court party, and
that the tracing to his shelves of a copy of what
was accounted a seditious pamphlet resulted in his
arrest and the sealing up of his beloved library.
Even when he was released from confinement, his
manuscripts were still denied him; they remained
under lock and seal, and only in the presence of an
official of the council could he have any access what-
ever to the treasures he had amassed through so
many years and at such enormous cost.
Far pleasanter to dwell upon is that aspect of
his career which reveals him in close friendship
with men of letters, recalls the “good cheer '' of
his hospitality, and shows him diligently adding
treasure to treasure and opening his stores with
generous hand to industrious scholars. Honour
enough would it have been for most men to be
counted the friend of Sir Walter Raleigh, of Bacon,
of Ben Jonson, as Cotton was. His house by the
side of the Thames, with its ever-growing library,
was the congenial resort of those immortals and
many more of somewhat lesser fame. The most cas-
ual glance over the letters addressed to him leaves
18 The British Museum: Its History
a glowing impression of his helpfulness to scholars.
Now it is Camden who, that in his solitariness he
may ‘‘ avoid the deadly sinne of Slouth,” is an
urgent applicant for manuscripts and books; anon
there are hurrying and earnest letters from John
Speed, begging information for his “History of
Great Britain,” soliciting the loan of coins for il-
lustration, imploring aid in proof-reading, and
making frequent acknowledgment of corrections
already received; from John Borough there are
offers of services to buy rare treasures for Cotton’s
“Jewel house; ” from Dr. Ussher a promise of a
unique manuscript; from Sir John Ware a gift of
an abbey register and a significant wish that the
donor had ‘‘the happiness, by having some em-
ployment in England, to enjoy your company
and the use of your excellent Library oftener than
I do.”
And so the sixty years of Robert Cotton’s life
wore to their close. It seems probable that the
reverses which accrued from his interference in
politics hastened his end. That, at any rate, was
his own belief. When he was released from con-
finement he had little more than a year to live, but
those final months were saddened by the loss of his
beloved library. All appeals for its restoration
Were vain; two such appeals he made in the month
in which he was to pass away, and in one he pleaded
that his cherished manuscripts were being injured
The Earliest Benefactors 19
from lack of air. That, too, was futile. And the
antiquary became a changed man. “When I Went
several times to visit and comfort him in the year
1630,” wrote one of his friends, “he would tell me
“ they had broken his heart that had locked up his
library from him.’ He was so out-worn, within a
few months, with anguish and grief, as his face,
which had formerly been ruddy and well coloured
(such as the picture I have of him shows) was
changed into a grim blackish paleness, near to the
resemblance and hue of a dead visage.” And again,
a little before he died, when a messenger from
court came and hinted at a restoration to royal
favour, Cotton merely replied, “You come too late,
my heart is broken.” If one could have looked
into that heart, said another of his friends, “My
Library '' would have been found inscribed there
as Queen Mary declared “Calais '' was deeply
printed on hers.
When Cotton died on a day early in May, 1631,
he left behind him such a collection of source ma-
terial for English history as has rarely been
equalled; indeed it has been asserted that writers
upon the history and antiquities of Great Britain
have been more indebted to the inexhaustible treas-
ures of the Cottonian library than to all other
sources together. “His rich collection of Saxon
charters proved the foundation of the scholarly
study of pre-Norman-English history. . . . . Orig-
20 The British Museum: Its History
inal authorities for every period of English history
were in his possession.”
Some few years after Sir Robert’s death the
library was restored to his son, Sir Thomas Cotton,
who continued his father's generous policy of allow-
ing students free access to its treasures. From Sir
Thomas it descended to Sir John Cotton, who, two
years before his death, announced his intention of
giving it to the nation. At first it seemed as though
Oxford University might be enriched by the collec-
tion, for in 1698 the honest Humfrey Wanley, whom
we shall meet again as the custodian of the Harleian
library, wrote that a servant of Sir John had told
him, under the rose, of his master’s intention to
bestow some of his chief treasures in that quarter.
Although Sir John Cotton died before any final
arrangements were made for making the library
generally accessible, his gift was definitely con-
cluded by 1700, and thus the first foundation stone
of the British Museum was well and truly laid.
One glimpse of the inside of the library about
this time has survived in a gossipy letter from Lon-
don. The writer was engaged mainly in buying
books for a country gentleman, and hence was prob-
ably correct in thinking an account of his “short
view '’ of the Cottonian library would interest his
employer. Dating his letter 15th October, 1692, he
wrote: -
“I had a short view of Sir R. Cotton's Library.
The Earliest Benefactors 21
It is situated adjoining to the House of Commons
at Westminster, of a great height, and part of that
old fabric, but very narrow, as I remember, not
full six feet in breadth, and not above twenty six
in length; the books placed on each side, of a tol-
erable height, so that a man of an indifferent stat-
ure may reach the highest. Over the books are the
Roman Emperors, I mean, their heads, in brass
statues, which serve for standards in the catalogue,
to direct to find any particular book, that is, under
such an Emperor’s head, such an number. I had
not time to look into the books; some relics I took
notice of, besides the books; viz., I saw there Sir
H. Spelman’s and Buchanan’s pictures, well done;
also, Ben Jonson’s and Sir R. Cotton’s, and in the
stairs was Wicliff’s. I had in my hand the sword
of Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester, that came in with
the Conquest. I saw Pope Eugenius” Bull to the
Ring of England; the original in a fair Greek char-
acter in parchment, anno 1500 [?] and odd years.
Instead of wax seals, were the cardinals’ heads in
metal, that subscribed it. I also saw Dr. Dee’s in-
struments of conjuration, in cakes of beeswax al-
most petrified, with the images, lines, and figures
On it.” * -
Thirty years after the death of Cotton another
of the earliest benefactors of the British Museum
saw the light of day. This was that Robert Harley
who was to give his name to a London thorough-
22 The British Museum: Its History
fare, become the intimate friend of Swift and Pope,
be described as “ the Maecenas of learned men in
his time,” experience the triumphs and defeats of
a political career, and found that library which, in
the opinion of Dr. Johnson, excelled any other in
the value as well as the number of volumes it con-
tained.
No one acquainted with the Harley ancestry
would have predicted that one of that name would
become a patron of learning and the arts. The
father and grandfather of Robert were Puritans
of the dourest type, especially the latter, who hated
images and pictures with a consuming hatred. In
the family letters of that Sir Robert Harley is a
brief note penned by his daughter which tells how
there had been brought to her father “a most hor-
rible picture of the Great God of Heaven and Earth,
which he broke all to pieces.” That was a congenial
task. Another document in the family archives is
a copy of a stern order addressed to a couple of
churchwardens charging them on their peril to im-
mediately destroy the crosses and crucifixes and
stained-glass windows of their church. Two years
later Sir Robert Harley was appointed to a task
which gave him large liberty for his iconoclastic
zeal. This was in 1644, when the Parliamentary
party was getting the upper hand in the civil war,
and Puritanism grasping at the reins of power. A
part of the programme of the hour was to cleanse
ROBERT HARLEY, EARL OF OXFORD.


The Earliest Benefactors 23
Westminster Abbey of its “monuments of super-
stition and idolatry,” and Harley was given com-
mand of the committee appointed to achieve that
end. He revelled in the task. Among the docu-
ments which impeach and condemn Puritanism for
its ruthless hostility to the graces of life there is
none richer in damning counts than that which sets
forth the sums of money paid by Sir Robert Harley
for the spoliation of Westminster Abbey. To-day
the desecrater hands out six shillings for “three
days work in planing out some pictures in the Ab-
bey,” to-morrow it is ten shillings for “taking
down the high altar in Henry the Seventh’s
Chapel,” anon there are more liberal payments for
the demolition of angels and crosses and “colour-
ing the boards from which the carpenter had planed
off the pictures.” The list, in fact, is nigh endless.
It makes the spirit groan to note its detailed sac-
rilege. What treasures of the brush curled into
shavings under those Puritan planes, what beauties
of colour and form fell into splintered fragments as
those Puritan hammers smashed the storied panes of
glass' But Sir Robert looked on and paid his bills
in the conviction that he was doing God Service.
Was it consciousness of the iniquity of this im-
pious work which made the grandson a connois-
seur? Had he not been of so secretive a nature,
so adverse to frankness in everything relating to
his own views or actions, Robert Harley might have
}
24 The British Museum: Its History
left some answer to that natural question. The
explorer among the Harley papers must surely find
his hopes rising high when he comes upon a docu-
ment in which the founder of the library, being
alone in an inn on a journey, wrote a page or
two of his autobiography. But that document is
scanned in vain for an explanation of why and when
he first began to collect ancient manuscripts, rare
books, and choice engravings. Indeed it does not
make the least mention of that library which will
perpetuate his name when those political achieve-
ments of which he was so proud are wholly for-
gotten.
One of Harley’s biographers, however, has given
the year 1705 as the date when he acquired the
nucleus of his famous collection. But that can
hardly be correct. Four years earlier Humfrey
Wanley had been sent to Harley with a strong rec-
ommendation as one who “ has the best skill in
ancient hands and MSS. of any man not only of this,
but I believe, of any former age,” and it is difficult
to understand why so well-qualified a librarian
should have been commended to Harley if he did
not already possess a considerable library. Again,
a year later, Harley was appointed a trustee of the
Cottonian library, a fact which postulates some-
thing in his favour as a book and manuscript ex-
pert. Further, about the same time “all learned
men at Oxford ” had a “particular esteem and
The Earliest Benefactors 25
veneration ” for him, and erudite Scholars were
inscribing their tomes with his names. These facts
make it practically certain that Robert Harley
began to accumulate manuscripts and books some
years prior to 1705, though that he was a biblio-
phile from his youth, as is sometimes stated, may be
open to question.
Perhaps the year 1705 has been carelessly as-
signed because it was then he became the possessor
of the “precious library '' of Sir Symonds D’Ewes.
There is a story to the effect that Harley urged
Queen Anne to purchase D’Ewes's valuable collec-
tion, but that she declined on the plea that “while
the blood and honour of the nation was at stake
in her wars, she could not, till she had secured her
living subjects an honourable peace, bestow their
money upon dead letters.” And so, the story con-
cludes, Harley “stretched his own purse, and gave
£6000 for the library.” Which is somewhat of an
exaggeration. Wanley was the intermediary in the
transaction, for he seems to have kept closely in
touch with Harley after his introduction in 1701,
and he redeemed that promise he made to the
statesman that, if he desired D’Ewes's treasures,
he should have them “cheaper than any other per-
son whatsoever.” The sum actually given by Har-
ley has been put down at five hundred pounds, but
the total cost, on Wanley's own evidence, was fifty
pounds in excess of that amount. Even at the
26 The British Museum: Its History
higher figure the library was an astonishing bar-
gain, and Wanley’s part in its acquisition may well
have been the factor which determined Harley to
take that astute barterer into his own service.
Whatever be the actual date of the foundation
of the Harleian library, it had attained unusual
proportions in 1707. Letters of that year refer to
it as a “noble library,’’ ‘‘ a valuable store of
manuscripts,” and, on the old principle that to
him that hath shall be given, not a month passed
without its treasures being increased by gifts of
books and manuscripts. One example may be cited
in illustration. The donor in this case was Eliza-
beth Elstob, that zealous Anglo-Saxon scholar
whose appetite for languages was cultivated de-
spite the opposition of that guardian who declared
that “one tongue was enough for a woman.”
The story of her gift to the Harleian library is told
in a quaint letter by Dr. George Hicks:
“My Saxon mistress, as I call Mrs. Elstob, was
with me about a fortnight since. I then asked her
what was become of her curious copy of the Teactus
Roffensis, which she intended to present to my
Lord Treasurer; she said it was in his Lordship’s
library. I asked her then what my Lord said, when
she presented it to him; she replied that she was
ashamed to present it to him, but put it in his li-
brary, without presenting it to him or desiring Mr.
Wanley to shew it to him. At this answer I was
The Earliest Benefactors 27
much troubled, and chid her for her sheepish mod-
esty, because I knew my Lord would have been
pleased with the admirable transcript, which is as
like to the original as ever any copy of a picture
was to its original.”
By the date of this letter Robert Harley had
become the Earl of Oxford — it was right, Queen
Anne said, that he ‘‘ who is himself learned, and
a patron of learning, should happily take his title
from that city where letters do so gloriously flour-
ish ’’ — and was more than ever immersed in the
political strifes and intrigues of the day.
But was Dr. Hicks justified in crediting his Lord-
ship with so genuine an interest in scholarship?
Was Harley a Maecenas for show or of honest in-
tent? Did he deserve the ‘‘ particular esteem and
veneration ” of Oxford scholars? Was his library
dear to his heart or merely an expression of his
pride? Macaulay would not have hesitated in his
answers to such questions. A passionate Whig
himself, the historian had little but scorn for a
renegade from that camp, such as Harley became.
Hence his verdict that Harley’s intellect was
“both small and slow,” that his verses were
“more execrable than the bellman's,” and that his
reputation as a deep thinking statesman was “Sup-
ported with that cunning which is frequently found
in company with ambitious and unquiet medioc-
rity.” All this is a severe judgment, but that it
28 The British Museum: Its History
is in the main accurate seems highly probable. Ma-
caulay made a bad blunder by deriding Harley’s
poetic talent on the score of verses which were
eventually found to be Dryden's, but that Harley
was a learned man, a scholar in the uncorrupted
use of that word, and that he had a bibliophile’s
passion for ancient manuscripts and rare books
is at least open to question. Certainly in all his
voluminous correspondence there is nothing to sup-
port that view of his character. Like Sir Robert
Cotton, he, too, made the acquaintance of a cell in
the Tower, but there is no lament that his heart
was broken because he was exiled from his library.
If it be urged that he was allowed books in his
imprisonment, as was the case, it may be answered
that, so far as evidence goes, the works he asked
for were such as bore upon political affairs. “I
wanted him,” he wrote his son concerning one
author, “for a discourse between Augustus and
Livia about the best way to confirm his new gov-
ernment; it is an excellent piece.” It is true that
Matthew Prior one morning wrote this inedited
couplet in Harley's library,
“Fame counting thy books, my dear Harley, shall tell,
No man had so many, who knew them so well; ”
but it would be idle to attach serious importance
to a poetic compliment written in the early eight-
eenth century.
The Earliest Benefactors 29
With Edward Harley, however, the only son of
Robert and his successor to the title of Earl of Ox-
ford, the case seems to have been different. While
at Oxford, and not yet twenty years old, his expen-
diture for the half year included over twenty-five
pounds for books and more than sixteen pounds for
bindings, these sums together representing more
than a third of his expenses for the six months.
The young booklover was evidently alarmed when
he saw those figures, for in sending his account to
his father he wrote:
“I am extremely ashamed of the two articles
that have so great a share in it; I mean what’s
paid to the bookseller and bookbinder. I have
nothing to say in excuse for my fault but only
that as it is the first of this sort that ever I
was guilty of, so I assure you it shall be the
last.”
Alas for good intentions ! Edward Harley would
have died a richer man had he kept that youthful
resolve. The fact is, however, that, like his father,
he always had a weakness for gorgeous bindings,
and throughout his career as a collector he fre-
quently bought books, manuscripts, and miscellane-
ous curiosities at prices far in excess of their real
worth. Not that he was always what is known as
an “easy mark; ” and, besides, for several years
his treasury was faithfully protected by the astute
Wanley. Once that guardian was removed he was
30 The British Museum: Its History
pestered incessantly. Here is one Thomas Baston
who wants thirty guineas for three drawings, but
a few days later is content to take what Harley
thinks “ they may deserve; ’’ on another occasion
the Earl protests that he has been asked too high
a price for some manuscripts, makes a reduced
offer, and begs his agent not to let the owner know
who is bidding for the papers. A dealer in old
prints once angled for a large order on the plea
that the collection he offered contained a thousand
more heads of eminent men “than the king of
France has in his collection,” but whether the bait
was taken is not recorded.
Perhaps Edward Harley's inborn indolence
saved his pocket more pounds than his judgment.
In one case that indolence was protracted till it
became cruelty. Towards the end of 1719 Dr. John
Covel, the venerable master of Christ’s College,
Cambridge, sent Harley his laboriously compiled
catalogue of the miscellaneous curiosities which he
had collected in strange lands, and offered to ac-
cept for them whatever price was agreed upon by
two or three “equal and indifferent judges.” The
old man’s eulogium at the close of his letter
ought to have been rewarded with a prompt
decision. *
“There is no man living,” he wrote, “who shall
more than myself devoutly honour, or more zeal-
ously applaud, your most truly noble and glorious

The Earliest Benefactors 31
enterprise for outvying the Vatican and the great
Ptolemy himself, by your magnificent structures,
and exquisite collections of books and all other
monuments of antiquities and curiosities, which
may in all manner of literature advance the glory
of your own nation, and eternally oblige the whole
learned world.”
Notwithstanding that stately panegyric, nineteen
months later Harley was still undecided whether to
buy or decline. Then came several piteous letters
from the aged owner. He ‘‘ begged ” an answer
one way or the other; he was four score years
and four and this incertitude would “ certainly
shorten '’ his life; if Harley had lost his catalogue
he was “utterly undone; ” his infirmities were
many and increased daily; “therefore pity me, oh
pity me, by your speedy and gracious answer.”
The old man wrote no more; three months later he
was dead.
One excuse may be offered for Edward Harley,
and one only. At this time his father, the Earl of
Oxford, was still alive and may have limited his
expenditure. On the other hand, however, it is
clear from the family letters that for several years
before the Earl of Oxford’s death Lord Harley had
virtually superseded him in all matters connected
with the library and additions to its treasures.
Hence it was to Lord Harley rather than to the
Earl of Oxford that the faithful Wanley made his
32 The British Museum: Its History
reports about his progress with the catalogue, and
he it is instead of his father who is spoken of as
making purchases or receiving gifts for the collec-
tion.
For all these cases of spasmodic and sometimes
stubborn cautiousness, Edward Harley, especially
after he became Earl of Oxford in 1724, made copi-
ous and valuable additions to the family library.
And that he made them in the spirit of the true
connoisseur there can be little doubt. Before he
succeeded to the title, but especially directly after-
wards, the Harley correspondence underwent a no-
table change. Instead of copious letters on polit-
ical themes, the outpourings of statesmen and
place-hunters, the reports of spies and the records
of intrigues, we find the graceful epistles of wits
and poets, the earnest correspondence of learned
antiquaries, and the business-like missives of deal-
ers in vertu. As was claimed in the previous chap-
ter, the character of this correspondence pro-
claimed the man to whom it was addressed. What-
ever Edward Harley’s faults of indolence and ex-
travagance — extravagance which finally crippled
his finances and left him a practically ruined man —
it is surely to his praise that he preferred the so-
ciety of poets and men of letters to that of gam-
blers and debauchers, and that, to apply to him
alone that language which Dr. Johnson used for
father as well as son, he dedicated to literature and
5’
The Earliest Benefactors 33
generous and exalted curiosity that time and for-
tune which others of his rank employed in the pur-
suit of contemptible amusements or the gratifica-
tion of guilty passions.
When all this is duly recognized, who can feel
other than a pang of regret that some more divine
poet than Soame Jenyns did not exercise his musé
in praise of the Harleian library? Yet, in the ab-
sence of a more inspired eulogy, the lines, written
by Jenyns in the library itself, deserve to be re-
called in the present connection:
“Who, uninspir’d, can tread this sacred ground,
With all the sons of fame encompass'd round?
Where, crown'd with wreaths of ever-verdant bays,
Each sister art her willing charms displays:
Mellow’d by time, here beauteous paintings glow,
There marble busts illustrious faces show:
And in old coins are little heroes seen,
With venerable rust of ages green:
Around, unwounded by the teeth of age,
By Gothic fire, and persecution's rage,
Perfect and fair unnumber'd volumes stand,
By Providence preserv'd for Oxford's hand.
Whilst thus within these magic walls I stray,
At once all climes and ages I survey: .
On fancy's wings I fly from shore to shore,
Recall past time, and live whole eras o'er:
Converse with heroes fam'd in ancient SOng, .
And bards, by whom those heroes breathe so long:
Observe the quick migrations learning makes,
How harass'd nations trembling she forsakes,
34 The British Museum: Its History
And hastes away to build her downy nest
In happier climes, with peace and plenty bless'd,
See how, in fam’d Augustus' golden days,
Wit triumphs, crown'd with universal praise!
Approaches thrones with a majestic air,
The prince's mistress, and the statesman's care.
Maecenas shines in ev'ry classic page,
Maecenas once the Harley of his age.
Nor with less glory she her charms display’d,
In Albion once when royal Anna sway’d.”
But the curious in details may be anxious to learn
something of the extent of this famous library. At
the death of the first earl there were upwards of
six thousand volumes. of manuscripts, more than
fourteen thousand charters and rolls, while the
printed books extended to some twenty thousand
volumes. When the second earl, Edward Harley,
died in 1741, the manuscript volumes had increased
to nearly eight thousand and the printed books to
some fifty thousand, while of pamphlets and such
ephemeras the total amounted to nearly four hun-
dred thousand. In addition, Harley's treasures in-
cluded over forty thousand prints and a varied and
choice collection of coins, medals and portraits.
Less than a year after Edward Harley’s death
his widow had sold not only the coins, medals, and
portraits, but also the printed books, engravings,
and pamphlets. The latter were purchased en bloc
by the famous bookseller, Thomas Osborne, for
thirteen thousand pounds—a sum which would not
The Earliest Benefactors 35
have discharged the binder’s bill. Even at that
paltry price, however, Osborne found his purchase -
a veritable White elephant. In his perplexity as to
how to handle such a vast store of books, he wrote
to Dr. Birch announcing his purchase of “a more
valuable collection than perhaps was ever in the
hands of any Bookseller,” and expressing his de-
sire of “consulting the learned with regard to the
disposal of it.” The learned could not have en-
lightened him to any extent, for his sales were slow
and his profits in no relation to his large invest-
ment. -
A better fate was reserved for the Harleian man-
uscripts. The Countess of Oxford was something
of an antiquary herself, or, rather, an amateur in
genealogy. She relieved the tedium of her widow-
hood by piecing together all kinds of odds and ends
of information concerning the families with which
she was connected, and no doubt found much to
amuse or interest her in the Harleian manuscripts.
And so they escaped the saleroom. But in March,
1753, she received in rapid succession two letters
which altered her point of view. The one was from
James West, that member of Parliament who com-
bined politics with antiquarian research; the other
from Henry Drummond, then Bishop of St. Asaph
but afterwards Archbishop of York, and always a
patron of learning and art. Each letter was to the
same effect. There had been a discussion in the
36 The British Museum: Its History
House of Commons in favour of providing a per-
manent home for the Cottonian library and the
Sloane museum, and as complimentary references
had been made during the debate to the value of
the Harleian manuscripts, it occurred to both her
ladyship’s correspondents that she might be dis-
posed to consider their transference to the national
treasures. Mr. West mentioned that the sum of
ten thousand pounds had been named as a possible
purchase price.
What was the Countess to do? She soon made
up her mind to refer the decision to her daughter
and son-in-law, the Duchess and Duke of Portland.
“I desire,” she wrote, ‘‘the Duke and you to con-
sider what answer is best to return. If to sell them,
I think twenty thousand pounds should be the low-
est price to ask. . . . If you think that money can-
not be got, I leave it to you to make the best bargain
you can for me.” But the Duke and Duchess were
not inclined towards bargaining; in the true spirit
of noblesse oblige the Duchess wrote to the Speaker
of the House of Commons:
“Though I am told the expense of collecting
them was immense and that if they were to be dis-
persed they would probably sell for a great deal
of money, yet as a sum has been named and as I
know it was my father’s will and is my mother’s
intention that they should be kept together, I will
not bargain with the public. I give you this trouble
The Earliest Benefactors 37
therefore to acquaint you that I am ready to accept
of your proposal upon condition that this great and
valuable collection shall be kept together in a
proper repository as an addition to the Cotton
library and be called by the name of the Harleian
collection of manuscripts. I hope you do me the
justice to believe that I do not consider this as a
sale for an adequate price but your idea is so right
and agreeable to what I know was my father’s in-
tention that I have a particular satisfaction in con-
tributing all I can to facilitate the success of it.”
And so the Harleian manuscripts, by far the most
valuable portion of the famous library, passed into
the keeping of the British nation.
One other early benefactor of the British Mu-
seum remains to be mentioned: Sir Hans Sloane.
In the order of chronology he comes last as a col-
lector; in the practical result of his generosity he
was the immediate cause of the museum taking
objective form when it did. This, no doubt, is the
reason why he is sometimes referred to as the sole
founder of that institution.
Few physicians of the seventeenth and eighteenth
century had so varied, so prosperous, so honour-
able, or so protracted a career as Hans Sloane.
His name figures frequently in the literature of the
eighteenth century, and when he had still twenty-
five years to live he was made the target of Edward
Young’s satiric muse. Not yet had the poet
38 The British Museum: Its History
brought his “churchyard contemplations to mar-
ket ’’ in his “ Night Thoughts; ” he was vying with
Pope in lashing the fashions and foibles of the hour.
As Sloane was not a politician from whom the poet
could hope for preferment, there could be no loss
in enshrining him in such lines as these:
“But what in oddness can be more sublime
Than Sloane, the foremost toyman of his time?
His nice ambition lies in curious fancies, .
His daughter's portion a rich shell inhances,
And Ashmole's baby-house is, in his view,
Britannia's golden mine, a rich Peru!
How his eyes languish! how his thoughts adore
That painted coat, which Joseph never wore!
He shows, on holidays, a sacred pin,
That touched the ruff, that touched Queen Bess's chin.
‘Since that great dearth our chronicles deplore,
Since that great plague that swept as many more,
Was ever year unblest as this?’ he’ll cry,
‘It has not brought us one new butterfly!'”
Born in Ireland, in 1660, Hans Sloane studied
medicine at Paris and Montpelier, the latter town
having been, it will be remembered, famous for its
medical school since the twelfth century. At Mont-
pelier it was the good fortune of Sloane to make
the acquaintance of William Courten, who deepened
in the young student that strong inclination towards
the study of nature which had characterized him
from his earliest years. Having taken his degree
and been admitted a fellow of the College of Phy-
…….…
…
SIR HANS SLOANE.


The Earliest Benefactors 39
sicians in London, Sloane found himself in his
twenty-seventh year fully qualified for the exercise
of his chosen profession. And at this juncture he
was offered a position which was to be for him
as educational as Darwin’s experience on board the
Beagle. His proficiency as a medical man became
known to Christopher Monck, the second Duke of
Albemarle, who, towards the close of 1687, was
made governor-general of Jamaica. Needing a
physician for his own retinue, the Duke offered the
position to Sloane on his own conditions. Fired
with the vision of new lands and opportunities for
unusual botanical research, Sloane accepted the
post, advising his friend Courten that he designed
sending him “what is curious from the several
islands we land at.” He was absent from England
nearly twenty months, and when he returned
brought with him an amazing collection of dried
plants and other curiosities of natural history.
“My collection,” he remarked, “ of dried samples
of some very strange plants excited the curiosity
of people who loved things of that nature to See
them, and who were welcome, until I observed some
so very curious as to desire to carry part of them
privately home, and injure what they left. This
made me upon my guard.”
Having laid for his museum such an admirable
foundation, Sloane throughout the remainder of his
long life spared no pains to add to its stores. Some
40 The British Museum: Its History
three years after his return from the West Indies
the death of his friend Courten left him heir to the
valuable collection of that connoisseur. It was such
a collection, Evelyn said, ‘‘ as I had never seen in
all my travels abroad — either of private gentle-
men, or of princes. It consisted,” added the dia-
rist, ‘‘ of miniatures, drawings, shells, insects, med-
als, minerals; all being very perfect and rare of
their kind; especially his books of birds, fishes,
flowers, and shells, drawn and miniatured to the
life.” This was a notable addition to Sloane's
treasures, and gave variety to his museum. And
that he delved freely into his own purse at all times
for desirable acquisitions is eloquently demon-
strated by the fact that at the time of his death
he possessed over three thousand volumes of manu-
scripts, some forty thousand printed books, and a
countless array of medals, coins, precious stones,
antiquities, and vegetable and anatomical speci-
mens. But he was not a selfish collector. The let-
ter book of Edward Harley testifies to that fact.
Now Sloane writes to send Harley a catalogue of
manuscripts which were to be sold in Paris; anon
he informs his fellow connoisseur that he had had
offered to him a rare Greek copy of the Evangelists,
which he had declined to purchase on the ground
that it was “properer '' for Harley's library.
Although the life of Sloane has never been writ-
ten there is no lack of material. His own manu-
The Earliest Benefactors 41
scripts contain valuable data, and the diaries of the
eighteenth century are rich in picturesque refer-
ences to the famous physician. One page from such
a diary will be read with interest, especially as it
records a visit to Sloane while he was still living
in Bloomsbury and almost within a stone’s throw
of that noble building where his treasures have
found a permanent home. The extract is from the
manuscript diary of Sir Erasmus Philipps, and is
best given in its original spelling, abbreviation, and
punctuation:
“June 1st, 1730. — Sir Richard Ellys, Sir Tho.
Whored, Bartts., and their Ladies, Miss Ayer, my
Father, Bro. Bulkeley, and self waited on Sir Hanse
Sloane, Bart., President of the College of Physi-
cians, and of the Royal Society, at his House in
Gt. Russell Street, who showed us his Museum;
dined w” him, and after dinner, finish’d showing.
D* Cromwell Mortimer lives wºº him, and assisted
— a Swiss also – M*. Stanley, Sº Hanse’s eldest
daughter, din’d wºn us. About 30,000 vols, 3000
manuscripts, 500 Books of Prints, Albert Durer’s,
5 vols. folio, invaluable; also Hans Holbein; vast
No. of Curiosities in the Animal, Vegetable, and
Mineral way; a Swedish owl, 2 Crain Birds, a dog;
vast No. of Agats, an Owel in one, exact, orange;
Tobacco in others, Lusus Naturas; an opal here;
Catalogue of Books, abº 40 volumes; 250 large
Folios, Horti Sicci; Butterflies in Nos.; 23,000
42 The British Museum: Its History
Medals; Inscriptions, one exceeding fair from
Caerleon; A foetus cut out of a Woman’s belly,
thought she had the dropsy; lived afterwards, and
had several Children; Fine Injections of the Brain
by Rhuish of Amsterdam. Sir Hanse said at din-
ner, yº there were three things he never had at his
Table, viz. Salmon, Champagne, and Burgandy.
Very friendly, and seemed to take delight in shew-
ing his things. Must be 70 at least.”
Eleven years later, when he had attained the ripe
age of eighty-one, Sloane gave up his active life as
a physician and retired to what were then the rural
shades of Chelsea. He had been lord of the manor
there for a quarter of a century, having purchased
in 1714 the fine old mansion and its spacious gar-
den. It was an ideal haven for a man of his tastes,
and the house provided him with ample room for
the proper display of his varied treasures. Here
he spent the last twelve years of his life, and,
thanks to the recording pen of Sylvanus Urban,
there is in existence a pleasant picture of the ven-
erable man and his famous collection. This narra-
tive, which was published in the Gentleman’s Mag-
azine for July, 1748, relates the visit of the Prince
and Princess of Wales, the parents of George III.
It adds a certain piquancy to its perusal to remem-
ber that although Frederick Louis “affected to pat-
ronize the arts and literature, his tastes were not
otherwise refined,” and that Horace Walpole de-
The Earliest Benefactors 43
clared the chief passion of the prince “was women;
but, like the rest of his race, beauty was not a neces-
sary ingredient.” As with the quotation from Sir
Erasmus Philipps's diary, the account is best given
in its original form:
“Dr. Mortimer, secretary to the Royal Society,
conducted their Royal Highnesses into the room
where Sir Hans was sitting, being antient and in-
firm. The Prince took a chair and sat down by the
good old gentleman some time, when he expressed
the greatest esteem and value he had for him person-
ally, and how much the learned world was obliged
to him for his having collected such a vast library
of curious books, and such immense treasures of the
valuable and instructive productions of nature and
art. Sir Hans’s house forms a square of above
100 feet each side enclosing a court; and three
front rooms had tables set along the middle, which
were spread over with drawers fitted with all sorts
of precious stones in their natural beds, or state as
they are found in the earth, except the first, that
contained stones formed in animals, which are so
many diseases of the creature that bears them; as
the most beautiful pearls, which are but warts in
the shell fish; the bezoars, concretions in the stom-
ach; and stones generated in the kidneys and blad-
der, of which man woefully knows the effects; but
the earth in her bosom generates the verdant emer-
ald, the purple amethist, the golden topaz, the azure
44 The British Museum: Its History
Saphire, the crimson garnet, the scarlet ruby, the
brilliant diamond, the glowing opal, and all the
painted varieties that Flora herself might wish to
be decked with ; here the most magnificent vessels
of cornelian, onyx, sardonyx and jasper, delighted
the eye, and raised the mind to praise the great
creator of all things.
“When their Royal Highnesses had viewed one
room, and went into another, the scene was shifted,
for, when they returned, the same tables were cov-
ered for a second course with all sorts of jewels,
polished, and set after the modern fashion; or with
gems carved or engraved; the stately and instruct-
ive remains of antiquity; for the third course the
tables were spread with gold and silver ores, with
the most precious and remarkable ornaments used
in the habits of men, from Siberia to the Cape of
Good Hope, from Japan to Peru; and with both
ancient and modern coins and medals in gold and
silver, the lasting monuments of historical facts;
as those of Prusius, king of Bithynia, who be-
trayed his allies; of an Alexander, who mad with
ambition, over-run and invaded his neighbours; of
a Casar, who inslaved his country to satisfy his
own pride; of a Titus, the delight of mankind; of
a Pope Gregory XIII. recording on a silver medal
his blind zeal for religion, in perpetuating thereon
the massacre of the protestants in France; as did
Charles IX. the then reigning king in that country;
The Earliest Benefactors 45
here may be seen the coins of a king of England,
crowned at Paris; a medal representing France
and Spain, striving which should first pay their
obeissance to Britannia; others showing the effect
of popular rage, when overmuch oppressed by their
superiors, as in the case of the De Witts in Holland;
the happy deliverance of Britain, by the arrival of
King William; the glorious exploits of a Duke of
Marlborough, and the happy arrival of the present
illustrious royal family amongst us.
“The gallery, 110 feet in length, presented a
most surprising prospect; the most beautiful corals,
crystals and figured stones; the most brilliant but-
terflies, and other insects, shells painted with as
great variety as the precious stones, and feathers
of birds vying with gems; here the remains of the
Antediluvian world excited the awful idea of the
great catastrophe, so many evident testimonies of
the truth of Moses’s history; the variety of animals
shows us the great beauty of all parts of the crea-
tion. -
“Then a noble vista presented itself through
several rooms filled with books, among these many
hundred volumes of dried plants; a room full of
choice and valuable manuscripts; the noble present
sent by the present French king to Sir Hans, of his
collections of paintings, medals, statues, palaces,
etc. in 25 large atlas volumes; besides other things
too many to mention here. -
46 The British Museum: Its History
“Below-stairs some rooms are filled with the
curious and venerable antiquities of Egypt, Greece,
Hetruria, Rome, Britain, and even America, others
with large animals preserved in the skin; the great
saloon lined on every side with bottles filled with
spirits, containing various animals. The halls are
adorned with the horns of divers creatures, as the
double-horned Rhinoceros of Africa, the fossil
deer’s horns from Ireland nine feet wide; and with
weapons of different countries, among which it ap-
pears that the Mayalese, and not our most Chris-
tian neighbours the French, had the honour of in-
venting that butcherly weapon the bayonet. Fifty
volumes in folio would scarce suffice to contain a
detail of this immense museum, consisting of above
200,000 articles.
“Their royal highnesses were not wanting in
expressing their satisfaction and pleasure, at seeing
a collection, which surpassed all the notions or ideas
they had formed from even the most favourable
accounts of it. The Prince on this occasion showed
his great reading and most happy memory; for in
such a multiplicity, such a variety of the produc-
tions of nature and art; upon anything being
shown him he had not seen before, he was ready
in recollecting where he had read of it; and upon
viewing the ancient and modern medals, he made
so many judicious remarks, that he appeared to be
a perfect master of history and chronology; he
The Earliest Benefactors 47
expressed the great pleasure it gave him to see so
magnificent a collection in England, esteeming it
an ornament to the nation; and expressed his sen-
timents how much it must conduce to the benefit of
learning, and how great an honour will redound to
Britain, to have it established for public use to the
latest posterity.”
When that narrative was published, Sir Hans
Sloane had still nearly five years of life before him.
But his thoughts were already busy with the final
disposal of his museum, and a year after the royal
visit he made a will bequeathing it to the British
nation on the condition that the government paid
his executors the sum of twenty thousand pounds,
that not being, Sir Hans added, a fourth of the
real and intrinsic value of his treasures. He died
on the eleventh of January, 1753, and with his pass-
ing the founding of the British Museum was
brought within measurable distance.
CHAPTER III
TELE MUSEUM FOUNDED
BUT it is time to return to that fire which jeopard-
ized the Cottonian library to such an alarming ex-
tent. -
Without seeing in the conflagration “the Neme-
sis of Cotton’s ghost '' it is possible to recognize it
as a providence in disguise, for the flames at Ash-
burnham House did sear the consciences of British
legislators. The immediate result of the catastro-
phe was the appointment of a committee of the
House of Commons charged with the duty of in-
Quiring into the fire and with the further task of
reporting upon the extent of the damage done.
From the documents laid upon the table of the
House of Commons by that committee it is possible
to gain a clear idea of what had happened. The
fire, as Edward Harley’s correspondents reported,
was discovered about two o'clock on the morning of
October 23rd, 1731. Not appreciating the extent to
which the flames had taken hold of the building, the
fire-fighters at first paid no attention to the precious
manuscripts but busied themselves with throwing
water on the burning timbers. But those efforts
proved futile, and as the engines did not arrive “so
48
The Museum Founded - 49
soon as could be wished,” it at last dawned upon the
excited custodians that their wisest policy was to
save the manuscripts as far as possible. The deputy
librarian had sufficient coolness to seize first upon
the most valuable documents, such as the famous
Alexandrian MS., but for the rest the salvage was g
attempted without bibliographical zeal. Some
presses were broken open as they came handy,
others were hauled out intact, while the books, “as
many as could be, were thrown out of the windows.”
Happily the fire-fighters were soon re-enforced by
a capable captain. This was not Dr. Bentley, the
librarian, who should have been foremost in the con-
flict, but who is said to have fled from the building
immediately the fire was discovered; but Arthur
Onslow, that incorrupt politician to whose credit
stands the enviable record of having been Speaker
of the House of Commons for thirty-three years.
As soon as the fire was reported to him he hastened
to the scene, took charge of the operations, and him-
self rendered yeoman’s help in carrying the manu-
scripts and books to a place of safety. This was a
labour of love to Arthur Onslow, for has he not
recorded, in his inedited autobiography, how as a
young man at Oxford he “got into a love of books
and reading?”
Not content with his share in the salvage, Onslow
at once called a meeting of his fellow trustees to
take immediate counsel as to the best means of re-
50 The British Museum: Its History
pairing such of the manuscripts as had been dam-
aged by the flames. At that gathering an elaborate
scheme was resolved upon. The paper books were
to be unbound, their leaves soaked in the “softest
and clearest '’ water obtainable, then immersed in
a solution of alum and water, and afterwards hung
upon lines until they were dry enough to be re-
bound. The vellum manuscripts were to be care-
fully sorted into damaged and undamaged, and then
the latter were to be further segregated according to
whether their injury had been caused by fire or
water, after which they were to be carefully and
tenderly treated as their needs required. Even the
fragments were to be “carefully cleaned and re-
paired.” In fact, so far as the knowledge of the day
went, Onslow and the other trustees did their ut-
most to mitigate the ravages of the flames.
All this was duly and generously acknowledged
by the committee in their report to the House of
Commons — a report which dealt faithfully with the
dereliction of duty which the nation’s officials had
been guilty of in connection with the Cottonian li-
brary. “The public faith,” they said, “is engaged
for the better reception and preservation of the
Cottonian Library.”
Prior to their ordeal by fire, Sir Robert Cotton’s
books and manuscripts had passed through many
tribulations. It has been shown in the previous
chapter how the collection fell under suspicion in its
The Museum Founded 51
owner's lifetime, and was formally sealed up and
placed under the guardianship of a court official.
Later its shelves were ruthlessly searched for im-
aginary stolen property, and it remained under a
ban for some years as though it were a hot-bed of
treason. Then came the civil war, and as its owner
in these unsettled days, Sir Thomas Cotton, was
keenly alive to the suspicion with which his father’s
library was regarded, he took the precaution of re-
moving the greater part of its contents to his son's
country villa at Eyworth in Bedfordshire. During
the temporary exile of the library Cotton House was
placed at the disposal of the Parliamentary party,
who allowed Charles I to sleep under its roof dur-
ing his trial. When order was once more restored
in the kingdom the books and manuscripts were re-
turned to their home, but by 1706 Cotton House had
become so dilapidated as to be no longer a fit re-,
pository for such treasures. In that year Sir Chris-
topher Wren was deputed to examine the building
and fit it for public use, but he had to report that
it had fallen into utter decay. The apartment in
which the library was kept was described as “a
narrow, little room, damp, and improper for pre-
serving the books and papers.” All this was set
forth in an Act of Parliament, but nothing was done.
Six years later, however, Cotton House had become
so ruinous that the library was transferred to Essex
House in the Strand, which, for all its congenial as-
52 The British Museum: Its History
sociations with the poet Spenser, was “surrounded
with buildings, and therefore in danger of fire.”
There, nevertheless, the books and manuscripts re-
mained for eighteen years, until, in fact, 1730, when
the government of the day became so far conscious
of its duty to Cotton’s invaluable legacy as to pur-
chase Ashburnham House for its home. That build-
ing, situated in Little Dean’s Yard, under the
shadow of Westminster Abbey, had been designed
by Inigo Jones for the family whose name it bore,
but reverses of fortune compelled its sale. This
house, as has been seen, nearly proved fatal to the
Cottonian collection. It has also been recorded that
when the fire occurred, Dr. Freind, the headmaster
of Westminster School, offered the hospitality of his
new dormitory to the charred and endangered vol-
umes. The schoolhouse was but the other side of
Little Dean's Yard, and there the books and manu-
scripts were to remain until, their wanderings and
perils at an end, they found a secure haven in a
suitable building.
That, however, was not until twenty-seven years
later. And Heaven knows how much longer it would
have been but for Sir Hans Sloane's death. His
will was of such a nature that his executors and
trustees felt it incumbent upon them to act quickly.
Hence, sixteen days after Sloane’s death they met
in council, and as a result of their deliberations
agreed to present a memorial to the king urging
The Museum Founded 53
the acceptance of the terms on which Sir Hans had
bequeathed his museum to the nation, that is, the
payment of twenty thousand pounds to his execu-
tors. But here there was another hitch. It seemed
as though the fates were conspiring against the birth
of the British Museum. For, in the year 1753, the
throne of England was occupied by George II. This
was singularly unfortunate, for not only was
George II indifferent to the claims of letters, but he
had a rapacious spirit where money was concerned,
save, perhaps, in connection with his mistresses. It
was little wonder, then, that when the memorial was
presented he dismissed it with the remark, “I don’t
think there are twenty thousand pounds in the treas-
ury.”
Such may have been the case, but that fact did not
daunt Arthur Onslow. That single-hearted politi-
cian now took the matter in hand, prompted thereto,
no doubt, by his lively recollection of his efforts to
save the Cottonian manuscripts from the flames.
For it should be noted that by this time the idea
for a British Museum had taken more or less defi-
nite form; Sloane’s bequest was an important addi-
tion to the Cottonian Library and afforded a reason
why an effort should be made to house the two col-
lections in one suitable building. Besides, there
were the invaluable Harleian manuscripts — might
not they also be saved from dispersion and added
to the national stores? So a discussion in the House
54 The British Museum: Its History
of Commons was arranged for, and out of that dis-
cussion arose that proposal which the Countess of
Oxford referred to the Duke and Duchess of Port-
land with such good results. To facilitate the adop-
tion of the scheme, Onslow proposed the authoriza-
tion by Parliament of a public lottery for a sum of
money sufficient to provide enticing prizes and leave
a balance ample for all the purposes in view.
For result is not the statute-book of England en-
grossed with that piece of legislation occultly de-
scribed as ‘‘ 26 Geo. 2, c. 22? '” The preamble ex-
plains it to be ‘‘ an Act for the Purchase of the
Museum or Collection of Sir Hans Sloane and of
the Harleian Collection of Manuscripts, and for pro-
viding one general repository for the better recep-
tion and more convenient use of the said Collections,
and of the Cottonian Library, and of the additions
thereto.” The Act comprised forty-nine sections,
one of which authorized the holding of a lottery to
raise three hundred thousand pounds, out of which
thirty thousand pounds were to be paid to the execu-
tors of Sloane and the Countess of Oxford, while
another thirty thousand pounds were to be invested
at interest in the public funds for the payment of
salaries and other expenses. In addition a sufficient
sum was to be devoted to the building or acquisition
of a suitable home for the collections. The passing
of this Act in 1753 definitely marked the foundation
of the British Museum.
The Museum Founded 55
But how about that “general repository? ''
That was the next question to exercise the trustees
who were appointed to carry out the Act. The
manor house of Sir Hans Sloane at Chelsea was
wisely ruled out of court as too remote from the
centre of eighteenth-century London. Far more
conveniently situated was Buckingham House, that
spacious mansion of the Duke of Buckinghamshire,
which occupied the site now burdened by Bucking-
ham Palace. In 1753 it belonged to a natural son
of the Duke, who, however, was anxious to convert
it into hard cash. But as he wanted thirty thousand
pounds for the structure, the trustees decided to
look elsewhere. And they found what they wanted
in Montagu House, Bloomsbury, which, with its
seven acres of ground, fronted on that Great Rus-
sell Street where Sir Hans Sloane had his home in
1730.
As its name would suggest, Montagu House was
built by Ralph Montagu, that “arrant a knave as
any in his time ’’ who spent what time he had left
from his amours in any plot which promised his
own advancement. The first mansion to which he
gave his own name was built in 1678, and when
Evelyn visited it the following year he found it
‘‘somewhat after the French.” That is not sur-
prising; Ralph Montagu was fond of French fash-
ions. In that very year he was acting as ambassador
for Charles II at Paris, and was giving the gossips
56 The British Museum: Its History
material for their letters. “There are terrible do-
ings at Paris between my Lady Cleveland and her
daughter Sussex,” wrote one of those news vendors.
“As I am a friend to the family, till the story be
more complete I will not venture at sending you the
whole relation, but whilst the mother was in Eng-
land the daughter was debauched by our ambassa-
dor, Mr. Montagu, who has lived with her in the most
open scandal to the wonder of the French court and
the high displeasure of this.”
However, the first Montagu House was not des-
timed to harbour such serious guests as the Cotto-
nian, Harley, and Sloane collections. It was burnt
six years later. Then was built that successor which
was offered to the trustees of the British Museum
for ten thousand, two hundred and fifty pounds.
That offer was accepted, but nearly six years were
to elapse ere the building was thrown open to the
public, for many alterations were deemed necessary,
and these appear to have been carried out in that
leisurely manner which characterized all the birth
throes of the British Museum.
Not, then, until 15th of January, 1759, did that in-
stitution enter upon its beneficient career. The
event made no stir in the news of the day. Here, in
evidence thereof, is the page of the monthly chron-
icle in the Annual Register for that year, wherein
the recorder of that day set down the most impor-
tant happenings. Under the fifteenth of January
№ae,
* GISO OH O £)VLNO IN

The Museum Founded 57
two items are reported, one telling how two English
officers had gone to Ostend to arrange a general
exchange of French and English prisoners; the
other recording the arrest of six Sussex pirates
who had been plundering a Danish ship. But not
a sentence about the opening of the British Mu-
seum !
When the colloquialism ‘‘ thrown open to the pub-
lic ’’ was used a few sentences back it was with a
large mental reservation. “ Thrown open '' is far
too generous a term to apply to the regulations
under which visitors were first admitted to the Brit-
ish Museum. To-day the building is open through-
out the year save on Good Friday and Christmas
day; even on Sunday afternoons visitors are wel-
comed; and, save for the special students’ rooms,
every nook and corner of the vast treasure-house
may be freely explored. If a student of books or
newspapers, or of manuscripts, or of prints and
drawings, etc., wishes admission to either of the spe-
cial rooms set aside in connection with those depart-
ments, he has but to apply to the Director’s office
and be at once armed with a temporary order.
Should he wish to pursue his studies for weeks and
months instead of days, an application accompanied
by a suitable reference will speedily elicit a six
months’ ticket of admission “with the Director’s
compliments.” Difficult, indeed, would it be to name
a public institution where the highest officials to the
58 The British Museum: Its History
lowest are more unfailing in courtesy and helpful-
Ile SS.
Two or three sentences, then, would suffice to de-
fine the conditions under which visitors and students
are admitted to the museum to-day, but a century
and a half ago it needed a small pamphlet to contain
the regulations thought necessary by the trustees.
At the outset it demanded something like a mathe-
matical calculation to determine when the building
was and was not open. There were so many excep-
tions. For example, ‘‘ except Saturday and Sunday
in each week; ” likewise “except Christmas day
and one week after; ’’ also except the week after
Easter Sunday and the week after Whit-Sunday;
and except Good Friday, and ‘‘ all days, which are
now, or shall hereafter be specially appointed for
Thanksgivings or fasts by public authority.” Hav-
ing mastered these exceptions, the next mnemonic
lesson was to remember that “between the months
of September and April inclusive, from Monday to
Friday inclusive, the museum be opened, from nine
o'clock in the morning till three in the afternoon;
and likewise at the same hours on Tuesday, Wednes-
day, and Thursday, in May, June, July, and August;
but on Monday and Friday, only from four o’clock
to eight in the afternoon, during those four months,
except at the times above stated.”
Having eliminated all the exceptions, and gained
some sort of an idea at what hour the museum was
The Museum Founded 59
open when it was open, the prospective visitor had
not by any means reached the end of his troubles.
Far from it. There was the question of getting in.
At the entrance was a lodge, in the lodge was a por-
ter, by the porter’s side was a formidable volume
known as the register, and until the persevering ap-
plicant had given his name, condition, and address
to the porter; and until that official had entered
those particulars in the aforesaid register; and
until that volume had been duly laid before the libra-
rian or his understudy; and until that librarian or
his next in command had decided the weighty prob-
lem as to whether the person applying was
“proper '' to be admitted; and until — the solu-
tion being in the affirmative — either of those offi-
cials issued a ticket for admission, the prospective
visitor had no more chance of getting inside the
museum than Satan has of eluding the vigilance of
St. Peter at the gates of Heaven.
It will be gathered from the foregoing that the
inquiring person who contemplated the pleasure of
inspecting the treasures in Montagu House had to
make two visits to secure his ticket. Such was the
case. Hence it was on a third journey only that he
was able to gain admission. Even then he might
have to wait several hours for his turn. This was
owing to the fact that no more than ten tickets could
be used for each hour the museum was open, for the
visitors were escorted round in little parties of that
60 The British Museum: Its History
number, and consequently it might easily happen
that even on his third call the visitor would have to
go away with his object unaccomplished.
Granting, however, that he was fortunate enough
to get into one of the groups of ten, what was his
experience? At that time the museum consisted of
three departments — that is, manuscripts and med-
als, natural and artificial productions, and printed
books — and just so many hours and no more were
allowed for the inspection of the whole. And the
various objects were shown in a manner which im-
plied that each of the visitors was a possible thief.
For example: “if any of the spectators desire to
see any book, or other part of the collection, it be
handed to them by the officer, as far as is consistent
with the security of the collection, to be judged of
by the said officer; who is to restore it to its place,
before they leave the room.” And again: “That
the coins and medals, except such as the standing
committee shall order, from time to time, to be
placed in glass cases, be not exposed to view, but
by leave of the trustees, in a general meeting, or
of the principal librarian; that they be shown be-
tween the hours of one and three in the afternoon,
by one of the officers, who have the custody of them;
that no more than two persons be admitted into the
room to see them at the same time, unless by par-
ticular leave of the principal librarian.” But it
would be tedious to merely recite all the infinite de-
The Museum Founded 61
tail of restrictions which hedged the visitor round
at every step; sufficient has been cited to show how
superficial must have been his acquaintance with the
treasures he had taken so much pains to see. And
it should be noted that at this time ‘‘ no children ''
were admitted to the museum under any considera-
tion.
For over forty years the Draconian regulations
outlined above were kept in force with but slight
modification. The results may be imagined. In
1776 those who had applied for tickets in April were
still waiting for them in August 1 Six years later it
was possible to obtain a ticket in about a fortnight,
but even then, as a visitor sadly noted, “it was the
room, the glass-cases, the shelves, which I saw; not
the museum itself, so rapidly were we hurried on
through the departments.” And the ticket specula-
tor of those days reaped a rich harvest, doing a
thriving trade in selling to country visitors that card
of admission which their short stay in the capital
prevented them securing for themselves. One such
visitor from the country has left us a picture of his
gallop through the museum. “We began to move
pretty fast, when I asked with some surprise
whether there were none to inform us what the
curiosities were as we went along. A tall genteel
young man in person, who seemed to be our conduc-
tor, replied with some warmth : ‘What! would you
have me tell you everything in the museum? How
62 The British Museum: Its History
is it possible? Besides, are not the names written
upon many of them?' I was too much humbled by
this reply to utter another word. The company
seemed influenced; they made haste, and were si-
lent. No voice was heard but in whispers. When
our leader opens the door of another apartment, the
silent language of that action is, ‘Come along.' . . .
In about thirty minutes we finished our silent jour-
ney through this princely mansion, which would well
have taken thirty days. I went out much about as
wise as I went in, but with this severe reflection that,
for fear of losing my chance, I had that morning
abruptly torn myself from three gentlemen with
whom I was engaged in an interesting conversation,
had lost my breakfast, got wet to the skin, spent
half-a-crown in coach hire, paid two shillings for a
ticket, and been hackneyed through the rooms with
violence.”
Not until 1805 was the ticket speculator elimi-
nated, and three more years were to elapse ere ad-
mission cards were finally abolished.
But the adoption of a more liberal policy was a
slow process. In 1835 the public were admitted to
the museum on but three days of the week, Monday,
Wednesday, and Friday, Tuesday and Thursday be-
ing reserved for “artists,” and Saturday always
kept sacred as the “general cleansing day.” When,
during the Parliamentary inquiry which was held in
1835, a tentative suggestion was made that a part of
The Museum Founded 63
Saturday might suffice for cleansing, the officials
scouted the idea as impracticable. And they resisted
just as strenuously the proposal that the policy of
closing the museum for one month in the year
should be abandoned, blandly oblivious to the fact
that the argument adduced — that it was necessary
for “cleaning, whitewashing, and re-arranging ” —
had been previously used in favour of keeping the
building shut for two months. The apologists of
the officials contend that all these objections were
the result of too small a staff and an inadequate
grant from the national treasury for working ex-
penses.
Certainly it cannot be denied that for many years
the grants for the British Museum were either small
or grudgingly given. When the annual estimates
were under discussion in the House of Commons in
1833, William Cobbett gave a typical example of his
persistent pugnacity in opposing the proposed grant
of sixteen thousand pounds for the upkeep of the in-
stitution. Of what use in the wide world, he asked,
was that British Museum; to whom, and to what
class of persons was it useful? “Let those who
lounged in it and made it a place of amusement, con-
tribute to its support. Why should tradesmen and
farmers be called upon to pay for the support of a
place which was intended only for the amusement of
the curious and the rich, and not for the benefit or
for the instruction of the poor? If the aristocracy
64 The British Museum: Its History
wanted the Museum as a lounging place, let them
pay for it. For his own part, he did not know where
this British Museum was, nor did he know much of
the contents of it; but from the little he had heard
of it, even if he knew where it was, he would not
take the trouble of going to see it.” And so forth.
Seven years before that diatribe, however, there
were visible signs in stones and mortar that the
nation’s representatives were beginning to adopt a
more generous policy in connection with the insti-
tution. In October, 1826, the Annual Register re-
ported that “the building, lately erected in the gar-
den of the British Museum, for the reception of the
library presented by his Majesty, is nearly in a
finished state.” The building referred to is that
part of the present structure known as the King’s
Library, the long and handsome gallery which runs
almost the entire length of the east side of the mu-
seum. The erection of that gallery inaugurated the
building of the museum in its present form. By
1823 the collections had increased so enormously
that Montagu House became far too straitened for
their accommodation, and the acquisition of George
III's eighty-four thousand volumes made the pro-
vision of more room an imperative necessity. And
the growing need for more and still more space was
satisfied year by year until the last trace of Mon-
tagu House disappeared and the present quadran-
gular building completed in 1847. Since that date
s
‘GISQOH QĐVLNOJN (IN IHGHAI NOILOGIHOI JO GISHQ OO NI INQUISQ IN HSILIH H

The Museum Founded 65
the chief additions to the structure have been the
famous circular Reading-Room, completed in 1857,
and the White Wing on the east, erected in 1884.
Imposing as is the principal façade of the mu-
seum, with its numerous Ionic columns and its pedi-
ment with sculptures by Westmacott, representing
the progress of the human race, the most notable
architectural feature of the building is that spa-
cious circular Reading-Room with its monster dome
two feet larger than that of St. Peter’s at Rome.
What a contrast that noble apartment is compared
with the tiny basement room in Montagu House
which was in 1759 thought ample for the needs of
literary students In that original Reading-Room
there was but one simple, baize-covered table, and
the chairs were but twenty in number. Even so,
however, the accommodation was equal to the de-
mand. Writing six months after the museum was
opened, the poet Gray informed his friend Mason,
“I am just settled in my new habitation in South-
ampton Row, and, though a solitary and dispirited
creature, not unquiet nor wholly unpleasant to my-
self. The museum will be my chief amusement. I
this day passed through the jaws of a great levia-
than that lay in my way into the den of Dr. Tem-
pleman, superintendent of the Reading-Room, who
congratulated himself on the sight of so much good
company. We were — a man that writes for Lord
Royston; a man that writes for Dr. Barton of
66 The British Museum: Its History
York; a third that writes for the Emperor of Ger-
many or Dr. Peacock, for he speaks the worst Eng-
lish I ever heard; Dr. Stukely, who writes for him-
self, the very worst person he could write for; and
I, who only read to know if there were anything
worth writing, and that not without some diffi-
culty.”
Six in all, including the official 1 No wonder the
trustees thought one table and twenty chairs ample
accommodation. If it be answered that those were
early days, the rejoinder is supplied in Disraeli’s
reference to the experience of his parent: “When
my father first frequented the reading-room of the
British Museum at the end of the last century, his
companions never numbered half a dozen.” So
late as 1805 that was about the average. By that
date, however, the readers had long been provided
with an upstair room in Montagu House, which
continued in use until 1817. By that time their
numbers had increased so considerably that another
and larger apartment was set aside, and five years
later it became necessary to increase the accommo-
dation once more. But the problem of finding room
for the ever-growing army of book students was not
to be solved by makeshifts.
What had happened since the almost solitary
vigils of Gray and Isaac Disraeli was that the mod-
ern passion for book-making had set in and was
taking possession of an ever increasing army. It
The Museum Founded 67
was in those changing times that Washington Irv-
ing sauntered one day into the museum, and, hav-
ing tired of the Egyptian mummies and other curi-
osities, found his attention attracted to a distant
door.
“It was closed, but every now and then it would
open, and some strangely favoured being, generally
clothed in black, would steal forth, and glide
through the rooms, without noticing any of the sur-
rounding objects. There was an air of mystery
about this that piqued my languid curiosity, and I
determined to attempt the passage of that strait,
and to explore the unknown regions beyond. The
door yielded to my hand, with that facility with
which the portals of enchanted castles yield to the
adventurous knight-errant. I found myself in a
spacious chamber, surrounded with great cases of
venerable books. Above the cases, and just under
the cornice, were arranged a great number of black-
looking portraits of ancient authors. About the
room were placed long tables, with stands for read-
ing and writing, at which sat many pale, studious
personages, poring intently over dusty volumes,
rummaging among mouldy manuscripts, and taking
copious notes of their contents. A hushed stillness
reigned throughout this mysterious apartment, ex-
cepting that you might hear the racing of pens over
sheets of paper, or occasionally the deep sigh of
one of these sages, as he shifted his position to turn
68 The British Museum: Its History
over the page of an old folio; doubtless arising
from that hollowness and flatulency incident to
learned research.
“Now and then one of these personages would
write Something on a small slip of paper, and ring
a bell, whereupon a familiar would appear, take
the paper in profound silence, glide out of the room,
and return shortly loaded with ponderous tomes,
upon which the other would fall tooth and nail with
famished voracity. I had no longer a doubt that
I had happened upon a body of magi, deeply en-
gaged in the study of occult sciences. . . . My curi-
osity being now fully aroused, I whispered to one
of the familiars, as he was about to leave the room,
and begged an interpretation of the strange scene
before me. A few words were sufficient for the
purpose. I found that these mysterious person-
ages, whom I had mistaken for magi, were princi-
pally authors, and in the very act of manufacturing
books. I was, in fact, in the reading-room of the
great British Library.”
As has been noted, how to provide for that ever-
growing tribe of book manufacturers became a seri-
ous problem. The trustees discussed it for years,
and seemed at the end as far as ever from the solu-
tion, inasmuch as all the plans suggested were based
upon the purchase of more land than already be-
longed to the museum. Then someone had a happy
idea. Exactly who the someone was is a matter
The Museum Founded 69
still as undecided as the identity of Junius. Like
Columbus with the egg, the plan to-day looks child-
ishly simple. The museum buildings are in the
form of a quadrangle, and at the time when more
library space was an urgent necessity the inner
area of the structure was wholly unoccupied, save
by a sickly-looking grass lawn which the children
of one of the officials used as a playground. The
credit of the “happy thought '’ of utilizing this
waste space is claimed for three men, but it would
seem that the first to place the suggestion on record
was Thomas Watt, who, as early as 1837, wrote:
“The space, thus unfortunately wasted, would
have provided accommodation for the whole Li-
brary.” Whether Anthony Panizzi was acquainted
with that remark seems improbable, but even Mr.
Watt declared that, whoever suggested the proposi-
tion, “it was only such a man as Panizzi who could
have got the project carried out.” It was a difficult
task, for government sanction and treasury support
were but slowly obtained. However, the day was
finally won, and the building begun in 1854. Three
years later the splendid apartment was finished to
its last item at a total cost of about one hundred
and fifty thousand pounds.
Naturally the distinctly literary associations of
the British Museum cluster most thickly around
those apartments which have been more intimately
connected with the department of printed books.
V
70 The British Museum: Its History
Although the old rooms have vanished, that where
Gray found himself in such a select company, and
the other to which Washington Irving penetrated
in so clandestine a manner, the present spacious
apartment has in its more than half-century of his-
tory gathered associations which to a distant age
will vie with those of the past.
Since the great Reading-Room was completed the
only notable addition to the structure of the British
Museum has been the erection, in 1884 as already
stated, of that White Wing which owes its exist-
ence to William White’s generous bequest. But
the museum has gained in space in another way.
Between 1880 and 1883 the natural history collec-
tions were removed from the Bloomsbury institu-
tion to the Natural History Museum at South Ken-
sington, such a separation having become necessary
not only by consideration of space but by the im-
mense growth of scientific knowledge. Hence those
who are anxious to inspect the ‘‘ embrios and cock-
leshells,’’ ‘‘ sharks with one ear, and spiders as
big as geese,” which Horace Walpole was given the
co-guardianship of, must seek them elsewhere than
under the roof of the successor of Montagu House.
t
CHAPTER IV
IANDMARKS IN GROWTIEI
BETWEEN the passing of that Act of Parliament
which was the foundation charter of the British
Museum and the actual opening of Montagu House,
the three collections which were the immediate oc-
casion of the act were augmented by a fourth of
considerable value. This was the first of the two
royal libraries which form part of the literary
treasures of the institution, and consisted of the
books which had been collected by the kings of Eng-
land from the time of Henry VII. The foundation
of that library dates back, then, to the fifteenth cen-
tury, and it is eminently appropriate that it should
have owed its beginnings to “the Solomon of Eng-
land,” who was as interested in the achievements
of Caxton as in the explorations of the Cabots.
At the opening of the seventeenth century, how-
ever, the royal library was hardly of an importance
commensurate with the position and resources of
its owner. Actual statistics and particulars are
lacking; all that is probable is that the collection
was little more than a respectable nucleus when it
became an object of interest to Henry, Prince of
Wales, that first-born son of James I whose early
- 71
72 The British Museum: Its History
death was the occasion of so many high-pitched
elegies and lamentations. The contemporary ap-
preciations of his character are so overlaid with
Seventeenth-century extravagance — ‘‘in a word,”
Wrote one eulogist, ‘‘ he was the most fair fruit of
his progenitors, an excellent ornament of the pres-
ent age, a true mirror to posterity,” — that it is
Somewhat difficult to divine what his actual prom-
ise was, but that he had some love of learning is a
probable inference from his act in purchasing, in
1609, the goodly library of Lord Lumley and add-
ing it to the stores of his royal ancestors. For a
youth of fifteen, even though he were a prince and
heir to the English throne, Lord Lumley’s books
were an enviable possession. They included the
valuable volumes of his father-in-law, Lord Arun-
del, which, in turn, comprised many of the works
formerly in the collection of Archbishop Cran-
IſleI’.
Between the death of Prince Henry and the gift
of the royal library to the British Museum by
George II there elapsed a period of nearly a cen-
tury and a half, during which time it was both aug-
mented and depleted. That it escaped entire de-
struction during the civil war of the seventeenth
century seems almost a miracle in view of what
happened to Westminster Abbey and the iconoclas-
tic, zeal of the Puritans. Before those turbulent
days its treasures had been enriched by the famous
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Landmarks in Growth 73
Codea, Aleaxandrinus, one of the most invaluable
manuscripts of the Bible in existence, the gift of
the Patriarch of Constantinople to Charles I; and
even in the reign of Charles II many important
additions were made. All told, when the library
joined the congenial companionship of the Cotton-
ian, Harleian, and Sloane collections in Montagu
House it comprised some twelve thousand volumes,
and was a worthy addition to the nation’s stores of
learning. George II probably parted with the li-
brary without regret; he had no appreciation of
either “ boetry or bainting,” and probably felt
something was due from him for having pooh-
poohed the purchase of the Sloane Museum.
Five years later the museum was favoured with
another royal gift, and this time a gift which, in
contrast with that of George II, cost the donor some
personal expense. And it was a gift which, many
years later, was to earn from Thomas Carlyle as
high praise as he ever indulged. Being called to
give evidence in connection with the Parliamentary
inquiry into the condition of the museum, and asked
whether he had found the library well equipped in
materials for English history, Carlyle signaled out
the Thomason collection of tracts for unstinted eu-
logy. “They are called,” he said, “the King’s
Pamphlets; and in value, I believe, the whole world
could not parallel them. If you were to take all
the collections of works on the civil war, of which
74 The British Museum: Its History
I have ever heard notice, I believe you would not
get a set of works so valuable as those.”
How that tribute would have warmed the heart
of the unremitting George Thomason 1 And he
would have rejoiced unfeignedly to hear his collec-
tion called “ the King’s Pamphlets,’’ for he is
credited with having made it ‘‘ only for his Maj-
esty’s use that then was.” It seems Thomason,
who was a London bookseller, first conceived the
idea of his collection about 1641, and that the object
he set before him was to secure a copy of every
pamphlet or leaflet published by Royalists or Par-
liamentarians in connection with the strife between
king and Commons. Nay, he went further, and
secured nearly a hundred manuscripts “which no
man durst then venture to publish here without
endangering his ruin.” For some twenty years he
continued his task with unflagging zeal, heartened
by the fact that on one occasion Charles I himself,
in need of a certain pamphlet and unable to find it
elsewhere, was able to gratify his curiosity from
his collection. -
At the end of his labours Thomason found him-
self in possession of nearly thirty thousand tracts,
and when bound in a uniform style they constituted
a unique library of some two thousand volumes.
But hardly has any library ever caused its owner
so much anxiety. Because it contained all the pam-
phlets written in favour of the royal cause, the col-
Tandmarks in Growth 75
*
lection was anathema to the Parliamentary party,
and many were the devices Thomason resorted to
to save it from their clutches. Once it was sent
into the country in Surrey, then into Essex, and
anon serious thought was taken of dispatching it to
Holland for “more safe preservation.” Then the
precious volumes were hidden away in tables with
false tops, and so were preserved until quieter days
returned. After other tribulations of a less dan-
gerous character the collection was purchased in
1762 by George III for three hundred pounds and
immediately handed over to the British Museum.
Of course that sum does not represent a tithe of its
value; Thomason himself refused an offer of four
thousand pounds as insufficient to pay his out-of-
pocket expenses.
Among the lesser but still valuable donations by
which the printed and manuscript treasures of the
museum were enhanced in its early years record
should be made of the library of Hebrew books and
manuscripts bequeathed by Solomon da Costa, an
Amsterdam Jew, as a “ thanksgiving, in part, for
the generous protection and numberless blessings ’’
he had enjoyed in his adopted land; the library of .
Dr. Thomas Birch, notable for its wealth of biog-
raphy; David Garrick’s collection of English plays
which Charles Lamb laid under contribution to such
excellent purpose in his “Specimens of English
Dramatic Poets; ” and the two thousand volumes,
76 The British Museum: Its History
largely of biography, gifted by Sir William Mus-
grave. The latter also left the museum his exten-
sive and interesting collection of manuscripts bear-
ing upon the history of portrait-painting in Eng-
land.
Ere the eighteenth century ended, another land-
mark in the growth of the museum was raised by
the generous bequest of Clayton M. Cracherode, a
man of considerable means whose one enjoyment
in life had been the collecting of rare books, draw-
ings, prints, coins, and gems. He was of a singu-
larly retiring disposition; had taken holy orders
but evidently found the conspicuousness of a pulpit
too trying; lived, it is said, in constant dread of
having to discharge a court function on the per-
formance of which he held his manor from ‘the
Crown; was never on horseback or never travelled
further from London than Oxford; and restricted
his daily exercise to visits to a couple of celebrated
book shops. How such a recluse was ever induced
to become a trustee of the British Museum is not
explained, but his services were secured, and, when
his will was read in April, 1799, it disclosed that he
had left all his treasures to that institution. They
comprised some four thousand five hundred vol-
umes, each of high value for one reason or another;
seven portfolios of choice drawings; a hundred
portfolios of rare prints after Rembrandt, Durer,
and other great artists; and a richly-equipped cab-
Landmarks in Growth 77
inet of coins and cameos. Cracherode’s prints were
so tempting that Robert Dighton, the etcher, was
unable to resist their appeal, with the result that
he stole a number from the portfolios and sold them
for considerable sums. This was the theft which
led to the dismissal of Rev. William Beloe, an early
keeper of the printed books, whose good graces
Dighton had been careful to cultivate.
All the additions noted above were, it will have
been observed, free gifts to the national storehouse;
they had not cost the trustees or the government a
penny piece. Up to the beginning of the nine-
teenth century, indeed, the national purse had not
contributed a single cent towards enriching the lit-
erary treasures of the British Museum. But the
year 1807 marked the inauguration of a more gen-
erous policy; it witnessed the grant of nearly five
thousand pounds for the purchase of the Lansdowne
manuscripts. As was the case with the first of the
Harleys, the collector of those manuscripts — Lord
Shelburne, afterwards created the first Marquis of
Lansdowne — had a somewhat chequered career as
a statesman, “one of the most unpopular ’’ of his
time, and was the model of whom Gainsborough,
flinging down his pencil after a second attempt at a
likeness, declared, “D– it! I never could see
through varnish, and there’s an end.” It was after
an early reverse in his political career that Shel-
burne retired to his country seat and found recrea-
78 The British Museum: Its History
tion in remodelling his estate and collecting manu-
scripts. From time to time he was able to acquire
the collections of Sir Julius Caesar, the Burghley
Papers, the manuscripts of Bishop Kennet and
James West, and other valuable documents. They
included all kinds of political papers, and extensive
material relating to many periods of English his-
tory. In its final form, then, the Lansdowne collec-
tion became a worthy rival to its Cottonian and
Harleian predecessors.
Having set a precedent in the spending of public
funds for the increase of the library, Parliament
repeated the experiment in 1813, when eight thou-
sand pounds were voted for the purchase of Francis
Hargrave's library, which was largely of a legal
character. Wholly different was the classical li-
brary of Dr. Charles Burney, for which the next
Parliamentary grant was made. This was eight
years later, and the sum involved was thirteen
thousand five hundred pounds. Even so, however,
the nation received good value for its money, for it
has been estimated that at public auction the books
would have realized fully twenty thousand pounds.
In actual figures the printed books totalled upwards
of thirteen thousand, and the manuscripts over five
hundred, but the latter included some unique ex-
amples of Greek transcripts on vellum, and the for-
mer were particularly rich classical texts.
Notable as were the gifts and purchases which
Landmarks in Growth 79
have been briefly described above, they were wholly
eclipsed by the acquisition of the second royal li-
brary in 1823. This was the collection which, as
was indicated in the previous chapter, necessitated
the erection of a new building and inaugurated the
entire reconstruction of the museum.
When George III became king of England he
found himself without a library. The reason will
be fresh in the memory of the reader of the fore-
going pages; his grandfather, George II, had pre-
sented to the nation the only collection of books
which answered that purpose. So the third of the
Georges had to begin all over again, and he set about
the task in good earnest. Not only was he happy
in the choice of his librarian, Frederick A. Bar-
nard, but that librarian in turn was fortunate in
having Dr. Johnson as an adviser. When Barnard
was on the eve of leaving England for the Continent
in search of acquisitions for the king’s library,
Johnson addressed him in a lengthy letter full of
wise counsel and practical suggestions, otherwise
“ most masterly instructions '' as Boswell phrased
it. That, however, was more than a year subse-
quent to Johnson’s famous interview with George
III, in the library, which contained even then books
“more numerous and curious than he supposed
any person could have gathered in the time which
the king had employed.” That the monarch took
a keen pride in his collection is obvious from the
80 The British Museum: Its History
indirect way in which he angled for Johnson's
compliments. The king asked, Boswell records,
“whether there were better libraries at Oxford or
Cambridge. He answered he believed the Bodleian
was larger than any they had at Cambridge; at
the same time adding, “I hope, whether we have
more books or not than they have at Cambridge, we
shall make as good use of them as they do.” Being
asked whether All Souls or Christ Church library
was the largest, he answered, “ All Souls library
is the largest we have except the Bodleian.’ ‘Ay,”
said the king, ‘ that is the public library.’” Even
that obvious opening for some eulogium of the
library in which the conversation took place was
missed by Johnson, so the talk drifted into other
channels. -
By the date of Johnson's interview with George
III the royal library was housed in Buckingham
Palace and there continued through the remainder
of that king’s reign. Barnard missed no oppor-
tunity to add to its shelves, and from year to year
its treasures were augmented by Joseph Smith’s
choice volumes, by the rich harvest gathered dur-
ing the librarian's tour on the Continent, by numer-
ous Caxtons, and by countless desirable works in
general literature. For result, at the time of the
king’s death in 1820 the royal library contained
all told some eighty-four thousand volumes.
But such a repository of knowledge did not ap-
Landmarks in Growth 81
peal to George IV. And there were two serious
objections against harbouring the collection, the
first being that it occupied considerable space, and
the second that its upkeep demanded an annual
expenditure of more than two thousand pounds
from the royal purse. In view of the new king’s
character, then, it is hardly surprising that he con-
cluded to sell the library which his father had so
carefully gathered at great cost. Not surprising,
but at the same time wholly reprehensible, and
hardly in keeping with what “the first gentleman
of Europe ’’ should have contemplated. However,
there the library was, an incumbrance and an ex-
pense, and, on the other hand, the Emperor of Rus-
sia was known to covet and would undoubtedly
give a goodly sum for its possession. But just as
George IV was on the eve of concluding his disrep-
utable transaction, he was sharply reminded that a
king had other obligations than the enrichment of
his own coffers. News was carried to Lord Sid-
mouth that the books were consigned for the Bal-
tic, with the protest that it would be “a shame
that such a collection should go out of the coun-
try.” “It shall not,” he rejoined. Nor did it.
Reproved by his ministers, George IV retorted,
“Well, if I can’t have the roubles, you must find
me their value in pounds sterling.” Which had to
be done in an underhand way, and when the “self-
ish dog,” as Grenville called him, was sure of his
s2 The British Museum: Its History
money, he sat down in his gaudy Pavilion at Brigh-
ton to write that hypocritical letter in which he ex-
pressed his “ satisfaction ” in being able to “pre-
sent ’’ the library to the nation l That pious fiction
is yet perpetuated in the museum in Latin and Eng-
lish in the inscriptions in those languages which
set forth how the library was “given to the Brit-
ish nation by his most gracious Majesty George
IV.” The foregoing statement will enable the
reader of those lines to make the necessary deduc-
tions, and at the same time enable him to appreci-
ate how large a debt of gratitude is due to George
III.
If George IV proved himself a “selfish dog ''
in relation to his father’s library, no such charge
can be brought against the eccentric Francis Henry
Egerton, whose name is assured of fame in the
annals of the British Museum by his bequest of
the Egerton Manuscripts and a sum of twelve thou-
sand pounds, the interest of which was to be devoted
to increasing the collection and paying the salary
of its custodian. As the last Earl of Bridgewater,
to which title he succeeded six years before his
death in 1829, he will also be long remembered by
those Bridgewater Treatises, for the writing of
which he bequeathed a further sum of eight thou-
sand pounds. -
Francis Egerton was as strange a character as
is to be found on the lengthy annals of donors to
Landmarks in Growth 83
the museum. Appointed by his father prebendary
of Durham, he also accepted two other ecclesiastical
preferments and retained them until his death,
but discharged their duties by proxy. His three-
fold connection with the church did not prevent
him from succumbing to temptations of the flesh,
for among the engraved plates of members of his
family which he had prepared one bore the inscrip-
tion, “Sophia Egerton, natural daughter of Fran-
cis Henry Egerton.” That deviation from the
paths of virtue happened during his long residence
in Paris, where he eventually died. His house in
the French capital is said to have been “filled
with cats and dogs, some of which were dressed up
as men and women, and were driven out in his car-
riage, and fed at his table.” Most of the manu-
scripts he collected bore upon Continental history
and included numerous original letters of the sover-
eigns and statesmen of France and autographs of
famous Italians. In accordance with the terms of
the donor’s will, the manuscripts are still kept as a
distinct collection, and the chief keeper of manu-
scripts conjoins the office of “Egerton Libra-
rian.” - -
Three years after the acquisition of the Egerton
manuscripts in 1829 the autograph treasures of the
museum were further increased by the Arundel
manuscripts, which had been collected in the first
half of the seventeenth century by Thomas Howard,
84 The British Museum: Its History
Earl of Arundel, who seems to have been first in-
oculated with a love of antiquities in 1609, when he
went to the Continent in search of health. This was
that member of the Howard family whom Horace
Walpole characterized as “the father of vertu in
England ’’ and who gathered the famous Arundel
marbles. In his “good Mr. Petty '' he had an
agent as zealous as the invaluable Wanley, and the
efforts of that worthy dependent were ably sec-
onded by several other representatives. But it
was the Earl himself who secured the Pirckheimer
library, the rich classical treasures of which are per-
haps the most important section of the Arundel
manuscripts.
One other important landmark in the growth of
the literary treasures of the museum remains to be
noted — the bequest by the Right Hon. Thomas
Grenville of that noble library which is rightly
preserved as a distinct entity under his name. In
the entire museum there are but seven apartments
which perpetuate the names of donors, and none is
so worthy of that chary honour as Thomas Gren-
ville, for in money value alone his gift ranks as the
most princely. A member of a family illustrious in
the political annals of England, and with numerous
and influential connections, it seemed, during his
early years, as though he were destined to achieve
high distinction in the councils of his nation, but
soon after his fiftieth birthday he withdrew from
Landmarks in Growth 85
public life and devoted himself to the more conge.
nial task of building up his library. But his love of
books was not a late acquirement. As he delighted
to relate in his old age, when still a youthful officer
in the Coldstream Guards he, at an auction, bid
against a whole bench of bishops for a rare edition
of the Bible. By the year of his death he had col-
lected upwards of twenty thousand volumes, con-
spicuous among which were unique editions of Ho-
mer and AEsop, and numerous and equally valuable
works of travel, Irish history, English poetry, Greek
and Latin classics, and old Italian and Spanish lit-
erature. There can be little doubt that Grenville’s
friendship for Anthony Panizzi accounted largely
for the presentation of this valuable collection to
the museum. When he mooted his intention to that
official Grenville asked “Where are you going to
put my books? I see your rooms are already full.”
In answer Panizzi took his friend to the gallery at
right angles to the King's Library, and said, “If
we can’t do better, we’ll put them here; and, as you
see, my room is close by. Here, for a time, they
will at least be under my own eye.” And there they
were placed in 1847, an enviable monument to their
generous donor. .
As the reader will no doubt have noticed, all the
foregoing gifts or purchases were accessions to the
purely literary treasures of the museum, increasing
merely the departments of manuscripts and printed
86 The British Museum: Its History
books. There was a third department, it will be re-
membered, that of “natural and artificial produc-
tions,” and it must not be supposed that no addi-
tions were made to its treasures. On the contrary,
the public purse was opened for the enrichment of
that section a quarter of a century before the other
two departments partook of national generosity.
When one looks over the old volumes of the Annual
Register and notes the space given year by year to
papers on natural history and antiquities, and when
it is further remembered that the last half of the
eighteenth century was remarkable for the interest
taken in all kinds of curios, it is not surprising that
the honourable members of the House of Commons
were quite willing to vote public funds for the ac-
Quisition of such objects.
Hence this official record made in March, 1772:
“The Commons agreed to the following grants:
that £8410 be granted to his majesty, for purcha-
sing antiquities brought from Italy, for the use of
the public, to be vested in the trustees of the British
Museum. That £840 be granted to the trustees of
the British Museum, for providing a proper reposi-
tory for the said collection.”
Behind that businesslike minute lay a story of
unusual interest. The “ antiquities brought from
Italy ’’ had been collected by William Hamilton, not
yet Sir William nor the husband of that Emma
whose philanderings with Nelson have secured her
Landmarks in Growth 87
so much notoriety. In 1764 Hamilton was appointed
British ambassador at the court of Naples, and oc-
cupied that position for thirty-six years, but he had
not been long at his post before he discovered that
he needed something more than his diplomatic duties
to occupy his time. At first he turned his attention
to the neighbouring Vesuvius, which he ascended
twenty-two times in four years, and made the sub-
ject of exhaustive investigations. Then in a fortu-
nate hour he bought a valuable collection of Greek
vases, and from that foundation built up a remark-
able museum of other vases, terracottas, ancient
glass and bronzes, gems, ivories, gold ornaments
and coins. These were the “ antiquities brought
from Italy ’’ for the purchase of which Parliament
made the grant mentioned above, and it is interest-
ing to note that the phrase “for the use of the pub-
lic ’’ was quickly justified. The vases were at once
studied and imitated by the famous potter, Josiah
Wedgwood, who testified that by the sale of his
copies he had in two years brought into England
three times the sum voted for the purchase of Ham-
ilton's collection. And, further, that collection was
to render the additional service of leading to the
formation of the present invaluable department of
Greek and Roman antiquities. -
Not a bequest, nor a purchase, but the spoils of
War led to the organizing of another department of
the museum — that of Egyptian antiquities. The
88 The British Museum: Its History
colonization of Egypt was said to be Napoleon's
“ darling child,” hence the foundation of that “In-
stitute of Egypt” which led so many French savants
to examine the monuments of that land and its va-
ried archaeological treasures. They had made con-
siderable progress and gathered together a deeply
interesting collection by the time the British troops
made their assault on Alexandria in 1801, and com-
pelled the surrender of the French. Then it became
a disputed point what was to become of the antiqui-
ties, the Frenchmen claiming that they were private
property but the British general contending that
they were part of the spoils of war. Of course he
had his way, being in a position to enforce his views,
and hence the renowned Rosetta stone, and the
sarcophagus which was claimed to have been the
tomb of Alexander, and a multitude of other relics
of the past were shipped to England and added to
the stores of the British Museum. But there was
no room for them in Montagu House; that building
was full to overflowing, and the Alexandrian an-
tiquities had to be relegated to the shelter of a
wooden shed.
By reason of their smaller bulk, however, such
accessions as the Roberts’ collection of English
coins, including specimens from the Norman Con-
quest to contemporary times, and the Tyssen cabi-
nets of Anglo-Saxon coins, and the De Bosset Greek
coins, were provided with house room immediately
Landmarks in Growth 89
on their purchase. In these years, that is, from 1801
to 1816, the frequent acquisitions of heavy and spa-
cious stone antiquities brought home to the trustees
the urgent necessity of more gallery room. The
Towneley marbles, collected in Italy by Charles
Towneley, and including some of the choicest art
treasures of the world, were soon to be added to the
national storehouse, and in the meantime another
unwearied, collector was at work on an enterprise
which was to emphasize more than ever the need
of a new building in place of the outgrown Montagu
House.
In the last year of the eighteenth century there
had been dispatched to Constantinople as ambassa-
dor of England to the Porte one Thomas Bruce,
seventh Earl of Elgin, a Scotsman of more than
ordinary determination. He was also, like most of
his race, a serious-minded man with a bent towards
classical study. On the eve of his departure for Tur-
key, remembering that he was bound for the court
of that power which had control of the affairs of
Greece, he bethought him to take counsel with an
architect named Harrison who was distinguished
for the classical character of his buildings. Would
it not be beneficial, the Earl asked, if he were able
by his official position to acquire full and minute
details of the architecture and sculpture of ancient
Greece? Mr. Harrison’s answer was heartily in the
affirmative. It would be of immense value, he re-
90 The British Museum: Its History
plied, if the Earl could procure such information,
and, above all, casts of whatever specimens had sur-
vived the ravages of time.
Finding his own views so warmly supported by
an expert, the Earl of Elgin attempted to enlist the
support of the English government, proposing that
several artists should be sent out at the public ex-
pense. But his pleas fell upon deaf ears. Unfortu-
nately, too, his own means were not ample enough to
warrant him in undertaking the charges of the Eng-
lish artists he had in view, and it seemed as though
the project would have to be abandoned. However,
on his journey to Constantinople he halted at Sicily
and had an opportunity to discuss his plan with Sir
William Hamilton. That connoisseur reminded the
Earl of Elgin that Italian artists were cheaper than
English, and by his aid Elgin was able to secure the
services of a Neapolitan painter, Lusieri, and sev-
eral assistants, to take casts and help in making
drawings. This little band proceeded to Athens at
Elgin's expense, and as soon as he arrived at Con-
stantinople he set to work to secure from the Porte
permission for his artists to proceed with their work
of taking drawings and making casts of the fast
perishing monuments and sculptures of Athens. At
first the permission was but grudgingly given, and
limited in its scope, but later, owing to the success of
British arms in Egypt, the Porte became exceed-
ingly generous and issued a firman to Elgin giving
Landmarks in Growth 91
his agents not only full liberty for their sketching
and casting operations but also permission to “take
away any pieces of stone with old inscriptions or
figures thereon.”
That firman entirely changed Elgin's plans. It
had been no part of his scheme to actually remove
any of the ancient marbles of Athens. Yet his ex-
perience in carrying out his original purpose conclu-
sively proved that if something were not done in a
few years all the “glory that was Greece ’’ would
have disappeared. Turks and travellers and Greeks
were devastating the ancient marbles in a ruthless
manner. In the past half-century one glorious tem-
ple had been so utterly destroyed that even the foun-
dation could not be discovered; another had been
converted into a powder magazine and blown into
fragments by an explosion; countless statues of
priceless worth had been pounded into dust to make
mortar; and it was no uncommon thing for the Turks
to make targets of such figures as remained or
climb the walls to deface any sculpture within reach.
With such havoc around him, what wonder that El-
gin determined to avail himself of his firman to
the letter and began to remove from the Parthenon
such of the metopes as were left, and the frieze,
and what other fragments were in any way por-
table? -
Such, in brief, is the story of the Elgin marbles,
the addition of which to the treasures of the British
92 The British Museum: Its History
Museum was perhaps the most notable landmark in
the history of its growth. But their journey to Eng-
land was fraught with stirring adventure. It was
no easy matter to get the marbles safely on ship-
board in their huge cases, for there were no conve-
niences for lifting and hauling, and no roads. Once
on board his ship, the Mentor, however, Elgin must
have concluded that his heavy task was virtually at
an end. Not so. The Mentor ran into a fierce storm
off the island of Cerigo and was wrecked. Four
only of the cases were salved at the time, and it was
not until two years later that the other seven were
raised by divers at a heavy cost. And when the
marbles finally reached England, Elgin's reward was
to be branded as a thief and informed by the so-
called Dilettanti that he had brought home a cargo of
worthless stone! His answer to the latter verdict
was to place the marbles on exhibition and invite the
opinion of the greatest painters and sculptors of the
day. That opinion was given in no uncertain tones;
all were agreed with Canova that they were the work
of “ the ablest artists the world had ever seen.”
At length a select committee of the House of Com-
ICl(OIlS reported on the whole question, and found that
Elgin was justified in removing the marbles, that
they were of supreme merit, and that a “reasonable
and sufficient price ’’ for the collection was thirty-
five thousand pounds. And for that sum Elgin sur-
rendered his collection in 1816, although the cost to
Landmarks in Growth 93
his own purse had exceeded that amount by forty
thousand pounds.
For no other single collection has the Parliament
ever made so large a grant. But in the years that
followed, and down to the present day, the trustees
have ever been on the alert to secure desirable ac-
cessions, while the countless bequests of generous
donors have contributed materially to give the Brit-
ish Museum its proud pre-eminence among national
storehouses. Among the gifts which are conspicu-
ous landmarks in the history of its growth should be
named the collections of Mrs. Banks, Richard Payne
Knight, Sir Joseph Banks, Sir William Gell, Sir
William Temple, John Bowring, Edward Wigan,
Henry Christy, Henry Witt, James Woodhouse,
Felix Slade, and Baron Ferdinand Rothschild; while
the purchases, either by the trustees or by govern-
ment grant which have enriched the museum include
the varied collections of Claudius Rich, H. P. Borell,
Joseph Sams, Thomas Hawkins, Henry Salt, Sir
Charles Fellowes, Austen Henry Layard, Nathan
Davis, Edward Hawkins, Lord Napier, and many
others. These collections were of great diversity,
and their accumulation gradually led to the organ-
ization of the museum into the eight great depart-
ments in which its contents are now arranged. \
Unlike the Louvre, the British Museum has no pic-J
ture gallery in the strict sense of the word. But this
does not mean that paintings have never been be-
94 The British Museum: Its History
queathed to the institution. On the contrary, they
have, and, in the old days, many portraits in oils used
to adorn the mineral gallery. Yet, as Sir Henry
Ellis pointed out in 1835, no provision was ever
made for a gallery of paintings, and consequently
such bequests as were left to the museum were trans-
ferred to the National Gallery. On the other hand,
as will be seen later, the department of prints and
drawings has been fostered with great care and ar-
ranges for periodical exhibitions of its varied treas-
ll. I’OS,

CHAPTER V
SOME NOTABLE OFFICIALS
“I BELIEVE the present officers to be men of learn-
ing and ability.” Such was the remark made by a
witness in the course of his examination before the
select committee which was appointed in 1835 to in-
quire into the condition and management of the
British Museum.
More recent in date and less interested is the eu-
logy pronounced by the illustrious historian, John R.
Seeley. “One of the greatest seats of learning in
England,” he said, “is the British Museum; one
of the most brilliant of learned bodies is the staff
which is employed by the State to take charge of
that vast National Collection.”
Such opinions as these might be duplicated until
they reached the dimensions of a considerable vol-
ume. Rare, indeed, is it to find any biography of a
notable English writer written within the past sev-
enty years which does not contain some passage or
passages which would adorn an anthology in praise
of the museum officials. It is not only that those of—
ficials have been remarkable for their unfailing cour-
tesy, for their eager willingness to assist the serious
inquirer, but that to an unusual extent they have
95
96 The British Museum: Its History
been, especially for several generations past, men of
profound learning and rare natural abilities. De-
spite the fact that for many years in the early stages
of the museum’s history the pecuniary inducements
were small, the service of the institution has happily
appealed in an irresistible manner to just the type
of men best adapted for the custody of its treasures.
Courtesy on the part of those officials is an estab-
lished tradition of the institution, dating back for at
least three-quarters of a century. For example,
when, during the sittings in 1835 of the committee
referred to above, Anthony Panizzi was asked
whether the same facilities were given to the most
obscure person equally with the most celebrated, he
replied emphatically and without the least hesita-
tion: - -
“Yes; not long since a poor woman came to the
museum; she wanted a newspaper about an enclo-
sure. Mr. Baber happened to be present when she
addressed herself to me, and he began to ask ques-
tions about the enclosure, what it was and where it
was; he gave her not only the newspaper which she
wanted, but a great deal of information how she
was to go about to get her rights properly guarded.
If she had been a lord, the only thing would have
been a bow on introducing him to the reading-room,
and, given the newspaper, he would then have had
to find what he wanted by himself.”
At the present time the officials of the museum are
Some Notable Officials 97
almost countless; when it was first opened to the
public there were four. These were the Principal
Librarian, and the Keepers of the three departments
in which the contents were arranged. The latter
title of Keeper is still retained for the responsible
heads of the eight departments, but that of Principal
Librarian has been augmented to “Director and
Principal Librarian.” It should be noted, however,
that the title of Principal Librarian has never been
interpreted as having any special reference to the de-
partment of books; he has always been the official
head of all the departments, and it would have pre-
vented possible confusion had he been from the first
designated by the simple term of Director. But,
whatever his title, it is obvious that the Principal
Librarian has from the beginning been the most
important official, and that the history of the insti-
tution has been materially influenced by the men
who have occupied that important position.
In qualification of that last statement, however,
it must be observed that in the first half-century of
the museum’s history the three men who succes-
sively occupied the post of Principal Librarian ap-
pear to have regarded the position more as a sine-
cure of learned leisure than as one calling for initi-
ation and alert administration. Not that the salary
attached to the office was sufficient to provide its re-
cipient with enervating luxuries; it amounted, all
told, to the modest sum of two hundred pounds a
98 The British Museum: Its History
year; but that the incumbency was looked upon in
the light in which Sir Walter Scott regarded the
pursuit of literature, that is, as a walking-stick
rather than a crutch. Hence the first Principal
Librarian eked out his income by the sale of com-
passes, the second combined that office with the sec-
retaryship of the Royal Society, and the third ap-
pears to have enjoyed several subsidiary sources
of revenue.
Yet competition for the office was keen. For the
first appointment there were two candidates who
exerted themselves to the utmost in canvassing for
influential support: John Hill and Gowin Knight.
That the first-named should have imagined he had
any chance of success is but one more proof of his
inexhaustible effrontery. Hill was that quack, lam-
pooner, and unscrupulous sponger whom Garrick
gibbeted in his epigram,
: “For physic and farces, his equal there scarce is,
His farces are physic, his physic a farce is,”
and who was the theme of Christopher Smart’s
“Hilliad,” in which the would-be Principal Libra-
rian was hailed with
“O thou, whatever name delight thine ear,
Pimp! Poet! Pufferſ 'Pothecaryl Play’r!”
But besides having alienated all the wits of the
day, and been publicly thrashed by an Irishman
GOWIN KNIGHT.



Some Notable Officials 99
he had insulted, Hill, because of his failure to secure
election to the Royal Society, had turned his vitriolic
pen against the members of that body and so en-
listed the learned in the ranks of his enemies. A
promising candidate, truly, for the chief office of the
new institution It is not surprising, then, that the
choice fell upon Gowin Knight, who held the office
for some sixteen years.
In his forty-third year at the date of his appoint-
ment, Dr. Knight was the son of a virtuoso clergy-
man, a graduate of Oxford, and, for a time, a prac-
tising physician. While still a young man, however,
he was attracted to magnetical research and it is
upon his practical and theoretical contributions to
that science that his reputation principally rests.
He is credited with having made a great improve-
ment in the needle of the mariner’s compass, in-
venting a new method of magnetizing bars, and
rendering considerable service in connection with the
royal navy. Notwithstanding the secluded life he is
said to have lived, and the profits derived from the
sale of his magnets, he was not able to steer clear of
financial difficulties, for one of the most indubitable
facts of his career is that he was forced to seek a
loan of a thousand pounds from a friend and died
without cancelling his debt. That he discharged his
duties as Principal Librarian — such as they were —
faithfully, may be assumed in the absence of any
contrary evidence, but that his sixteen years’ tenure
100 The British Museum: Its History
of office were fruitful in improvements in the mu-
seum would be too much to grant. It was a com-
fortable and congenial post for a man of such pre-
dilections as his, yielding a welcome addition to his
small income, and, for the rest, who could blame him
if he took advantage of the statutes of the museum
which stipulated his attendance merely ‘‘ as his duty
required it?” It has been shown beyond question
that the gestation of the institution was a lethargic
process, the outcome, no doubt, of the lagging age
which gave it birth, and consequently Dr. Knight
can hardly be held blameworthy for not initiating re-
forms the need of which was not even dimly recog-
nized.
His successor, Matthew Maty, was no more stren-
uous. If any excuse is needed in his behalf it may
be found in the fact that at the time of his appoint-
ment, 1772, he had reached his fifty-fourth year and
was in failing health. Like Dr. Knight, Maty was
a physician, but, unlike his predecessor, was not
an Englishman. Born near Utrecht, he settled in
London in 1741, and, after practising for several
years as a doctor, finally turned his attention to liter-
ature. For six years he conducted unaided a publi-
cation called the “Journal Britannique,” a
bi-monthly magazine which summarized in French
the principal English books of the day, and thus be-
came acquainted with numerous literary men. So
considerable was his reputation that when Gibbon
DR. MATTHEW MATY.




Some Notable Officials 101
had written his first essay and became anxious to
submit it to “a critic and judge,” he at once thought
of Dr. Maty, a choice, the historian thought, equally
“judicious and fortunate.” The young author and
late editor of the “Journal Britannique '’ had sev-
eral ‘‘ free and familiar conversations '' over the
essay, and when it at last appeared in print Gibbon
found that Dr. Maty had inserted, without his knowl-
edge, ‘‘an elegant and flattering epistle to the au-
thor,” which was, however, so artfully worded that,
‘‘ in case of defeat, his favourable report might have
been ascribed to the indulgence of a friend for the
rash attempt of a young English gentleman.” That
stroke of diplomacy gives the key to Dr. Maty’s
character; the guiding principle of his life was to
make to himself friends of the mammon of un-
righteousness. With one exception. Dr. Maty’s re-
view in his “Journal '' of Dr. Johnson’s dictionary
so infuriated Boswell’s hero that when Maty was
Suggested as a desirable assistant in connection
with a projected literary review, Johnson shouted,
“The little black dog! I’d throw him into the
Thames first!” At that date, however, Maty had
secured his foothold in the British Museum, for he
was one of the first three Keepers of departments,
and when Dr. Knight died he appears to have ac-
quired the vacant position of Principal Librarian
without opposition. His four years of office were
as placid as Dr. Knight's sixteen. Practically all
102 The British Museum: Its History
that is recorded of him in connection with his
more important post is that he, as far as pos-
sible, thwarted visitors from obtaining tickets
of admission, and then connived at their
being hurried through the apartments in the brief-
est time.
Another medical man, but this time an English-
man, Charles Morton, succeeded to the chief office
of the museum on the death of Dr. Maty in 1776.
Dr. Morton was to occupy the post for a longer
term than the combined incumbencies of his prede-
cessors, and, indeed, counting his service as Keeper
of the manuscripts, was on the staff of the institu-
tion for forty-three years. In his subordinate office
he was occupied in continuing the catalogue of the
Harleian manuscripts; as Principal Librarian for
twenty-three years his record is summed up by Ed-
ward Edwards in these terms: “There are several
testimonies to the courtesy with which he treated
such visitors as came under his personal notice, but
his long term of superior office was not marked by
any striking improvement in the public economy of
the museum.”
Lest any one should be tempted to burden the mem-
ory of these three estimable men with silent reproach
for their masterly inactivity, their complete indorse-
ment of the gospel of laisser faire, their “rest and
be thankful" attitude, it should be noted that the
nation as a whole regarded the museum with lan-
Some Notable Officials 103
guid interest. It has been shown that Thomas Gray
and Isaac Disraeli were accustomed to having but
three or four fellow students in the reading-room,
that the gathering of museum objects was looked
upon as the occupation of a ‘‘ toyman,” while even
so pronounced a connoisseur as Horace Walpole re-
garded Sir Hans Sloane’s collections somewhat as a
joke. The fact is, the nation had been so long with-
out such an institution that it did not know what to
do with it when it got it. The British Museum had
to create its audience; it was an instrument of cul-
ture unique in the annals of the nation; and until
its value was realized the official tendency would in-
evitably be to let things alone. Even so late as 1836
the complaint could be made that “public opinion
is exercised only upon one of the purposes for which
the British Museum was instituted; that is, upon
its establishment as a show place. Unfortunately
as to its most important and most noble purpose, as
an establishment for the furtherance of education,
for study and research, the public seem to be almost
indifferent.”
As Dr. Morton’s term of office exceeded that of
his two predecessors combined, so even his own reign
of twenty-three years was to be eclipsed by the rule
of his successor, Joseph Planta, who, like Dr. Maty,
was of foreign birth. Born at Castegna in Switzer-
land, educated at Utrecht and Göttingen, broadened
by travel in France and Italy, and rendered still
104 The British Museum: Its History
more cosmopolitan by diplomatic employment at
Brussels, Planta joined the staff of the British
Museum in 1773, became keeper of the manuscript
department three years later, and, on the death of
Dr. Morton, was appointed Principal Librarian in
1799. His twenty-eight years’ occupancy of that
post marked the beginning of a new era. He found
the old restrictions as to admission and study still
in full force; when he laid down his trust they had
been materially relaxed: in his early days the stu-
dents frequenting the reading-room did not number
two hundred a year; by 1827 thew exceeded six hun-
dred: a few years after his assumption of office less
than twenty artists were in the habit of drawing
from the antique annually; in 1824 they had in-
creased to nearly three hundred. These figures
speak for themselves and bear cogent witness to a
more liberal policy, which, in its turn, is conclusive
evidence of Planta's fitness for his post and his zeal
to make the museum an important factor in the de-
velopment of national culture. It was during his
regime, too, that the trustees began that noble series
of publications which have diffused a knowledge of
the museum’s treasures and added so conspicuously
to the literature of learning. Planta bore his full
share in the compilation of catalogues, and in his
spare time completed that “History of the Helvetic
Confederacy '’ which made him the first historian
in English of his native land. His name, then, will
- _ ·• •-
··
”SITTIGH A™INGH H HIS:"VJLN.VII.a Ha-GISOT

Some Notable Officials 105
always be distinguished on the roll-call of Principal
Librarians.
Twenty-seven years before Planta's death the
museum staff was augmented by that laborious and
genial antiquary, Henry Ellis, who was to become
his successor and retain the position of Principal
Librarian for the record period of twenty-nine
years. Ellis entered the service of the institution
as a temporary assistant in the library in 1800, but
six years later he had risen to the responsible posi-
tion of keeper of the printed books. This rapid pro-
motion had its origin in that theft of prints by Rob-
ert Dighton already mentioned, the consequent resig-
nation of William Beloe making an unexpected va-
cancy. As the chief official of the library Ellis’s
principal contribution to the increased efficiency of
the department consisted in his labours on the im-
provement of the catalogue, but it was not until he
was transferred to the charge of the manuscript de-
partment that he began the compilation of those
volumes by which he is best known among students
of history. The first series of “ Original Letters
illustrative of English History '' was published in
1824, the second series following three years later,
and the third in 1848. In addition he edited for the
Camden Society in 1843 his equally fascinating vol-
ume of “Original Letters of Eminent Literary
Men,” most of the material for all these books hav-
ing been selected from the manuscripts in the Brit-

106 The British Museum: Its History
ish Museum. Welcomed at the time of their publi-
cation for their entertainment and instruction, and
applauded by Scholars for the varied and minute
knowledge displayed in the notes by which they were
elucidated, these twelve volumes still delight and in-
form their numerous readers and remain invaluable
for the light they throw on the byways of history.
Ellis also placed to his credit a general introduction
to the Domesday Book, which has been described as
‘‘ unquestionably the most valuable of his antiqua-
rian labours, and a work of very great importance.”
Unfortunately no such consensus of eulogy can
be adduced in relation to his administration as Prin-
cipal Librarian. Eight years after his appointment
to that office — an appointment which he is said to
have secured by “pursuing the carriage of the royal
physician. Sir William Knighton, and enlisting his
good offices with the king ”—the internal economy
of the institution was such as to justify the famous
committee of inquiry of 1835-6. That committee
may have had its origin in private pique, but the
revelations made during its protracted sittings
amply demonstrated the need for its labours. Natu-
rally Sir Henry Ellis was the first witness called,
and he was examined and re-examined at great
length. From his answers it is easy to diagnose the
kindly but unprogressive nature of the man. He
was an ideal antiquary; one who remembered but
did not anticipate; his interests were in the past

Some Notable Officials 107
and use and wont were second nature. One or two
examples will be sufficient. When asked whether he
could suggest any improvement in the constitution
of the museum, he replied, “I cannot, as far as re-
lates to the administration of it. I believe it to be
as faithfully administered and as perfectly admin-
istered as such an institution can allow.” And,
again, in defence of the custom of closing the mu-
seum for three weeks each autumn, he argued that
if that were not done the place would become “un-
wholesome,” and that to open the museum during
the Easter holidays would be dangerous as ‘‘the
most mischievous portion of the population is
abroad and about at such a time.” That dread of
the masses was evidently an obsession with Ellis,
for he pleaded still further for the closing of the
institution on public holidays on the ground that
“ people of a higher grade would hardly wish to
come to the museum at the same time with sailors
from the dockyards and the girls whom they might
bring with them.” In fact there is no disputing the
general verdict of Richard Garnett, than whom no
gentler judge could be desired by the most obdurate
offender. Ellis’s “administrative faculties, which
had served him well during a period of mere rou-
tine, were inadequate to cope with the rapidly aug-
menting demands of the country, and the inevitable,
almost involuntary, increase of the institution. His
views, though natural enough at the beginning of
108 The British Museum: Its History
the century, seemed strangely illiberal in the era of
the Reform Bill. . . . He possessed, indeed, few
qualifications for the chief office except industry and
kindness of heart, and the latter very essential qual-
ity certainly went too far with him. . . . A diligent
antiquary and an amiable man, he could scarcely be
blamed if the altered circumstances of his times ren-
dered him unequal to a post which at an earlier
period he would have filled with distinction.”
But during at least the last decade of Sir Henry
Ellis’s term of office the real head of the museum
was not the Principal Librarian. Virtually, though
not in name, the chief control had passed into the
hands of Anthony Panizzi, the third of the foreign-
born members of the staff who attained the highest
post of the institution. A native of Italy, he sought
refuge in England from the perils to which his po-
litical views had exposed him, and in 1831 was,
through his friend Brougham's influence, appointed
as an assistant librarian. He quickly justified his
appointment by the amount and thoroughness of his
work, which won such appreciation from Thomas
Grenville that when a proposal for an increase in
Panizzi's salary was rejected by the trustees that
warm-hearted booklover left the board-room and
never attended another meeting. Panizzi's evidence
before the select committee of 1835-6 revealed the
far-reaching nature of his knowledge of books, his
passion for work, and his fertility of ideas. He told,
.
º
º
º
º
º
º
/
- º
º
ſº º
º
//
SIR ANTHONY PANIZZI.

Some Notable Officials 109
for example, how he had devoted his vacation to a
tour on the Continent expressly undertaken to ex-
amine the working of famous libraries, and enunci-
ated his gospel as a librarian in these terms: “I
want a poor student to have the same means of in-
dulging his learned curiosity, of following his ra-
tional pursuits, of consulting the same authorities,
of fathoming the most intricate inquiry, as the rich-
est man in the kingdom, as far as books go, and I
contend that government is bound to give him the
most liberal and unlimited assistance in this re-
spect.” To every question he gave a prompt and ,
lucid answer, and nothing could move him from his
position that more space was necessary for housing
the library and a liberal annual grant needed for
adding to its treasures. And those who are experts
in such matters affirm that Panizzi's views on cata-
loguing stamped him as “the greatest legislator the
world of librarianship had yet seen.”
He was quickly afforded an opportunity to trans-
mute his theories into practice. A year after the
committee had concluded its inquiry he was made
keeper of the printed books, and that date, 1837,
marked the opening of that new era which resulted
in elevating the library of the British Museum to its
position of world-leadership. But the appointment
did not pass without protest; then and later, when
he was made Principal Librarian, Panizzi was ob-
jected to as “a foreigner,” even though he had long
110 The British Museum: Its History
been a naturalized Englishman. Consequently, when
a second inquiry was held in 1848, the critics of the
museum concentrated their forces on Panizzi, who,
however, rebutted all accusations in a triumphant
manner. Macaulay summed up the situation admi-
rably when the “foreigner '' was elected to the chief
office. “I am glad of this,” he wrote on being in-
formed of the appointment, ‘‘ both on public and
private grounds. Yet I fear that the appointment
will be unpopular both within and without the walls
of the museum. There is a growing jealousy among
men of science which, between ourselves, appears
even at the board of trustees. There is a notion that
the department of natural history is neglected, and
that the library and the sculpture gallery are unduly
favoured. This feeling will certainly not be allayed
by the appointment of Panizzi, whose great object,
during many years, has been to make our library the
best in Europe, and who would at any time give
three mammoths for an Aldus.” Panizzi was, un-
questionably, more deeply interested in his own de-
partment than in any other, but it should not be for-
gotten that so early as 1836 he declared that the de-
partment of natural history “ought to have better
assistance ’’ and be transferred to more suitable
premises.
Erom the spectacular point of view Panizzi's
greatest achievement was the institution and com-
pletion of that scheme for the erection of the famous
Some Notable Officials 111
circular Reading-Room already referred to; his
equally important labours in strengthening the weak
places of the library, securing more liberal grants
from Parliament, influencing by his private friend-
ship the donations of valuable accessions as in the
case of Thomas Grenville, elevating the standard of
public regard for the museum as a whole, and Se-
curing civil service recognition for the staff can be
appreciated only by those familiar with the inner
history of the institution.
In his sympathetic sketch of the famous librarian
Dr. Garnett speaks of Panizzi as leading ‘‘ a second
life of incessant occupation with politics, especially
as they affected the movement for the liberation of
Italy.” But even that does not take full account
of Panizzi’s bewildering activities. He was also an
author of no mean ability, gratefully remembered to
this day for his fine edition of Ariosto’s ‘‘ Orlando
Furioso '' and still more for his services in connec-
tion with Boiardo’s ‘‘ Orlando Innamorato.” So
many-sided a man naturally had numerous friends;
they included statesmen of the highest rank in Whig
circles such as Lord Palmerston, Lord Russell, and
Mr. Gladstone; men of letters of such eminence as
Samuel Rogers, Henry Hallam, Sydney Smith,
George Grote, and Lord Macaulay; but it may be
doubted whether any of these appreciated his fine
qualities more keenly than his colleagues at the Brit-
ish Museum, who entertained for him a feeling “not
112 The British Museum: Its History
only of admiration but also of affectionate re-
spect.”
Panizzi's term of office as Principal Librarian ex-
tended from 1856 to 1866, he resigning in the latter
year and being succeeded by John Winter Jones,
who had already been some thirty years in the serv-
ice of the museum. He had been an active and lead-
ing member of the committee which framed the
ninety-one rules of cataloguing now famous among
librarians, and generally Panizzi's right-hand man
in his campaign of reform. Whether as Keeper of
the printed books or as Principal Librarian, Jones
was ever an ideal officer of the museum, distin-
guished by “industry, regularity, and the general
attainment of a high standard of efficiency.” Be-
yond editing several books for the Hakluyt Society
and contributing to “useful knowledge ’’ publica-
tions and to the reviews, he did little work as a
writer, wisely contenting himself with the zealous
discharge of his official duties and with carrying on
the traditions of his predecessor.
When Jones resigned in 1878 the competent and
reforming Keeper of the manuscript department,
Edward A. Bond, was promoted to the chief office
of the museum and during his reign of ten years
many further improvements were carried out. Two
of these, the substitution of a printed for the un-
wieldy manuscript catalogue, and the adoption of
sliding presses to provide additional space for new
Some Notable officials 113
books, added materially to the efficiency of the
Reading-Room; another, the introduction of electric
light, enhanced the safety of the museum as a whole
and increased its availability for the use of the pub-
lic. It was under Bond's direction, too, that the
natural history collections were removed to their
new home at South Kensington, and that the White
Wing was added to the structure at Bloomsbury.
“Nothing,” as one of his colleagues has testified,
‘‘ was more remarkable in him than his openness of
mind, and a receptiveness of new ideas most unusual
in a veteran official.” He has, however, other claims
upon remembrance, for in addition to his eminent
services in bringing the manuscript department to
an ideal standard of efficiency, he was co-founder of
the Palaeological Society and edited in a scholarly
manner many important works. It was his associate
in the foundation of the Palaeological Society, Ed-
ward Maunde Thompson, who succeeded him as
Principal Librarian in 1888, just as he had followed
him in the keepership of the manuscript department.
The ninth Principal Librarian, who has so many
learned volumes to his credit, retained the office until
1909, when the present incumbent, Frederic George
Kenyon, was appointed. As was the case with both
of his immediate predecessors, Dr. Kenyon previ-
ously held office in the manuscript department and
had attained an enviable reputation for his palaeo-
graphical knowledge and for the ripe scholarship
114 The British Museum: Its History
which had been demonstrated, among numerous
other publications, by his text and translation of
Aristotle’s “Constitution of Athens.” That the
present Director and Principal Librarian is respon-
sive to the needs of the times is illustrated by the
recent (March, 1911) introduction of a public tele-
phone into the museum; that he will guide its des-
tinies along the lines of making its departments still
more efficient as instruments of knowledge may be
safely augured from his scholarly record.
In giving a brief account of the notable men who
have held the chief office of the British Museum it
has been thought best to maintain a chronological
sequence, but it would be unjust to leave the reader
with the impression that the Principal Librarians
have been the only men of note connected with the
institution. That is far from the truth. It would
mean that in a century and a half but ten distin-
guished men have been attracted to the service of
the British nation in that particular connection,
whereas the ranks of museum officials have included
H. F. Cary, Josiah Forshall, Frederic Madden, the
Richard Garnetts, father and son, John Thomas
Smith, Henry H. Baber, T. H. Horne, Thomas
Watts, Coventry Patmore, and such eminent living
authorities as Sir Sidney Colvin, Dr. E. A. Wallis
Budge, Dr. G. F. Warner, George K. Fortescue, Dr.
Lionel D. Barnett, and many more.
One member of the early band of scholars attained
Some Notable Officials 115
a distinction which no Principal Librarian has yet
achieved, that is, burial in the famous Poet's Cor-
ner of Westminster Abbey. Such was the climax
of Henry F. Cary’s useful life — a life which en-
riched English literature by that translation of
Dante which extorted from Macaulay the verdict
that it placed Dante under a greater debt ‘‘ than
ever poet owed to translator,” and was described
by Southey as “a translation of magnitude and
difficulty, executed with perfect fidelity and admi-
rable skill.” And a critic with more acumen than
either of those, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, wrote
Cary: “This is the excellence of the work consid-
ered as a translation of Dante, that it gives the
reader a similar feeling of wandering and wander-
ing, onward and onward.”
Cary had completed his translation fourteen years
before he joined the staff of the British Museum.
But he was already rich in the friendship of Cole-
ridge, Lamb, Wordsworth, Southey, and many an-
other son of fame. His initiation into that distin-
guished circle began by his making the acquaintance
of Coleridge in a novel manner. Wandering along
the seashore during a holiday, Cary was amusing
himself by reciting Homer to his son, when his enun-
ciation of the Greek lines arrested the attention of
another stroller, who introduced himself with, “Sir,
yours is a face I should know. I am Samuel Taylor
Coleridge.” The other friendships followed as a
116 The British Museum: Its History
matter of course, leading to those convivial literary
evenings in Cary’s rooms at old Montagu House at
one of which Lamb imbibed so freely that he had to
be sent home early in a hackney coach. Cary’s
duties in the library of the museum were not oner-
ous, for he was “mainly employed in cataloguing
new purchases and acquisitions by copyright,” but
when the keepership of the department became va-
cant he could not rid his mind of the delusion that
he was fully qualified for that important post, and
has, unhappily, to be reckoned among those provin-
cial persons who resented Panizzi's appointment on
the score of his being a “foreigner.”
One of Cary’s contemporaries at the museum was
Josiah Forshall, the Keeper of the manuscript de-
partment and afterwards secretary to the trustees,
who is remembered for the capable editing of vari-
ous manuscript catalogues and his partnership with
Frederic Madden in preparing that edition of the
Bible which reproduced the earliest English versions
made by John Wycliffe and his followers. His evi-
dence before the famous select committee revealed
him as a determined opponent of everything tending
to popularize the museum. Madden, too, was an
accomplished palaeographer, having, as Dr. Garnett
asserts, “no rival in his day,” his “ sagacity, con-
firmed by long practice, appearing almost intui-
tion.” Apart from his labours at the museum, he
published four great editions of ancient works
Some Notable Officials 117
“which stand out decisively from the mass of simi-
lar publications.” Of Richard Garnett, the elder,
Southey testified that he was “a very remarkable
person,” adding, “I do not know any man who has
read so much which you would not expect him to
have read; ” of Richard Garnett the younger there
are yet alive many to whom his name is a fragrant
memory for what it recalls of gracious kindliness
and willingness to share to the utmost with the hum-
blest student the rich stores of his varied learning.
He will live long in literary history, too, as the pic-
turesque biographer of Carlyle, Emerson, and Mil-
ton, as the writer of much graceful verse, and the
teller of many original and fanciful tales. In the
history of the British Museum library, as has been
justly said, ‘‘ his place is second only to that of
Panizzi.”
But to continue the list is impossible within the
space to which this history must be confined. So
far as the roll-call is written, it is one which amply
justifies Professor Seeley’s eulogy; that the names
added to it in the coming years will not be less illus-
trious needs no proving. All of which, in addition
to being exceedingly reassuring to the present race
of studious inquirers, must warm the learned
ghosts of Sir Robert Cotton, the two Harleys, and
Sir Hans Sloane.
II
THE BRITISH MUSEUM:
ITS TREASURES
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CHAPTER I
TEIE PRINTED BOOKS
SUCH prominence has already been given to the
purely literary treasures of the British Museum that
it will perhaps be most convenient to describe first
those sections of the building which are devoted to
the important department of printed books. Be-
sides, they are quickly in evidence as soon as the
visitor finds himself in the entrance hall, for while
the galleries of the Grenville and King's Libraries
are immediately to his right, he has but to walk
straight ahead for the swinging glass doors which
give ingress to the world-famous circular Reading-
Room.
In that direction, however, the visitor’s progress
will be barred unless he possesses a reader’s ticket
or has applied for an admission order. The latter
can be obtained in the entrance hall and is given
without delay to all adults; the former can be se-
cured only by written application to the Director,
which must be accompanied by suitable recommenda-
tion from a householder of established position.
When armed with an admission order merely the vis-
itor is personally conducted and not allowed further
\,
inside the Reading-Room than the immediate neigh-
121
122 The British Museum: Its Treasures
bourhood of the entrance door; the happy posses-
sor of a reader's ticket has entire freedom of that
spacious apartment, and ample time to note at will
not only its huge proportions but also the minute
attention which has been devoted to facilitating his
studies and ensuring his personal comfort.
Figures are stark looking things at the best, but
the curious in such matters will be interested to
learn that the dome of the Reading-Room is one
hundred and forty feet in diameter, and its height
one hundred and six feet. Part of the daylight which
floods the room comes from the lantern, which is
forty feet in diameter, and part from the twenty
circular-headed windows which divide the dome at
a height of thirty-five feet from the ground. These
windows are twenty-seven feet high by twelve feet
wide. The cubic space of the apartment extends to
a million and a quarter feet. And all this huge area
is provided for less than five hundred readers! To
criticize this liberality may seem ungracious or to
partake of the nature of sacrilege, for the Reading-
Room is pre-eminently the ‘‘ show ’’ architectural
feature of the museum; but in view of the fact that
the cry is ever “more room " for books, and the
further fact that part of the newspaper stores have
had to be removed and by that removal are less
available for immediate reference, it is almost in-
explicable that something has not been done to
utilize the immense space which is now wasted. Five
….……
º WOOH ÐNICIWCH?H : INQ GISQ IN HSILIH {I|-|- ---- «… ：-（ …
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The Printed Books 123
hundred readers do not require a hundred and six
feet of air above their heads; in what other public
room in daily use is there such a protracted interval
between humanity’s six-foot of height and the roof
which shelters it from the heavens? If those five
hundred had but fifty feet of air space above them
they would be as comfortable as they are with their
hundred and six, and the other fifty odd would pro-
vide room for the book-growth for many genera-
tions. At the very least it is obvious that nothing
would be lost by carrying the floor of the Reading-
Room to the level of the first gallery, and that in it-
self would relieve the space pressure for at least
half a century. Laudable as was Panizzi's scheme, it
was, after all, a wasteful scheme, for the object of a
library is not primarily to be an architectural wonder.
But, taking things as they are, there is probably
no reading-room in the world where the student is
so well cared for, so quickly served, and so free
from officialism as in the British Museum. That
his surroundings are nobly impressive will have
been gathered from the figures cited above, and
whenever he lifts his eyes from his studies they can
hardly fail to be gratified by the restful scheme of
decoration in white and gold which was carried out
when the room was thoroughly overhauled two
years ago. The ground-floor plan in diagram has
a striking resemblance to a wheel, the hub being
represented by the superintendent’s desk, raised
124 The British Museum: Its Treasures
sufficiently to command a view of the room, and the
spokes by the readers’ tables. Of the latter there
are thirty-five, with seats on either side, giving ac-
commodation for four hundred and fifty-eight read:
ers. The longer tables are screened down the cen-
tre, that screen being provided on either side with
a hinged desk and a folding shelf for books not in
immediate use. In addition there is a recessed
niche for carrying pens and a penwiper, and each
individual reader has in all table room amounting to
four feet three inches in length by two feet one inch
in depth. Artificial light is supplied from four arc
lamps of great power, supplemented by glow-lamps
at the readers’ tables. The ventilation is admira-
ble, the warming thoroughly efficient. And yet, not-
withstanding all this attention to the comfort of
students, there are probably readers to this day
who sympathize with a part of Thomas Carlyle's
complaint about the old reading-room. “I never
do enter the room,” he said, “without getting a
headache—what I call the museum headache—
and therefore I avoid the room till the last extrem-
ity.” It is not perhaps a headache from which
some present-day workers suffer, but rather a gen-
eral lowering of bodily and mental vitality, a heavi-
ness of spirit, induced, perhaps, by the oppressive
silence which has of course to be rigidly maintained.
Many a Reading-Room habitue will confess to a
desire to shout aloud or indulge in some unconven-
The Printed Books 125
tional relief to his pent-up feelings. Whether it is
still true, as was once complained, that “there is
a flea generated in that room that is larger than any
to be found elsewhere,” is a matter upon which no ad-
equate information is forthcoming. It needs a Par-
liamentary Inquiry to elicit such picturesque details.
If the flea has disappeared, so also has that table
which used to be reserved for the fair sex. Thus
does suffragism march to victory ! For surely that
last vestige of the distinction between the sexes
must have been swept away in deference to woman’s
strident claim of equality. Some sixty years ago
a historian of the Reading-Room noted that the
“ not numerous, but they are
women readers were
ominous of a social revolution.” He added, how-
ever, that “it is in the pursuits of art and literature
that we think we recognize one of the means for
asserting the independence of woman without any
sacrifice of the gentler graces of her sex.” But
then this philosopher proceeded to take back half
he had admitted by implying that the lady students
cared for nothing more than romance, declaring of
one that “it is any odds that the folio before her
is Sidney’s “Arcadia,” or one of Scudoni’s ro-
mances, and that she is reading it with all the faith,
interest and self-application of fifteen.” Two or
three decades ago the feminine preserve of the
Reading-Room led to a little squabble between the
Sexes, one of the blue-stockings charging her male
126 The British Museum: Its Treasures
rivals with deliberately filching from her special
table the leather-covered chairs and substituting for
them the wooden-seated abominations which she de-
tested. To which a spokesman for the sterner sex
rejoined that the lady was welcome to all the stuffed
chairs in the room, provided she and her sex would
keep to their own table and not invade the male
seats all over the room. “You may see a dozen
of these fair creatures at as many desks — shining
out, it is true, like flowers in a parterre — all the
room over, whilst a dozen seats at the ladies’ desks
are left still unclaimed by, and altogether desolate
of, fair occupants.” But all these cheerful ameni-
ties are of the past; there is still a choice of chairs
stuffed or plain; but the dividing line between the
sexes has gone, and the “shining ” flowers — a
few in early bloom but the majority past their
prime — scatter themselves where they will.
And if Washington Irving could return he would
observe another radical change. Instead of those
‘‘ black-looking portraits of ancient authors ”
which he noted above the bookcases there are, high
up on the breastwork of the windows, nineteen pan-
els adorned with just the names alone of as many
English immortals, beginning with Chaucer and
ending with Browning. That would have spoilt
Geoffrey Crayon’s inimitable dream. For did he
not lay emphasis upon those portraits so that when
he fell asleep amid the bookmakers around him he
The Printed Books 127
could imagine the old authors starting from their
frames to charge with theft the busy plagiarists
below? He saw in his dreamland vision how proud
the purloiners were of their borrowed garments,
how they pranced to and fro in their stolen finery,
until, at “the height of this literary masquerade,
a cry suddenly resounded from every side of
‘Thieves! Thieves ' ' I looked, and lo! the por-
traits above the wall became animated The old
authors thrust out, first a head, then a shoulder,
from the canvas, looked down curiously, for an in-
stant, upon the motley throng, and then descended
with fury in their eyes to claim their rifled property.
The scene of scampering and hubbub that ensued
baffles all description. The unhappy culprits en-
deavoured in vain to escape with their plunder. . . .
I was grieved to see so many men, to whom I had
been accustomed to look up with awe and reverence,
fain to steal off with scarce a rag to cover their
nakedness.” Perhaps it was a lively recollection of
this distressing exposure which prompted the trus-
tees to decorate the Reading-Room with names in-
stead of portraits.
But the “conveying ” goes on down below as
industriously as ever. The purloiners must take
confidence from the substitution of names for por-
traits that might raise a hue and cry. So among
those busy writers are members of Parliament
“cramming ” for the debate which is to pave their
128 The British Museum: Its Treasures
way to cabinet office, ministers of religion abstract-
ing sermons which are to give them a spurious rep-
utation for eloquence and exalt them in the affec-
tions of languishing females, poets gathering a bou-
quet of flowers not their own growing, novelists in
feverish search for forgotten plots, and many an-
other aspirant to fame. But after all, as Irving
said, this pilfering disposition may be the device of
Providence for the preservation of the seeds of
knowledge and wisdom. And, of course, there are
among the readers many, very many, who are add-
ing to the seed-store of learning and wit, and others
who only help themselves to a gem or two which
sparkles among their own ornaments “without
eclipsing them.”
What treasures they all have to draw upon'
Here again the curious will demand figures, and
yet how little use they are. In the book-presses
which surround the entire Reading-Room, to which
every reader has free access without having to fill
in a slip of any kind, there are some twenty thou-
sand volumes; the contents of the two galleries
above bring the total number actually in sight to
a total of about seventy thousand. But the entire
library comprises some two and a half million vol-
umes. In the New Library and Reading-Room
there are three miles of bookcases eight feet. in
height; in the entire department there are forty-six
miles of shelving. And this does not take account
The Printed Books 129
of the newspaper-room, or of the Hendon Reposi-
tory, to which all save London newspapers have
been exiled. Statistical minds may be able to ex-
tract some gratification from these figures; to the
ordinary mind they will convey but little even when
aided by the imposing array made by the seventy
thousand volumes in the Reading-Room itself. Be-
sides, it should, in justice, be added that the official
total of two and a half millions does not include the
pamphlets and other small publications usually
counted in other libraries. If they were reckoned
the total would be nearer five millions. On the
character of the library as a whole the following
impartial verdict has been passed: “The collection
of English books is far from approaching complete-
ness, but, apart from the enormous number of vol-
umes, the library contains an extraordinary quan-
tity of rarities. Few libraries in the United States
can equal either in number or value the American
books in the museum. The collection of Slavonic
literature, due to the initiative of Thomas Watts,
is also a remarkable feature. Indeed, in cosmopol-
itan interest the museum is without a rival in the
world, possessing as it does the best library in any
European language out of the territory in which
the language is vernacular.”
Literal as well as literary thefts have not been
unknown in the history of the Reading-Room. In
his attractive “Memories of the British Museum ”
130 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Robert Cowtan states that the trustees have not in-
frequently been compelled to institute criminal pro-
ceedings against some who have abused the privi-
leges of the library by stealing books. “In every
case conviction followed, and the offenders were
sentenced to long terms of imprisonment with hard
labour. Mutilation of books has also occurred: I
recollect some flagrant instances of this nature,
where the parties were discovered and severely
punished. One was that of a man well known, and,
I may add, highly respected. He was writing a
life of Daniel O’Connell, M. P., and had consulted
the newspapers for information that was required.
Some of the speeches were too long to be copied,
and the reader deliberately cut them out with a
pen-knife. He was discovered and punished. An-
other instance I recollect well, as I was engaged
with others for some weeks in making the requisite
examination of books he had used, in order to bring
the offender to justice. He was an artist, and com-
mitted wholesale depredations among books con-
taining prints and engravings. He was, however,
discovered, but not before he had succeeded in fill-
ing a large scrap-book with plates which he had
abstracted from books in the national library. Not
long since, a long set of ‘The Pulpit,” in many vol-
umes, had to be removed from its place in the Read-
ing-Room, as many entire sermons had been cut
out.” After all, however, these offences are but
The Printed Books 131
few in number compared with the vast army of
readers using the room. Two years ago they num-
bered over two hundred and thirty thousand, main-
tained a daily average of seven hundred and sixty,
and, in course of the year, consulted close on a mil-
lion and a half volumes.
While of great interest to bibliophiles, minute
details as to the treasures of the museum library
mean so little to the general reader that they would
be out of place in these pages; besides, the ordi-
nary visitor has no opportunity to examine those
treasures, and may not even consult the volumes in
the open presses of the Reading-Room. There are,
however, two adjuncts of the library where his lib-
erty is not so restrained, namely, the galleries
where are kept the handsome volumes of the Gren-
ville and King's Libraries. As has been stated
already, these apartments lead off the right of the
entrance hall and are open to every visitor. Not
that the books can be handled; on the contrary
they are protected by glass doors, enabling the curi-
ous to see if they cannot read.
Turning to the right, then, from the entrance hall
the visitor enters first the room devoted to the
choice volumes bequeathed to the museum by the
Rt. Hon. Thomas Grenville. As with the other gal-
leries, there are many glass-covered cases in this
apartment, but their contents have no relation to
the Grenville Library as such. As the exhibits in
132 The British Museum: Its Treasures
those cases are designed to illustrate the develop-
ment of manuscript illumination, their considera-
tion must be reserved for the succeeding chapter.
It is the printed book, and the printed book alone,
which claims immediate attention. And in this one
gallery there are upwards of twenty thousand such
volumes.
Apart from the King's Library the Grenville col-
lection is the most important single accession ever
made to the literary treasures of the museum.
“Formed and preserved,” as Panizzi wrote, “with
the exquisite taste of an accomplished bibliographer,
with the learning of a profound and elegant scholar,
and the splendid liberality of a gentleman in afflu-
ent circumstances,” it is not surprising that while
the outward appearance of the volumes is indicative
of their former owner’s wealth the works them-
selves bear convincing testimony to his catholic
learning. The editions of Homer and AEsop are
among the rarest known; Latin classics are repre-
sented by the unique copy of Azzoguidi’s first edi-
tion of Ovid and the Aldine Virgil of 1505; among
the English poets included are the first and second
editions of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales '' and the
first edition of Shakespeare’s collected works; in
the domain of English history are countless con-
temporary works on the advance and defeat of the
Spanish Armada; Spanish and Italian literature
are exhibited by many rare volumes. “But,” as
The Printed Books 133
Panizzi, who knew the volumes as intimately as
their owner, remarked, “where there is nothing
common, it is almost depreciating a collection to
enumerate a few books as rare.” It constitutes a
worthy vestibule to the book treasures of the mu-
seum, and, as in life, it is meet that the generous
donor’s presence should preside in its midst.
Whether, however, the rear of the catalogue table
is the best position for displaying the bust of Gren-
ville is open to question; one is reluctant to study
its refined and benevolent lineaments lest the occu-
pation should excite in the catalogue-seller antici-
pations of purchases which are not to be realized.
From the Grenville to the King's Library is only
a few steps, for the visitor has but to pass into the
manuscript saloon and turn to the left to find him-
self in the noble gallery where are stored the vol-
umes collected at so much expense by George III
and “presented ” to the nation by his inglorious
son. This, as has been stated, is the oldest portion
of the present museum buildings, it having been
erected in 1828 specially for the reception of the
royal library. Here, too, one comes upon an asso-
ciation which must always lend interest to this sec-
tion of the museum. Macaulay, as his nephew
wrote, was most assiduous in his attendance at the
institution, both as a trustee and a student. “His
habit was to work in the King's Library; partly
for quiet; and partly in order to have George the
134 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Third’s wonderful collection of pamphlets within
an easy walk of his chair. He did his writing at
one of the oak tables which stand in the centre of
the room, sitting away from the outer wall, for the
sake of the light. He availed himself of his official
authority to search the shelves at pleasure without
the intervention of a librarian; and (says the at-
tendant) * when he had taken down a volume, he
generally looked as if he had found something in
it.” ”
Perhaps Macaulay’s oak table is preserved some-
where, but neither it nor any other table now stands
in the centre of the room. On either side, however,
are numerous show-cases, some containing Oriental
manuscripts and others reserved for temporary
exhibitions, but the bulk given up to a deeply inter-
esting sequence of books illustrating the develop-
ment of printing in Europe from its earliest stages.
The cases begin on the left-hand side of the room,
but after he has inspected number one the visitor
will have to cross the aisle to the right for number
two, and continue that zigzagging process down the
gallery. - -
Seeing that the first case is devoted to block-
books, it would almost appear as though the mu-
seum authorities subscribe to the theory that print-
ing from the solid block must have preceded print-
ing from movable types, but the origins of printing
are still shrouded in so much mystery and doubt
The Printed Books 135
that it is idle to demand any definite statement on
the question of priority. The experts seem to have
decided upon one conclusion which is flattering to
European vanity, and that is that the Western
world was not indebted to either China or Japan
for the art of block-printing or printing from mov-
able types, although both were known and prac-
tised in the East many centuries before they came
into use in Europe. The ten block-books in this
show-case represent a period of about seventy
years, beginning with the “Ars Moriendi,” which
is attributed to an unknown Netherlands printer of
about 1460, and ending in 1530 with the last known
example. The fact that block-printing was contin-
ued for so long after movable types were in general
use certainly does militate against the theory that
movable type was a development of the solid block.
It seems wiser to leave that problem in abeyance
and be content with the fact that as the block served
the purpose of a stereotype plate its survival should
not be cited as evidence one way or another.
Of course block-printing was a primitive form of
typography. It was a simple matter to cut pictures
and letter-press in wood, and then take an impres-
sion by smearing the surface with some kind of ink
and pressing a piece of paper into contact. At first
the block-books were printed on one side of the
paper only, but when a press became available they
were printed on both sides after the manner of a
136 The British Museum: Its Treasures
modern volume. Sometimes these early books con-
sisted wholly of illustrations, at others of text and
pictures combined on the same, or of text on some
pages and cuts on others. And that the results,
especially in the illustrations, were surprisingly
good is amply proved by that picture from the
“Ars Moriendi '’ which depicts the dying man as-
sailed by temptations to impatience. In the same
case are two examples of the “Biblia Pauperum,”
that “ Bible of the Poor ’’ which consisted of scenes
from the life of Christ and was so popular in the
fifteenth century. Another volume of great inter-
est and excellent workmanship is the “Mirabili
Romae,” an ancient forerunner of Baedeker, for
the volume is a guide-book to Rome designed for
the use of German pilgrims visiting the Eternal
City. This is printed on both sides of the paper
and is supposed to have been produced about 1475.
German printing craft dominates the next
four cases, which set forth the history of printing
in that country from about 1455 to 1532. This, as
the visitor will soon discover, is a debatable terri-
tory. Those pages of quiet-seeming print, espe-
cially the two “Indulgences '' and the forty-two-
line Bible and the thirty-six-line Bible, have been
the occasion of volumes of controversy. It all re-
solves itself in the end into the question whether
printing from movable type is to be placed to the
credit of Johann Gutenberg of Mainz, or to that of
The Printed Books , 137
Lourens Janszoon Coster of Haarlem, or to some-
one else unknown. Such hair-splitting is not of
momentous interest, but the open page of the forty-
two-line Bible, more usually described as the Maza-
rine Bible, and hence regarded as the first book to
be printed in Europe, will have a special appeal for
those who recall Hallam's happy simile. “It is a
very striking circumstance,” noted the historian of
the literature of Europe, ‘‘ that the high-minded
inventors of this great art tried at the very outset
so bold a flight as the printing of an entire Bible,
and executed it with astonishing success. It was
Minerva leaping on earth in her divine strength
and radiant armour, ready at the moment of her
nativity to subdue and destroy her enemies. The
Mazarine Bible is printed, some copies on vellum,
some on paper of choice quality, with strong, black,
and tolerably handsome characters, but with some
want of uniformity; which has led, perhaps un-
reasonably, to a doubt whether they were cast in
a matrix. We may see in imagination this vener-
able and splendid volume leading up the crowded
myriads of its followers, and imploring, as it were,
a blessing on the new art, by dedicating its first-
fruits to the service of Heaven.”
Whoever invented movable type, the printers
who first employed it were chary of exploiting their
own names and careless in not dating their pro-
ductions. Had they attended to those small details,
138 The British Museum: Its Treasures
what hundreds of volumes need not have been writ-
ten. Hence the feeling of relief with which the
visitor will pass to the third show-case, wherein is
exhibited the earliest book inscribed with the name
of its printer and the date of publication. This is
a Latin Psalter which was produced in Mainz by
Fust and Schöffer in 1457. Henceforward the
words “about ’’ and “printer unknown '' prac-
tically disappear, and the student of the printed
book feels that he has reached firm land at last. He
is free now, at any rate to examine succeeding vol-
umes with a feeling of confidence, and is in a posi-
tion to form his own conclusions as to whether the
art of printing was advancing or degenerating.
One thing he can hardly fail to note, and that is
that as the matrix cutters became more expert and
were able to impart sharper outlines and greater
uniformity to their dies, the art of the illustrator
became more crude. Some forty years, for example,
divided the artist of the “Ars Moriendi '' from the
illustrator of the Strassburg AFsop, but the work
of the latter is rough and primitive compared with
that of the former.
Whether Gutenberg is ever conclusively credited
with the invention of movable types is hardly of
grave importance seeing that he is declared to have
“no serious rival for the honour of having brought
printing into existence as a practical art.” This
leaves Germany with the chief laurels, but it must
The Printed Books - 139
not be overlooked that the art quickly spread into
other lands, and that ere many years had passed
printing-presses were busily at work in Italy,
France, Holland, Spain, and England. All this is
cogently illustrated by the numerous examples dis-
played in show-cases number six to thirteen.
Among the exhibits in those cases are many no-
table volumes, including a copy of the first book
printed at Venice (1469); the “Hypnerotoma-
chia,” the most famous of Venetian illustrated
books; the “Virgilius,” which has the distinction
of being the first volume printed in italic type; a
copy of the first book printed in France; and nu-
merous other rarities. Owing, however, to the fre-
quent newspaper notoriety which is now given to
the competition among millionaires for the posses-
sion of such Caxtons as come to auction it is prob-
able that the English-speaking visitor will find more
to interest him in the show-cases devoted to the
typographical achievements of the father of print-
ing in England. That William Caxton is entitled to
that honour is beyond dispute, for the story told
by Richard Atkyns in favour of transferring that
credit to another has been proved “a mere fable.”
Caxton learned the craft of printing on the Continent
and is believed to have printed his first book at
Bruges about 1475. This was a translation from
the French by the printer himself of Raoul Le
Fèvre's “Recueil des histoires de Troye,” and is
140 The British Museum: Its Treasures
second in interest only to Caxton’s “The Dictes or
Sayengis of the Philosophres,” to which belongs
the unique distinction of being the earliest book
printed in England. For in the interval between
the two volumes Caxton had returned to his native
land and set up his printing-press at Westminster,
whence, in 1477, he issued that memorable volume
to the world. Of the thirteen copies of this book
known to exist an admirable example is displayed
in case eleven, side by side with copies of the two
books produced by Caxton at Bruges. Keeping
them company may also be seen five other Caxtons,
including his edition of Chaucer’s “Canterbury
Tales '' and his crudely illustrated version of
AEsop’s fables. The British Museum possesses no
fewer than eighty-four Caxtons, twenty-five of
them, however, being duplicates.
Shortly after Caxton had established his press at
Westminster the new art began to be practised at
Oxford, and in 1480 printers were at work in St.
Albans and in the city of London. On Caxton’s
death in 1491 his business was acquired by his fore-
man, Wynkyn de Worde, and another printer who
quickly came to the front was Richard Pynson.
Rare examples of the work of these early craftsmen
are shown in cases adjoining the Caxton exhibition.
Nor should it be overlooked that in case fourteen,
among the specimens of early printing in Scotland,
Ireland, and the Colonies, is a copy of John Eliot’s
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A PAGE FROM CAxTON’s “AESOP.”




The Printed Books 141
translation of the Bible into the language of the
Massachusetts Indian, this being the first Bible
printed in America.
Perhaps, however, among all these priceless
treasures there are no volumes of such absorbing
interest as those displayed in the fifteenth and six-
teenth show-cases. Here are copies of the first
edition of the first Prayer Book of Edward VI,
the first edition of the Authorized Bible of 1611,
the first folio of Shakespeare, and the first editions
of “Tottel's Miscellany,” Sir Philip Sidney’s “An
Apologie for Poetrie,” Spenser’s “The Faery
Queene,” Bacon’s “Essayes,” Herrick’s “Hes-
perides,” Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” Izaak Wal-
ton’s “The Compleat Angler,” John Bunyan’s
“The Pilgrim’s Progress,” Daniel Defoe's “The
Life and strange Surprising Adventures of Robin-
son Crusoe,” Jonathan Swift’s “Gulliver’s Trav-
els,” Oliver Goldsmith’s “The Vicar of Wake-
field,” the “Lyrical Ballads'' of Wordsworth and
Coleridge, Robert Burns’s “Poems, chiefly in the
Scottish dialect,” Sir Walter Scott’s “Waverley,”
and Alfred Tennyson’s “Poems, chiefly lyrical.”
What a feast for the book-lover ! To be per-
fectly frank, even he may have been somewhat bored
by the contents of the other cases, instructive and
invaluable as they are, but now he is in a familiar
land, among authors whose names are more than
names, among the friends of his world of imagina-

142 The British Museum: Its Treasures
tion. He cares little, perhaps, save in a mildly
curious way, that these volumes are first editions;
he is not a pundit of title-pages, or a bargainer for
volumes just because they are scarce in that par-
ticular form. For him the chief and absorbing
interest of these books is that they are so many of
the contributary rills which have combined to swell
the full flood of English literature. Of course they
are priceless in money value, and would lead to
strenuous conflict of bank-roll against bank-roll
were they ever to reach the auction-room, but as
the visitor gazes upon those epoch-making volumes
his consolation is that, thanks to Gutenberg or
someone else, what is of supreme value in those
books is available now at a moderate cost.
Not in a mood of envy, then, will he turn to those
other half dozen show-cases which are dazzling for
their array of costly bindings. Two of these are
composed almost entirely of volumes that have once
belonged to famous owners. That the kings and
queens of England have cherished a preference for
handsome bindings is exemplified at every turn, as
may be seen by the Bible of Henry VIII and Anne
Boleyn, the Petrarch of Katherine Parr, the Greek
New Testament of Queen Elizabeth, or the Prayer
Book of Charles II. Most of the volumes so luxuri-
ously arrayed would pass Lamb’s test. In some
respects, he said, the better a book is, the less it
demands from binding, such as “Great Nature's

The Printed Books 143
Stereotypes,” which are eternal though individual
copies perish. “But,” he added, “where a book
is at once both good and rare — where the individ-
ual is almost the species, and when that perishes,
We know not where is that Promethean torch
That can its light relumine, -
such a book, for instance, as the Life of the Duke
of Newcastle, by his Duchess, no casket is rich
enough, no casing sufficiently durable, to honour
and keep safe such a jewel.” In supplement to the
examples of books bound for English monarchs are
some exquisite specimens of Italian and French
bindings illustrative of that craft from the fifteenth
to the end of the eighteenth century, and a final
show-case is devoted to English bindings which
were executed for other than royal libraries. That
some of the owners of these resplendent volumes
gave them such handsome raiment because they
treasured their contents is beyond question, for
these owners included C. M. Cracherode and
Thomas Grenville, but others may have been in the
Category of that nobleman the presence in whose
library of a splendidly bound but worm-eaten vol-
ume of Shakespeare prompted Burns to write:
“Through and through the inspired leaves,
Ye maggots, make your windings;
But O, respect his lordship's taste,
And spare his golden bindings!”
CHAPTER II
AMONG THE MANTUSCRIPTS
IF it is impossible to allow the general visitor to
the British Museum to have free access at will to
the department of printed books, how much more
impracticable must it be to permit an indiscriminate
use of the two departments of manuscripts. Why
there should be two departments may puzzle the
visitor until he remembers the great disparity
which exists between the East and the West, the
Occident and the Orient. Manuscripts dealing with
the thought of the Orient require for their custody
and interpretation knowledge of a different kind
from that rendered necessary in connection with the
written records of the Occident, and hence the di-
vision which gives a separate department to Orien-
tal manuscripts and books. But, so far as the gen-
eral public is concerned, this division does not exist,
for such of the treasures of each department as are
deemed suitable for exhibition are on view under
equal conditions.
That the manuscripts preserved in the museum
should be guarded with jealous care will surprise
no one. For one reason why a given book should
be the object of safe keeping a dozen reasons might
144
Among the Manuscripts 145
be adduced in favour of a given manuscript. The
written word is far more irreplaceable than the
printed word. No printed book can be destroyed.
At the time William Tyndale produced his New
Testament there was an Archbishop of Canterbury
who thought otherwise, and was simple enough to
appeal to his bishops for contributions to defray
the cost of the copies he had purchased and burnt.
Tyndale rejoiced that Providence had raised him
up so effectual a helper: “I am glad,” he said,
‘‘ for these two benefits shall come thereof; I shall
get money of him to bring myself out of debt, and
the overplus of the money that shall remain to me
shall make me more studious to correct the said
New Testament, and so newly to imprint the same
once again.” If Horace, long centuries before the
printing press was invented, and when the poet had
to commit his verse to the precarious custody of
papyrus or parchment, could boast that he had
reared himself a monument more durable than
brass, and could sing,
“I shall not wholly die. Some part,
Nor that a little, shall
Escape the dark Destroyer's dart,
And his grim festival,”
how much more secure is the record of the author
whose thoughts have been given to the printed
word. “The press,” as Hallam said, “pours forth
146 The British Museum: Its Treasures
in a few days a thousand volumes, which, scattered
like seeds in the air over the republic of Europe,
could hardly be destroyed without the extirpation
of its inhabitants.’’
With manuscripts the case is entirely different.
“The destruction of a few libraries by accidental
fire,” continues the historian of the Middle Ages,
“ the desolation of a few provinces by unsparing
and illiterate barbarians, might annihilate every
vestige of an author, or leave a few scattered cop-
ies, which, from the public indifference, there was
no inducement to multiply, exposed to similar cas-
ualties in succeeding times.” Hence the distress of
Edward Harley’s correspondents when it fell to
them to report to that collector the sad fate which
had overtaken the Cottonian manuscripts in the fire
of 1731. Although the extent of the damage wrought
by that fire was overestimated at the time, it is an
undeniable fact that the conflagration at Ashburn-
ham House did utterly obliterate many manuscripts
of priceless value.
Seeing that the number of those students who
can make intelligent use of written records is far
fewer than those who can derive benefit from the
printed book, it will not surprise the visitor to the
British Museum that the departments of manu-
scripts cannot boast of any apartment comparable
with the famous circular Reading-Room. There
are special rooms set apart for the use of students
Among the Manuscripts 147
of Occidental and Oriental manuscripts, but they
are Small apartments and wholly lacking in archi-
tectural pretensions. These, however, are not open
to the general public; their curiosity is catered for
by a number of show-cases arranged in the Gren-
ville Library and in the Manuscript Saloon, the
latter being a square apartment at right angles with
the Grenville and King’s Libraries. The exhibits
in the show-cases are supplemented by other re-
markable documents displayed in frames attached
to the wainscot on either side the entrances to the
saloon.
Before, however, the visitor can appreciate to the
full the interest and educational value of the numer-
ous papyri, vellum, and paper documents exhibited
in the Grenville Library and the Manuscript Sa-
loon, he will need to remind himself of several es-
sential facts. To the modern mind it is exceedingly
difficult to realize an age when printing did not
exist, and when a book was a totally different thing
from the object which now goes by that name. So
the inquiring visitor must at the outset recall that
in the centuries before the invention of printing,
all poetry, all history, all science, all biography, all
theology, in fact every form of literature without
exception, was produced by hand in a written form,
and that it was a laborious matter to provide even
half a dozen copies of say the Iliad of Homer or
the Psalms of David.
148 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Postulating, then, that man had acquired the art
of writing, it needs to be recalled that he was in
early ages accustomed to use various kinds of mate-
rials as substitutes for that paper now so generally
employed. Perhaps his first efforts to give visible
form to his thoughts were inscribed on stone, and
it is well known that some of the ancient nations
were in the habit of writing on clay tablets or tiles.
Other materials which have been used at some time
or other in the history of the human race have in-
cluded various metals, the roughly-prepared skins
of animals, slabs of wood, palm leaves, the bark of
trees, and finally papyrus was discovered and came
into general use in the ancient world. The date of
that discovery is unknown. The plant from which
it was made grew in abundance in the shallows of
the Nile and was a notable factor in the industries
of ancient Egypt. From its pliant stem boats were
made, and rope, and sandals, and mats, and cloth,
and, above all, that writing material which has been
the means of preserving so much of the knowledge
of bygone centuries. Thanks to the description
written by Pliny, the method by which papyrus was
prepared is fairly clear. When the stem of the plant
had been cut into long strips those strips were laid
on a board side by side and then crossed with a layer
of shorter strips at right angles. These were made
to adhere to each other either by some form of paste
or by the glutinous material of the plant, the process
Among the Manuscripts 149
being aided by hammering, after which the sheets
were placed in the sun to dry. Any roughness was
removed by polishing with ivory or a smooth shell.
It might be imagined that such material would prove
exceedingly perishable, whereas the contrary is the
case, for there are in existence papyri dating back
more than two thousand years before the Christian
era. In fact within recent years it has been seri-
ously proposed to re-introduce the manufacture of
papyrus for use as banknotes.
From Egypt the use of papyrus spread far and
wide, and it enjoyed a practical monopoly until
parchment, or vellum, began to contest its suprem-
acy. That writing material of the past, it will be
remembered, takes its name from Pergamum, the
capital of Eumenes II, whose efforts to enlarge his
library are said to have excited the jealousy of the
Ptolemies and led them to forbid the export of papy-
rus to Pergamum. That story is, however, regarded
as little more than a popular explanation of the
great development in the manufacture of skins for
writing purposes which took place in the second cen-
tury before Christ. One important result followed
from the use of parchment; unlike papyrus, it could
be written on both sides, and that convenience pre-
pared the way for the codex and the evolution of
the book-form of manuscript. The papyrus was
used in a roll-form as contrasted with a number of
leaves fastened together. There was a third kind
150 The British Museum: Its Treasures
of writing material in use in ancient Greece and
Rome, and that was the wax-covered tablet on which
letters were engraved with a pointed stylus or metal
instrument. The use of the tablet, however, was
practically confined to temporary needs, for school
lessons, for example, and hasty memoranda, the
stylus being generally provided with a broad end
to erase what had been incorrectly written or had
served its purpose.
On an ancient Greek vase which reproduces scenes
of school-life, two of the writing materials named
above are clearly represented. One scene shows the
waxen tablet used by the scholar, and another de-
picts the teacher with a roll of Homer in his hand.
The school-boy was not allowed to use papyrus for
his lessons, as it was too expensive; hence the wax-
covered tablet on which lessons could be as easily
written and erased as on the modern slate. In case
B in the Manuscript Saloon the visitor will see an
actual example of one of these tablets, and will ob-
serve with deep interest that it is a relic of the far-
off school-days of some Greek lad, for it still pre-
serves the copy of a couple of lines set by a school-
master and the efforts of the pupil to emulate his
teacher.
In practical illustration of the foregoing it will
perhaps be best for the visitor to seek out first those
show-cases which are devoted to classical papyri
and parchment manuscripts. The first of these is
Among the Manuscripts 151
that marked A, which is given up to Greek manu-
scripts. One of these, containing portions of the
“Phaedo ’’ of Plato, was written in the third cen-
tury before Christ, and is regarded as the oldest but
one classical Greek manuscript in existence. Near
by is the only extant manuscript of Bacchylides, dis-
covered in Egypt in 1896, while in close proximity
is the oldest extant manuscript of the Odyssey of
Homer. Another remarkable “find ’’ of recent
years is that papyrus of Aristotle's work on the con-
stitution of Athens, which has been edited in so
scholarly a manner by the present Principal Libra-
rian, Frederic G. Kenyon. "In addition to the in-
herent interest of the documents displayed in this
case and in cases B and C and D, it should be noted
that the exhibits illustrate the development of hand-
writing from the uncial style to the cursive or run-
ning hand of the present day. They also show how
confusing ancient manuscripts are owing to the
words being run into each other without those
blanks or punctuation marks to which the modern
reader is accustomed. -
Other Greek manuscripts are shown in case B, but
they are on parchment, or vellum, and paper. There
are, for example, two leaves of an oration of De-
mosthenes which, as they belong to the second cen-
tury, are regarded as the earliest extant vellum
manuscript dating from a time when vellum was still
regarded as inferior to papyrus. The two next
152 The British Museum: Its Treasures
cases, those marked C and D, are devoted to Latin
and other manuscripts and include parts of the
Bible and copies of works by Origen, Bede, St.
Jerome, Cicero, Juvenal, and many other illustri-
ous writers.
Perhaps, however, the English-speaking visitor
will be most attracted by the contents of cases E
and F, for these are devoted to English manuscripts
and the written chronicles of England. Of supreme
interest among the former is the manuscript of
Beowulf, the only existing manuscript, written in
England, of the oldest poem in the English lan-
guage. This came to the museum with the Cottonian
collection and was one of the volumes injured by the
fire of 1731. It was written about the year 1000, on
parchment, and now that it is in safe custody will
doubtless defy the hand of time for untold centuries.
Every student of English literature will respond to
Stopford A. Brooke's allusion to this ancient docu-
ment. “We approach it with a reverence which it
deserves for its great age, and with a delight which
is born of its association with the history of our
people and our poetry. It is a moment of romantic
pleasure when we stand beside the long undiscov-
ered sources of an historic river, beside whose
waters a hundred famous cities have arisen. It is
a moment of the same romantic pleasure when we
first look at the earliest upwelling of the broad river
of English poetry, and think of the hundred cities
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Among the Manuscripts 153
of the imagination that have been built beside its
stream.”
Reeping Beowulf company are vellum manu-
Scripts of Layamon’s “ Brut,” Langland’s “Piers
Plowman,” Chaucer’s “Troilus and Cressida,”
Gower’s “Confessio Amantis,” and many another
priceless relic of the past. As he bends over these
treasures the visitor will be able to in some meas-
ure transport himself back into the romantic ages
of “ladies dead and lovely knights,” to the days of
lordly castles and stately chivalry, and as he awakes
from his contemplation he may begin to wonder
whether he values his printed word as highly as
past generations valued that which was written so
laboriously.
As an object-lesson in the sources of English his-
tory the exhibits displayed in case F are of unique
interest. The curious student may often wonder
whence the historian derives his information about
long-past centuries, how such an one, for example,
as John R. Green, is able to paint such glowing
pictures of ages so far removed from our own times
as those in which the Angles swept down upon Brit-
ain and established a new home in that land. Well,
the answer is given by the seventeen ancient manu-
script chronicles shown in this case. The series
starts, not with the history of Gildas, the earliest of
British historians, for the museum possesses noth-
ing save a badly charred copy of his chronicle, but
154 The British Museum: Its Treasures
with a copy of the chronicle written by Nennius,
composed in the year 858. It gives the history of
Britain in Latin from the Roman conquest to the
year 687, but is so interwoven with fable that it is
of little serious value. Next in order, and of su-
preme importance, is Bede’s history, the copy shown
being one of the earliest made, thought to have been
written about the end of the eighth century. For the
history of the introduction of Christianity into Eng-
land it is our chief authority. Then follow examples
of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and of the histories
written by Wace, and Simon of Durham, and Will-
iam of Malmesbury, and Henry of Huntingdon, and
Hoveden, and several more. Those who are familiar
with Carlyle’s “Past and Present ’’ should take
special note of the chronicle of Jocelin of Brake-
londe, for this is the only manuscript in existence of
the ancient record from whence Carlyle drew the
materials for his fascinating picture of Abbot Sam-
son and his monastery.
After all, however, these chronicles represent but
a fraction of the original sources which the historian
has to study. In cases five and six the visitor will
find many examples of another kind of material
for history. Those exhibits, rolls of time-stained
parchment covered with unfamiliar handwriting, do
not look promising, but to the trained eye they are
rich in picturesque or instructive detail. And among
them is at least one document which has had far-
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Among the Manuscripts 155
reaching influence on human thought. This, of
course, is Magna Charta, sought out with feverish
eagerness even by the School children, who some-
times throng the Manuscript Saloon. But, to guard
against waste of emotion, it may be well to point out
that the Articles of Liberties displayed in case five
is not an original document, but a collotype copy.
Two originals are close at hand in the students’
room, and will be shown by the attendant on request.
One of those copies will demonstrate more vividly
than any other manuscript in the department how
seriously some of the Cottonian treasures were dam-
aged by the fire of 1731.
Chronicles and charters, invaluable as they are,
form, after all, but the groundwork of history. The
contributary sources which must be sought out by
the historian are almost endless; statutes, diplo-
matic correspondence, official reports of generals
and admirals, debates in councils and parliaments,
political pamphlets, sermons, private diaries and
letters, and even such seemingly trivial matters as
household accounts. All such sources are carefully
hoarded in the department of manuscripts, for the
examples actually on view for public inspection are
merely fragmentary illustrations of the vast stores
hidden from gaze. All told, the department con-
tains over fifty thousand bound volumes of manu-
scripts, seventy-five thousand charters and rolls,
Seventeen thousand seals, and casts of seals, and
156 The British Museum: Its Treasures
nearly two thousand ancient Greek and Latin pa-
pyri.
In view of such a formidable mass of material,
who can wonder that even in Isaac Disraeli’s days
there were historians who were “terrified ” at the
magnitude of their task? Earlier still some of their
number elected the easier method of copying what
had been written by their predecessors. Hence the
story told by Disraeli. “When Père Daniel under-
took a history of France, the learned Boivin, the
king’s librarian, opened for his inspection an im-
mense treasure of charters, and another of royal
autograph letters, and another of private corre-
spondence; treasures reposing in fourteen hundred
folios! The modern historian passed two hours im-
patiently looking over them, but frightened at an-
other plunge into the gulf, this Curtius of history
would not immolate himself for his country. He
wrote a civil letter to the librarian for his ‘super-
numerary kindness,” but insinuated that he could
write a very readable history without any further
aid of such paperasses, or ‘paper-rubbish.’” And
there was another historian who, on being directed
to volumes of manuscript material, rejoined that
“What was already printed was more than he was
able to read.”
Some idea of what the conscientious historian
has to tackle if he would tell the story of England
may be gathered from the show-cases briefly de-
Among the Manuscripts 157
scribed above, and the impression will be deepened
if the visitor will next turn his attention to the four
cases which are on his left and right hand as he
enters the Manuscript Saloon. The first of these is
given up entirely to a set of royal autographs,
which, for one thing, acquaint the visitor with the
signatures of English monarchs from Richard II to
Queen Victoria. In the case of two of those sover-
eigns, Charles II and Queen Victoria, the signa-
tures are in early and later forms, the first of Vic-
toria’s autographs being a childish effort of print-
ing between those ruled lines which are as necessary
apparently for royal as for humbler juveniles. The
holograph of the merry monarch is a more advanced
effort of penmanship, written in his eighth year, but
the ruled lines are still in evidence. And the easy-
going nature of the writer can be divined from the
few words in which he exhorts his correspondent
not to take too much medicine ‘‘ for it doth alwaies
make me worse, and I think it will do the like with
you.” Apart from their signatures, all these docu-
ments have some point of special interest, sometimes
a cynical interest in view of the course of history
subsequent to the dates at which they were written.
Who, for example, can read without a smile the ful-
some epistle in which Henry VIII urged his “awne
good Cardinall ” Wolsey to “take summe pastyme
and comfort ’’ from his labours for his royal and
“lovyng master?” Anne Boleyn's high spirits
158 The British Museum: Its Treasures
when on the eve of her marriage to Wolsey’s master
are almost pitifully in evidence in her letter to the
cardinal, a letter promising to serve him in any way
once she was Henry’s wife. Pathetic, too, is the
epistle which begins so boldly with “Jane the
Queen,” and is dated from the Tower in ‘‘ the first
yere of our reign.” Not even Cromwell is omitted
from the line of English rulers, the Protector being
represented by a pious and affectionate letter to his
wife. In addition to the English royal autographs
there are letters signed by such notable foreign
monarchs as Peter the Great, Frederick the Great,
and Napoleon.
Other royal autographs take their place in chrono-
logical order among the signatures of statesmen,
churchmen, and warriors who are represented in
cases two, three, and four. The churchmen include
Wolsey, Cranmer, Latimer, and Laud; the states-
men number Sir Thomas More, William Cecil, Rob-
ert Cecil, John Hampden, John Pym, Sir Robert
Walpole, William Pitt, Edmund Burke, Lord Pal-
merston, Sir Robert Peel, Richard Cobden, the Earl
of Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone; while the fight-
ing men are represented by Sir Philip Sidney, the
commanders of the English fleet against the Ar-
mada, Sir Francis Drake, Robert Blake, the Duke of
Marlborough, Lord Clive, Nelson, and the Duke of
Wellington. - - -
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Among the Manuscripts 159
of the manuscripts in these three show-cases is to
live through most of the exciting days of English
history. Here is Wolsey in the hour of his fall pi-
ning for the ‘‘ pity, compassion, and bounteous
goodness '' of his uxorious sovereign; Cranmer
expressing his pleasure that the king has given his
authority that the Bible may be “bought and read
within this realm; ” Lady Jane Grey announcing
her accession to the throne she was to occupy so few
days; Mary Queen of Scots complaining to Eliza-
beth of the rigour of her imprisonment; Lord
Burghley sketching in rude fashion the disposal of
the hall at Fotheringhay at the trial which sentenced
Mary Stuart to death; an eye-witness telling the
manner of that death, and how ‘‘ one of the execu-
tioners espied a little dog under her clothes, which
could not be gotten forth but by force, yet after-
wards would not depart from the dead corpse but
came and lay between her head and shoulders; ” the
sea-dogs of England signing a resolve to “pursue
the Spanish fleet until we have cleared our own
coasts; ” and numerous other actors of great deeds
in high stations telling with their own pens the hap-
pening of events which are among the glories of
English history. Now it is John Hampden writing
a few days after the struggle at Edgehill, anon
Cromwell gives praise to Heaven for his victory at
Naseby, and then comes a change to the diplomatic
speech in which Charles II thanked his House of
160 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Commons for its ‘‘ zeal and affection ’’ in providing
him with liberal pocket-money. That termagant of
Queen Anne's reign, Sarah Churchill, is here, too,
giving an early illustration of that vulgar abuse
which is so well developed in a modern member of
the family; and later there is the benign figure of
George Washington, urging that the principle which
should guide the new United States was ‘‘ to be little
heard of in the great world of Politics.” Of a date
two days before Trafalgar there is a letter from
Nelson to his notorious Emma, found on his desk
after that triumphant but fatal fight, and endorsed
by its recipient, “Oh miserable wretched Emmal
Oh, glorious and happy Nelson 1 '' and in fitting
company is a carelessly written memorandum in
Wellington’s autograph of the strength of the cav-
alry under his command at Waterloo. For climax
of the record of battle what could be more fitting
than the last page of Gordon's diary written in the
ill-fated Khartoum? He knew that the end was
near, but he was still master of his fate. “Now
mark this,” he wrote, “if Expeditionary Force,
and I ask for no more than 200 men, does not
come in 10 days, the town may fall, and I
have done my best for the honour of our coun-
try.” -
Memorable indeed are the associations which are
suggested by the varied documents which have been
hastily passed in review, yet the most inattentive
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Among the Manuscripts 161
visitor to the Manuscript Saloon can hardly fail to
notice that while many glances are given to the royal
autographs and the battle messages of soldiers and
sailors, and the papers of statesmen, the show-cases
which are lingered over the longest are those which
contain holographs of quite different men. What
Nathaniel Hawthorne and Washington Irving found
to be true in Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey
is true here. Having left the royal tombs and the
tombs of statesmen behind, Hawthorne realized in
Poets’ Corner a “genial awe, mingled with a sense
of kind and familiar presences.” He had never felt
a similar interest in other tombstones, or been
deeply moved by the imaginary presence of other
famous dead people. And so it was with Irving.
He turned from the resting-places of the men who
had filled history with their deeds, and was pleased
to observe that, notwithstanding the simplicity of
the memorials in Poets' Corner, visitors to the Ab-
bey remained longest in their vicinity. “A kinder
and tender feeling takes the place of that cold curi-
osity or vague admiration with which they gaze on
the Splendid monuments of the great and heroic.
They linger about these as about the tombs of
friends and companions; for indeed there is some-
thing of companionship between the author and the
reader. Other men are known to posterity only
through the medium of history, which is continually
growing faint and obscure; but the intercourse be-
162 The British Museum: Its Treasures
tween the author and his fellow-men is ever new,
active, and immediate.”
Two or three of the manuscripts which cannot fail
to arouse that sense of companionship are hung in
frames on the wainscot, such as the mortgage by
“William Shakespeare, of Stratford upon Avon,
Gentleman,” and a grant in the hand-writing of Ed-
mund Spenser, and the original contract by which
one John Milton agreed to dispose the copyright
of “A Poem entituled Paradise Lost,’’ to a cer-
tain printer for five pounds down and three further
payments of five pounds each if the poem reached as
many editions. From these the visitor will turn
with heightened interest to show-case number seven,
and its bewildering wealth of letters. Here is one
from John Dryden pleading for “ half a yeare of
my salary '' and urging his “extreme wants '' and
ill health. ‘‘’Tis enough for one age,” he concludes,
“ to have neglected Mr. Cowley and starved Mr.
Butler.” How different the haughty tone of this
epistle from Jonathan Swift, deriding a lady at
court for the queen’s non-fulfilment of her promise
to give him a medal, and laying down with the air
of a despot the terms upon which he will now deign
to accept a portrait of her Majesty. Something of
that resolute spirit, too, breathes from that docu-
ment signed “Richard Steele '' in which the writer
avows his determination to try all the processes of
the law before he will suffer a certain lord “to
Among the Manuscripts 163
send my children a starving.” More courtly, as be-
fitted the man, is Joseph Addison’s letter to the sec-
retary of George I, with its assurance that his cor-
respondent would find “a whole nation in the High-
est Joy '' because of that monarch’s accession to the
throne of England. How like the man, too, is Bos-
well’s announcement of the early publication of his
life of Johnson, “the most entertaining book that
ever appeared.” And Horace Walpole is surely
justified by the wild letter from Thomas Chatterton
in reply to remonstrances against his intention of
committing suicide: “It is my Pride, my damn’d,
native, unconquerable Pride, that plunges me into
Distraction.” Other literary amenities of the past
are recalled by David Hume’s letter regretting he
ever had any relations with so ‘‘pernicious and dan-
gerous a man '' as Rousseau, and William Cowper's
protest against Dr. Johnson’s treatment of Milton,
with its famous climax, “Oh I could thrash his old
Jacket till I made his Pension jingle in his pocket.”
Lamb is in the glorious company, of course, but he
is recalled to memory out of his exhibition order by
Coleridge’s confession that a member of his congre-
gation remarked he would rather hear him “talk
than preach.” Elia’s epistle is a record of one of
those “nights out ’’ which gave him so aching a
head in the morning. In close proximity is Byron's
impassioned refusal to sell his ancestral home of
Newstead notwithstanding his pressing need of
164 The British Museum: Its Treasures
money, and that typical epistle is followed by one
from Shelley relating to the suppression of his
‘‘ Laon and Cythma,’’ and a message from Keats to
his sister recording the beginning of his fatal ill-
ness. To a sister, too, Jane Austen writes of her
novel, “Sense and Sensibility,” that “I can no
more forget it, than a mother can forget her suck-
ing child; ” Tennyson complains of his pile of cor-
respondence accumulated during his absence from
home; and Browning, in thanking a correspondent
for appreciation of his writings, declares: “I can
have little doubt but that my writing has been, in
the main, too hard for many I should have been
pleased to communicate with ; but I never design-
edly tried to puzzle people, as some of my critics
have supposed. On the other hand, I never pre-
tended to offer such literature as should be a sub-
stitute for a cigar or a game of dominos to an idle
man.” Of all these letters, however, none has so
pathetic an interest as that penned by Dickens the
day before he was to cease writing for ever. To a
friend whom he was to meet the next day he sent
these prophetic lines: “ To-morrow is a very bad
day for me to make a call, but I hope I may be ready
for you at 3 o'clock. If I can’t be — why then I
Sha’n’t be.”
Before proceeding to those other show-cases
which resume the story of English literature the
visitor will enjoy spending a few minutes glancing
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Among the Manuscripts 165
at the contents of case number eight, where there
are letters in Latin, and Italian, and French, and
German from such sons of fame as Erasmus,
Luther, Calvin, Michelangelo, Ariosto, Galileo, Mon-
taigne, Corneille, Racine, Voltaire, Rousseau, Kant,
Goethe, Schiller, Heine, Handel, and Mozart. And
in case nine is a unique little collection of volumes
which have belonged to royal owners, including
Lady Jane Grey’s manual of prayers, and the book
written by James I for his son, Prince Henry.
On either side of the entrance to the King's Li-
brary are those other cases referred to above, in
which are exhibited many of the original manu-
scripts of books which have taken their place as
classics in English literature. Here are the only
two autographs in existence of dramatists of the
Elizabethan age, Ben Jonson’s “The Masque of
Queenes '' and Philip Massinger’s “Believe as You
List.” In the same goodly company is John Mil-
ton’s commonplace book, and a draft of Samuel
Butler’s “Hudibras,” and Jonathan Swift's
closely written “Journal to Stella,” and a volume
of Pope’s translation of Homer, and a corrected
draft in Sterne’s hand of “The Sentimental Jour-
ney,” and Edward Gibbon’s neatly written manu-
script of his autobiography open at the page where
he recorded the inception of his famous history.
There is a fair copy, too, of the immortal “Elegy''
of Thomas Gray, and another of Cowper's “John
166 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Gilpin.” Robert Burns is represented by the orig-
inal manuscript of his autobiography, Byron by the
first and second cantos of “Childe Harold,” Cole-
ridge by Odds and ends in verse and prose, Sir Wal-
ter Scott by the manuscript of “ Kenilworth,”
Keats by “The Eve of St. Mark,” Macaulay by his
article on “Warren Hastings,” and Tennyson by
his epilogue to the “Idylls of the King.”
Inevitably all the manuscripts noted above must
appeal with the greatest force to the English-speak-
ing peoples; but there are other treasures in the
saloon which break down all national dividing walls
and are of supreme interest to all races for whom
the Book is not only a light to their feet in the nar-
row path of life but a beacon to the world that is to
come. The selection of Biblical manuscripts dis-
played in cases G and H is small, but it illustrates
in a singularly attractive manner the textual his-
tory of the Scriptures and enables the visitor to see
with his own eyes several of the earliest and most
priceless manuscripts in existence. The vellum
volume of the Pentateuch, for example, is thought
to be the oldest manuscript in existence of any con-
siderable part of the Bible in Hebrew, while the
volume of the famous Codex Alexandrinus is one of
the three earliest copies of the complete Bible, and
dates from the middle of the fifth century. There
are several other Greek manuscripts of portions of
the Scriptures, some in Syriac, others in Greek and
:
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Among the Manuscripts 167
Coptic, and numerous examples of Latin versions.
From these to versions more nearly approaching the
English of to-day is a natural transition, illustrated
by an eleventh-century Anglo-Saxon version of the
Gospels and a fourteenth-century copy of Wycliffe’s
complete English Bible. As a remarkable specimen
of a Biblical manuscript written on English soil the
wonderful Lindisfarne Gospels should not be over-
looked. This is regarded as the most perfect exist-
ing example of the Celtic style of ornamentation
and is remarkable for its impeccable condition, it
being exceedingly difficult to believe that it was writ-
ten so long ago as the seventh century.
Belonging as it does to the category of illuminated
manuscripts, the last named exhibit would, had it
not been for its rare quality, have taken its place
in one or other of the nine show-cases in the Gren-
ville Library specially devoted to such treasures.
The word “illumination ” in connection with manu-
scripts has come to be interpreted as meaning deco-
ration, but the old monks and other artists who lav-
ished so much skill on Biblical and liturgical manu-
Scripts had another purpose than that of mere
adornment in view. As Ruskin pointed out, ‘‘the
drawings in Saxon manuscripts, in which, better
than in any other remains of their life, we can read
the people's character, are rapid endeavours to ex-
press for themselves, and convey to others, some
likeness of the realities of sacred event in which they
168 The British Museum: Its Treasures
have been instructed. . . . A Saxon monk would
scratch his idea of the Fall of the angels or the
Temptation of Christ over a whole page of his
manuscript in variously explanatory scenes, evi-
dently full of inexpressible vision, and eager to ex-
plain and illustrate all that he felt or believed.”
Yet elsewhere, such was the contradictory nature of
the man, Ruskin declared that “perfect illumina-
tion is only writing made lovely; the moment it
passes into picture-making it has lost its dignity
and function.” No one can examine the many and
beautiful examples in these show-cases without see-
ing that illumination did pass into picture-making,
but in the majority of cases those pictures may
surely have been an attempt to expound, to “illu-
minate ’’ the text, as sincere as the earlier and
cruder efforts which won Ruskin's approval.
Exactly when the writers of manuscripts began to
adorn their pages with borders, with initial letters,
with outline drawings, and then with miniatures, is
unknown; the earliest surviving examples are be-
lieved to date from the third century. They, how-
ever, are adornments of a secular text, Homer to
wit, and thus belong to an age when the spirit of
Christianity was still almost antagonistic to art.
“Cursed be all who paint pictures '' is a sentiment
inscribed largely in the writings of the early fathers
of the Church, and it was not until Christianity
became a state religion that it abandoned that atti-
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By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum. 2 : ºf 2.7 ::::
APOCALYPSE OF FOURTEENTH CENTURY. ". .” -, * ~ * * *
- -


Among the Manuscripts 169
tude of hostility. Dr. Muther has asserted that
“ the miniature painting of the Irish, Gallic, and
German monks was less painting than calligraphy,”
and hints that the human figures eventually intro-
duced were nothing more than the development of
scrolls and flourishes, but most of the examples
shown in the Grenville Library are far removed
from such an ancestry. In the first case there are
seven manuscripts representative of the Byzantine
School, all, with one exception, portions of the Bible.
The remaining exhibits in that case and in cases
number two and three are English manuscripts,
dating from the tenth to the fifteenth century. The
open pages display not only a marvellous wealth
of decorative effect, borders of flowers and birds
and insects, and initial letters of exquisite design
and colouring, but also carefully finished miniatures
and drawings of high artistic merit. In the second
case, for example, there is a manuscript of the
Apocalypse which is remarkable for the spirit of its
illustrations and the delicacy of its colouring. And
the initials shown in the third case are of excep-
tional beauty. In addition to the numerous exam-
ples of the English school of decoration, there are
manuscripts representing kindred work done in
France, Germany, and Italy. And to complete this
attractive exhibition there is one case filled with
volumes illustrating the superb manner in which
manuscripts were bound in the tenth to the sixteenth
170 The British Museum: Its Treasures
centuries. These handsome books, studded with all
kinds of ornaments, including figures in relief in
silver-gilt and rubies and turquoises, indicate that
the modern revival in favour of splendid bindings
has a severe task in attempting to rival the achieve-
ments of ages supposed to be far less advanced in
the arts than these later centuries.


CHAPTER III
RELICS OF GREECE AND ROME
WHEN the visitor to the British Museum turns to
that department which is concerned with the civi-
lization of ancient Greece and Rome he will find
himself not only freed from all restrictions in the
examination of those rare treasures, but also be-
wildered by the wealth of objects displayed for his
instruction. The two previous chapters have made
it clear that so far as printed books and manu-
scripts are concerned a few galleries exhaust all
that can be seen save by those holding students’
tickets; but the department which has now to be
considered spreads itself through no fewer than
twenty-one rooms, many of them of spacious di-
mensions. All these rooms are open to the public,
not excepting that in which the rare and invaluable
gold ornaments and gems are displayed.
For all the passion and eloquence with which he
was wont to expatiate upon the glories of Greek art,
Ruskin once took it for granted that that art
‘‘ bored ” his readers and hearers. “You know it
does,” he affirmed, and went on to explain that the
reason was because people were always being
forced to “ look in it for something that is not
171
172 The British Museum: Its Treasures
there.” With all deference to the great critic, that
is hardly the last word. If the richly-stored gal-
leries of Greek and Roman antiquities fail to arouse
living interest in their visitors it is because they
approach them in an unprepared state of mind and
Wander through them in a haphazard manner.
Given the proper mental preparation and a deter-
mination to take the rooms in their right sequence,
there is no reason why Byron’s exalted experience
should not be shared by every visitor. What he
sang of Greece itself is true of the galleries where
“ the glory that was Greece ’’ is fully as much in
evidence as among the plains and cities of that
storied land.
“Where'er we tread, 'tis haunted, holy ground;
No earth of thine is lost in vulgar mould,
But one vast realm of wonder spreads around,
And all the Muse's tales seem truly told,
Till the sense aches with gazing to behold
The scenes our earliest dreams have dwelt upon:
Each hill and dale, each deepening glen and wold,
Defies the power which crushed thy temples gone:
Age shakes Athena's tower, but spares gray Marathon.”
Amazing as it may seem, there are actually peo-
ple in this twentieth century who stoutly deny that
the modern world is in any sense indebted to an-
cient Greece | When it is remembered that it is
impossible to pass along almost any street of any
city, to gaze upon any public building and espe-
Relics of Greece and Rome 173
cially our churches and halls without encountering
that debt, and that in sculpture and literature Ath-
ens is still the “mother of the arts,” the business
of arguing with such unbelievers seems a hopeless
task. To approach these galleries in such a frame
of mind can but result in that sense of boredom to
which Ruskin referred.
But Ruskin himself has supplied one suggestion
of inestimable value for all who would win from
these marbles and vases and gems their ever-living
lessons of beauty and truth. He has reminded us
that the nine centuries before Christ can be di-
vided into three groups of three centuries each,
expressed as an A. B. C. Thus A. stands for “ Ar-
chaic ’’ and covers the ninth, eighth, and seventh
centuries; B. for “Best '' and includes the sixth,
fifth, and fourth centuries; and C. stands for “Cor-
rupt,” and is applied to the third, second, and first
centuries. No doubt the modern mind, accustomed
to add to years in estimating chronology, will find
it a little puzzling to be always subtracting years,
but the process is not so difficult as it seems on the
surface, and can soon be mastered at the expense of
a little thought. It is true, also, that the researches
of recent years have materially extended in a back-
ward direction the period of the Archaic, but, for
practical purposes, Ruskin’s A. B. C. will answer
the needs of all save the special student of archae-
ology.
174 The British Museum: Its Treasures
And there is one more fact which needs to be
kept in mind. In those nine centuries before the
Christian era the central point of time is of course
the fifth century, and it is suggestive to recollect
that that was the century of the battle of Marathon.
Now it will be within the memory of all that in Sir
Edward S. Creasy’s “The Fifteen Decisive Bat-
tles of the World '' the struggle which took place
on the memorable plain of Attica comes first on the
list. That pre-eminence was inevitable. Of course
there can be no ignoring the importance of the sub-
sequent conflicts of Greeks and Persians at Salamis
and elsewhere, but they do not rank in the same
category with Marathon. “ The day of Marathon
is the critical epoch in the history of the two na-
tions. It broke for ever the spell of Persian invin-
cibility, which had paralyzed men’s minds. It gen-
erated among the Greeks the spirit which beat back
Xerxes, and afterwards led on Xenophon, Agesi-
laus, and Alexander, in terrible retaliation, through
their Asiatic campaigns. It secured for mankind
the intellectual treasures of Athens, the growth of
free institutions, the liberal enlightenment of the
Western world, and the gradual ascendency for
many ages of the great principles of European civi-
lization.”
But the victory of Marathon in 490 B.C. did some-
thing for Greece, too. It accentuated that Pan-
Hellenic feeling, that consciousness of unity, that
Relics of Greece and Rome 175
necessity to make common cause against a common
foe, that identity of race which had never been
wholly dormant even during the centuries when the
various states of Greece had fought with each other
with that tenacity which always distinguishes fam-
ily quarrels. For that tiny peninsula of Greece, it
will be remembered, consisted, apart from its nu-
merous littoral islands, of two countries in the
North, eleven countries in the central division of
the land, and other eleven countries in the South.
Even that subdivision, however, and the constant
wars between the small states, did not entirely ob-
literate the community of feeling referred to above;
what was needed to make it a vital factor in the
life of the people as a whole was that common dan-
ger which was supplied by the invasions of Persia.
And from the united effort with which those inva-
sions were repelled there grew that keen realiza-
tion of pride in nationality out of which great lit-
erature and art are born. It is impossible not to
recall the parallel case of England, where, out of
the ever-pressing dangers of Spanish invasion,
there came to birth that pride of race, that height-
ened feeling of robust confidence which had issue
in Elizabethan literature. Hence when, nearly ten
years after Marathon, the Persian danger threat-
ened Greece once more, there took place that gen-
eral congress at the Isthmus, a new feature in Greek
history, which settled the internal quarrels of the
176 The British Museum: Its Treasures
states and united all Greece against the Persians
and ended for ever their attempts at conquest.
From such a triumph, giving to the victors a
sense of power and exaltation, the great period of
literature and art was born, and hence Ruskin's
insistence upon the fifth century B. C. as that which
marked the apex of Greek achievement.
Not that there had not been art before Marathon;
and not that there was not art after the fifth cen-
tury; but that what went before was hesitating
and crude and marked by alien influence, and that
what came after reflected that weakening of the
national spirit which finally prepared the way for
the conquest by Rome. But, in the height of those
good days, Athens became the most splendid of
Greek cities, the chosen home of all who excelled in
the arts. “Cimon and Pericles vied with each
other in beautifying the city of their birth; and the
encouragement which the latter especially gave to
talent of every kind, collected to Athens a galaxy
of intellectual lights such as is almost without a
parallel in the history of mankind.”
Beside bearing in mind such facts as the fore-
going, the explorer of the galleries devoted to
Greek and Roman remains will be well advised to
traverse those galleries in their chronological order.
This, unfortunately, is not the order in which the
rooms are arranged. Much has been done to facili-
tate the chronological study of the relics, but as
Relics of Greece and Rome 177
constant additions are being made, and as those
accessions naturally represent various periods, it
would be impossible to preserve a direct sequence
without disturbing all the galleries every time a
new object was acquired. In view of that situation,
the visitor should ignore for the time being that
Hall of Greek and Latin Inscriptions which can
hardly fail to arrest his attention directly he enters
the museum, and also resist the temptation to ex-
amine the busts in the Roman Gallery which is
immediately to the left of the entrance, leaving both
these for examination in their proper place. He
must, however, pass through the Roman Gallery,
and also through the three galleries in continuation
in order that he may start at the beginning, that
is, in the Archaic Room.
And one other suggestion may not be out of place.
We are all liable to seek out first those objects the
beauty and interest of which have been insisted
upon by every critic and advertised in countless
photographs. It is a common experience in any
of these galleries to observe visitors entering and
making straight for one given object, ignoring all
the rest, and spurning to allow that one special
piece of sculpture the opportunity of fitting itself
into an ordered study of its companions. That is
the path to chaos and boredom. Rather should the
visitor go his rounds in the spirit of the discoverer,
with open mind, intent upon examining and ponder-
178 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ing for himself. If, in the end, he finds that his
appreciation coincides with the general verdict he
will be fortified in his taste; if he discovers beau-
ties which other eyes have not seen and which have
not been proclaimed from the housetops, he will
enjoy a pleasure of a unique kind, a pleasure akin
to that which fell to the lot of Richard Jefferies
when, one day in the Louvre, he lighted upon that
Stooping Venus which gave him more joy than all
the other treasures of that famous museum.
Here, then, in the Archaic Room is the right
starting-point, the gallery which discloses the ori-
gins as it were of Greek sculpture. Taking the
objects in the order in which they are numbered
it will be found that the first place has been given
to some sculptures from Mycenae and Crete, which
are of uncertain age, but are certainly prior to the
eighth century before the Christian era. Here are
fragments from the Doorway of the Treasury of
Atreus, which show how the earliest craftsmen in
stone were contented with adorning their work with
simple decorative patterns, reluctant as yet to
attempt either the human figure or the forms of
animals. Even when the artist did soar higher and
tackle the human form, his efforts, as will be seen
in the first specimens in the Room of Terracottas,
were exceedingly crude, strikingly akin to those
paste cats and mice which Ruskin’s little girl friend
manufactured when she was allowed to exchange
Relics of Greece and Rome 179
the school-room for the kitchen. For there is “ no
other true account of the spirit of sculpture than
that it is an irresistible human instinct for the
making of cats and mice.” From the decorative
doorway to the sculptures from Branchidae is a dis-
tinct advance, for now the artist is dealing with the
human figure and animal form, but dealing with
them in a heavy and conventional manner. His
'prentice hand, too, is revealed in the frieze of
Satyrs and Animals which came from the Acropolis
at Xanthos, for here there is a strange lack of pro-
portion, due to the fact that the sculptor cannot yet
estimate distances and their relations. There is
more vitality, however, and a greater command
over material, in the frieze of Cocks and Hens.
Various periods and different districts are rep-
resented by the sculptures from Naucratis and
Rhodes, the casts from Selinus, and numerous scat-
tered fragments, but the most striking objects in
the room are the Harpy Tomb and the casts of
sculptures from Aegina. The former, which is es-
timated to be one of the “most important and elab-
orate works of archaic art" extant, consists of the
four reliefs which have been taken from the parapet
of the famous Harpy Monument at Xanthos. The
name of the tomb is derived from the harpies, or
“snatchers,” seen on two sides and depicted as
carrying off a small figure, thought to represent the
human soul. One relief has for its subject two
\
180 The British Museum: Its Treasures
enthroned women to whom three other women are
bringing offerings; another is of a venerable man
receiving a crested helmet from a youthful war-
rior; the third portrays another aged man on a
throne, to whom a boy is presenting a cock; and
the fourth shows an enthroned figure to whom an
attendant is offering a dove. But the meaning of
all this no one can expound. Plenty of theories
have been broached, including a suggestion that the
sculptures represent Homer’s story of the rape of
the daughters of Pandareos, but no agreement has
been reached. It is, however, fairly well estab-
lished that the tomb belongs to the middle of the
sixth century, and it can be seen by all that the
sculptor had attained considerable skill in working
out the details of his scheme. But his figures have
no pliability; they bespeak the hand of a man lack-
ing in confidence.
In justice to those long-dead artists there is, how-
ever, one thing which should be constantly kept in
mind. Neither the reliefs from the Harpy Tomb,
nor most of the sculptures in this and the other
galleries, were intended to be seen at such close
quarters as the exigencies of space in the museum
make necessary. This applies to the casts of Sculp-
tures from the Temple of Aegina despite the fact
that they are further removed from the vision by
being arranged on the south and north walls of the
Archaic Room, The originals of these figures were
-
- - -
º º
* * -
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum. : - - - - - - - :
THE DEMETER OF CNIDOS. *...* … : : - -






Relics of Greece and Rome 181
excavated a century ago, and once adorned the west
and east pediments, or gables, of that temple which
is situated in the northern corner of the island. It
seems to be agreed that the subjects are representa-
tive of contests between the Greeks and Trojans,
the central figure in each composition being that of
Athenè, who, to tell truth, seems somewhat indif-
ferent to the struggles taking place on either side
of her. Some three-quarters of a century divide
this work from that of the Harpy Tomb, and the
most casual inspection will show how great an ad-
vance had been made in the interval. Instead of
stiff, doll-like human figures, we have a band of
warriors instinct with movement, and the details
of drapery, arms, and armour reveal a sure ad-
vance in mastery. The visitor must, however, re-
member that he is still in the A. division of Ruskin’s
A. B. C., even though these sculptures belong to the
latest period of Greek archaic art.
But, on leaving the Archaic Room, he must be
prepared for a remarkable efflorescence of genius.
If he will pause for a few minutes in the ante-room
to ponder the Cnidos Demeter he will, in a measure,
be prepared for what is to follow. The sculptor
may well have intended, as is supposed, to repre-
sent the goddess mourning the loss of her daughter
Persephonè, for her face is suffused with a pensive
melancholy, as though she could still hear the dis-
tant echo of her child’s voice. There is, too, about
182 The British Museum: Its Treasures
the figure an atmosphere of maternity in harmoni-
ous keeping with her character as the earth-mother.
Although the ante-room gives entrance to the
Ephesus Room, the visitor’s immediate goal is the
gallery further north, namely that Elgin Room
which for nearly a century has been perhaps the
chief attraction of the British Museum. The mar-
bles in this room represent “the most marvellous
phenomenon in the whole history of art,’’ that is,
the swift progress made by Greece in the fifth cen-
tury in the mastery of sculpture. “As in literature
the fifth century takes us from the rude peasant
plays of Thespis to the drama of Sophocles and
Euripides; as in philosophy it takes us from Py-
thagoras to Socrates; so in sculpture it covers the
space from the primitive works made for the Pei-
sistratidae to some of the most perfect productions
of the chisel.” The rare beauty of these marbles
was glowingly eulogized by that Parliamentary
committee which, in 1816, advocated their purchase
with national funds. “The testimony of several
of the most eminent artists in this kingdom, who
have been examined,” so ran the report of the com-
mittee, “rates these marbles in the very first class
of ancient art. . . . They speak of them with ad-
miration and enthusiasm: and notwithstanding the
manifold injuries of time and weather, and those
mutilations which they have sustained from the
fortuitous, or designed injuries of neglect, or mis-
Relics of Greece and Rome 183
chief, they consider them as among the finest mod-
els, and the most exquisite monuments of antiq-
uity.” Some fifty years later Ruskin re-echoed that
tribute in another form when he told his students:
“If you were for some prolonged period to study
Greek sculpture exclusively in the Elgin Room of
the British Museum, and were then suddenly trans-
ported to the Hôtel de Cluny, or any other museum
of Gothic and barbarous workmanship, you would
imagine the Greeks were the masters of all that was
grand, simple, wise, and tenderly human, opposed
to the pettiness of the toys of the rest of mankind.”
Between those two eulogiums, and since the date
of the last, the anthology of praise has been un-
broken.
Inasmuch as the Marbles have of necessity to
be arranged around the inside of the gallery instead
of around the outside, thus reversing their original
position, the first step toward a proper apprecia-
tion is to study carefully the model of the Parthe-
non at the north end of the room. And, if the vis-
itor desires to gain a clear idea of the position of
that famous temple, he should also give some atten-
tion to the model of the Acropolis on which it was
built. .
Of course it will be remembered that Pericles was
the moving spirit in that adornment of the rocky
mass of the Acropolis in which the scheme for the
erection of the Parthenon took the leading place.
184 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Plutarch has told us that ‘‘ that which was the chief
delight of the Athenians and the wonder of stran-
gers was the magnificence of the temples and public
edifices; ’’ and among those structures none could
compare with the Parthenon, reared in honour of
the goddess Athenè, who as the virgin was emphat-
ically Parthenos. It was begun about the year
447 B. C. and is supposed to have been completed
some twelve years later. The architect was Ictnos,
but it was to Pheidias that the adornment of the
building was entrusted. As the model will show,
the temple was fashioned in the Doric style, and
was surrounded by a colonnade consisting of eight
columns at each end and fifteen columns on either
side; had an interior shrine, or cella, for the recep-
tion of the statue of Athenè; and measured two
hundred and twenty-five feet in length, one hundred
feet in breadth, and some forty-five feet in height.
The statue of Athenè, which was of gold and ivory,
has completely disappeared; but some idea of its
aspect may be gained from the three casts of stat-
uettes of the goddess displayed in the room.
In examining the model of the Parthenon it will
be observed that the temple had two pediments, one
at the east end and the other at the west; that
around the parapet under the cornice there was a
series of metopes; and that around the top of the
central chamber of the temple there ran a frieze
in low relief. Hence these three different parts of
ELGIN MARBLES: THE THREE FATES.

Relics of Greece and Rome 185
the building enabled Pheidias to display three kinds
of sculpture: that is, figures in the round, figures
in very high relief, and figures in low relief. All
the work was carried out in the famous Pentelic
marble, and was planned and executed under the
direction of the most illustrious sculptor of the
ancient world.
What has been told in a previous chapter of the
history of the Elgin Marbles will have prepared the
visitor for their fragmentary condition. Perhaps
the greatest havoc has been wrought on the sculp-
tures of the two pediments, but the parts which
have survived are arranged in so admirable a man-
ner that it is not difficult to realize what a revela-
tion they were to European artists when they were
first rescued. The remains of the eastern pediment
are displayed on a raised platform in what has been
conjectured to be Pheidias’s original order, the
subject of the entire composition being the birth.
of Athenè. Unfortunately all the central figures
were destroyed long ago, and there is considerable
doubt as to the identification of the portions that
have survived. These include, however, the two
horses of Helios, seen on the extreme left, a figure
supposed to represent Theseus, then two seated
female figures which may be Persephonè and Deme-
ter, next to whom is Iris, and then there is a great
blank till we come to the “Three Fates,” and the
marvellous horse's head which Goethe praised for
186 The British Museum: Its Treasures
its combination of natural truth with the highest
poetical conception. The Theseus was once selected
by Ruskin as embodying the whole end and aim of
the Athenian School, “the natural form of the
human body; ” while the “Three Fates '' are so
majestic in their ruin, so unique for the delicacy
and transparency of their drapery, so full of vital-
ity even in their repose, that the most indifferent
must respond to their appeal.
More fragmentary still are the relics from the
western pediment, also shown on a raised platform
and grouped in accordance with the latest scholar-
ship, the subject of which was the strife between
Poseidon and Athenê for the dominion of Attica.
There is one figure, however, which fully justifies
Shelley’s assertion that these fragments are “the
despair of modern art.” Who this headless sculp-
ture, reclining at the left of the pediment, is in-
tended to represent, is undecided, but that is of no
importance compared with the triumphant manner
in which the impliable stone has been made to take
on the seeming of yielding flesh, so that, were it
not for the forbidding “Visitors are requested not
to touch the sculptures,” one would expect the pli-
ant-looking thigh to give to the pressure of one’s
hand. Who can be surprised, then, that “this fig-
ure has been long and deservedly celebrated for the
perfection of its anatomy?”
Out of the ninety-two metopes which adorned the
Relics of Greece and Rome 187
Parthenon the Elgin Marbles include fifteen orig-
inals. These are in the highest possible relief, and
depict various phases of that conflict between the
Centaurs and Lapiths which, according to the old
legend, disturbed the harmony of the wedding feast
of King Peirithoos. They are of unequal merit,
with touches here and there of archaic influence, but
Several are so spirited in feeling and so finished in
execution as to make them worthy of the great tem-
ple they once adorned. *
Notwithstanding the supreme interest and beauty
of the relics from the pediments and the vigour of
the metopes, it is probable that all save artists will
find most to delight them in the panels of the Par-
thenon frieze which are placed on the walls of the
gallery. For one thing, they are more perfect. On
the temple itself the entire length of the frieze ex-
tended to five hundred and twenty-four feet, and of
that total the Elgin Marbles include nearly two
hundred and fifty feet of the original sculptures
and another hundred and seventy feet in casts.
Various theories have been formulated as to the
general subject of this exquisite series of low re-
liefs, but that which has most in its favour is that
the theme of the sculptors was the Panathenaic
Procession at Athens held in honour of Athenê as
the guardian deity of the Acropolis. Such a sub-
ject, so congenial to that love of stately procession
for which the Athenians were noted, provided Phei-
188 The British Museum: Its Treasures
dias and his assistants with an incentive to exert
their powers to the utmost, with the result of enrich-
ing humanity with the most beautiful band of low
relief sculpture the world has ever known.
While students of archaeology will doubtless con-
tinue to dispute for all time as to the exact meaning
of this section or the other, it will be obvious even
to the uninstructed that the frieze depicts a series
of well-defined episodes, such as the making ready
of the procession, the march of noble maidens, the
slower movement of aged citizens, the hurrying of
chariots, the prancing of horses, and the quiet se-
dateness of the godlike presence in which the pro-
cession comes to an end. When Keats saw the
Elgin Marbles for the first time he confessed to an
inability to put his thoughts into words, but as one
gazes upon that part of the frieze which shows the
passing along of the sacrificial animals it is impos-
sible not to feel that the poet had these in mind
when he asked: -
“Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?”
Never, too, has marble so responded to the touch
of genius as in that division of the frieze where the
Greek spirit of repose is so marvellously portrayed
in the ease with which Athenian youths are holding
Relics of Greece and Rome 189
in restraint the quivering, vivacious steeds on which
they are mounted. “While the horses bound and
prance with a fiery impatience which seems at
every moment ready to break loose from all control,
their irregular movements never disturb the even
hand and well-assured seat of the riders, as the
cavalcade dashes along like a torrent.”
In passing from pediment to metope, and from
metope to frieze, it is hardly possible to overlook
the fact that while the male figures are either in the
nude or are only half-clothed, those of women are
either completely swathed in a garment of many
folds, as in the case of the Demeter, or are arrayed
in material which though almost diaphanous yet
removes the figures from the category of the nude.
The reason for this was partly climatic. Under the
balmy sky of Greece it was no hardship for youths
and men to go lightly clad all the year, and during
the athletic games which entered so largely into
their lives it was their custom to contest with each
other entirely naked. Hence the nude male was a
familiar sight in Athens and other cities, and it is
notable that it is the nude rather than the naked
which is suggested by the sculptures of the Parthe-
non. There is nothing of the grossness of the un-
clothed body which the photograph gives, or is so
offensive in some modern sculptures. The women
of Greece, however, were evidently always clad,
because, as Ruskin has pointed out, the typical
190 The British Museum: Its Treasures
woman of the race, Venus, “ has power only over
lawful and domestic love.” The same observing
critic has also noted that the Greek Venus is con-
spicuous for her broad and full breasts, the sign,
with the emblems usually associated with her, that
‘‘ her essential function is child-bearing.” This is
fully illustrated by the female figures of the Elgin
Marbles, and, indeed, by most of the Greek sculp-
tures in the British Museum, all of which are re-
markable for their ample bosoms, plainly indicated
through the flimsy drapery which the sculptors han-
dled with such consummate skill as to portray while
still hiding the form.
Among the other contents of the Elgin Room the
visitor should note the casts taken from the monu-
ment of Lysicrates at Athens, if only for the fact
that they recall the custom which made individual
wealthy members of the community responsible for
dramatic performances. Lysicrates was one of
those who bore the expense of providing a chorus
for a dramatic performance, and by that generous
deed has attained an immortality beyond anything
he could have anticipated. Perhaps this will en-
courage millionaire patrons of New Theatre and
other dramatic enterprises.
There are also some interesting casts from the
temple of Theseus at Athens, which is thought to
have been built earlier than the Parthenon; and at
the south end of the gallery are two arrestive
Relics of Greece and Rome 191
heads, one of Pericles and the other believed to rep-
resent Asclepios. The latter is certainly worthy of
the god of the healing art, benign and almost profes-
sional-looking; the former is at least notable for
the manner in which it illustrates the idealizing tend-
ency of Greek portraiture in marble. If Pericles
were really as handsome as this marble present-
ment it is not difficult to understand the infatuation
of Aspasia; but while he may have been remarkable
for the grave beauty of his features, it is highly
probable that the sculptor followed the Greek man-
ner of softening all individual traits, without quite
losing the likeness, in his endeavour to maintain
that idealism characteristic of his race. Plutarch
informs us that while the person of Pericles was
in other respects well turned, ‘‘ his head was dis-
proportionately long,’’ and that, consequently, in
all his statues, his head was covered with a helmet,
as in the present example. g
Through the door at the north end of the Elgin
Room the visitor can pass into the Phigaleian
Room, where are displayed some remains of the
Temple of Apollo at Phigaleia, and of the Temple
of Wingless Victory, and also numerous votive and
sepulchral reliefs. The frieze of the first-named
is happily complete, and as it was intended for an
internal decoration, in distinction from that of the
Parthenon, it is exhibited in the manner in which
it adorned the temple for which it was executed.
192 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Here again one of the subjects is the struggle be-
tween the Centaurs and the Lapiths, the other
theme relating to the hostility of the Greeks and
Amazons.
Turning to the sepulchral reliefs it will be found
that they are of three kinds, that is, either a simple
tablet with an ornamental finish; or a tablet bear-
ing a scene from daily life; or vases sculptured in
the round or in relief. The first are akin to those
modern memorials to the dead in which pious grief
has to be content with a simple inscription and such
carved emblem as the common resources of monu-
mental masons can provide; the second are the
forerunners of the more ornate tombs of the
Wealthy. And yet, somehow, they make modern
tombs seem common by contrast. For the reliefs
are generally distinguished by that “nothing too
much '’ which was the Greek rule in death as well
as in life. Yet the pictures of “the daily round,
the common task '' sculptured on these memorials
have a wistful pathos of their own. Here is one
in which a woman of rare charm is putting off a
bracelet while her maid holds open her jewel-box
to receive it, as though suggesting that the time for
all such adornment is passed. And here is another
where the dead woman is relinquishing a necklace
to her servant. Or on a vase may be seen a pa-
thetic group of two women clasping hands as though
for the final farewell, while on either side are a girl
Relics of Greece and Rome 193
and a boy dissolved in tears. Instinctively one re-
calls a tender farewell from the Greek Anthology:
“I, Homonoea, who was far clearer-voiced than
the Sirens, I who was more golden than the Cyprian
herself at revellings and feasts, I the chattering
bright swallow lie here, leaving tears to Atimetus,
to whom I was dear from girlhood; but unforeseen
fate scattered all that great affection of childbirth.
How old? Two-and-twenty. And childless? Nay,
but I left a three-year-old Calliteles — may he live
at least and come to a great old age. And to thee,
O stranger, may Fortune give all prosperity.”
Death rather than life is the predominant note
of the two rooms which should be visited next in
order, that is, the Nereid and Mausoleum Rooms.
The first is reached by a door in the middle of the
Elgin gallery, and is given up to a model of and
fragments from the Nereid Monument which was
discovered at Xanthos in Lycia in 1842. It is
thought that the monument was the tomb of a
prince, and it takes its name from the Nereids which
stood between the columns of the upper portion of
the tomb. “Stood '' is hardly the correct word.
Even in their sadly mutilated condition these sculp-
tures of those sprightly nymphs of the sea, the fore-
runners of the mermaids of more modern times,
seem, it has been said, “to be scudding along the
surface of the waves.” Their thin drapery is blown
closely to their beautiful forms, that touch of the
194 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Sculptor’s art accentuating the sense of swift move-
ment. There is a model of the monument in the
room, from which the visitor can gain a fairly accu-
rate idea of the positions occupied by the four
friezes, one of which shows a battle between Greeks
and barbarians, while another sets forth various
phases in an assault on a town from the sortie to
the surrender.
On the north side of the Nereid Room is a stair-
case which leads down into the Mausoleum Room,
where are displayed the remains of that tomb of
Mausolus, the Prince of Caria, from which the word
mausoleum has been derived. Dying about 350 B.C.,
the Prince of Caria, an ancient district of Asia
Minor, was succeeded by Artemisia, who was his
sister as well as his wife. Notwithstanding that
Mausolus was an avaricious ruler, caring little how
he filled his treasury, he was evidently able to in-
spire Artemisia with a passionate affection, for she
was inconsolable in her loss, and is said to have min-
gled the ashes of her husband with her daily drink.
As a visible form of her grief she gave orders for
the construction of that splendid monument which
was included by the ancients among the Seven Won-
ders of the world, and at its consecration offered
a princely prize for the orator who should pro-
nounce the best eulogy of Mausolus. The tomb was
erected at Halicarnassos, the capital of Caria, and
remained practically intact until early in the fif-
---
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Relics of Greece and Rome 195
teenth century. Then, and in the following century,
it suffered from ruthless vandalism, and when an
effort was made in 1856 to recover its remains all
that was left were the fragments now exhibited in
the British Museum.
Although many efforts have been made to arrive
at some idea of the original appearance of the tomb,
no satisfactory conclusion has been reached. It is
not even known whether the monument was eighty
feet high or a hundred and forty feet; all that is
clear is that the building was surrounded by a
richly sculptured frieze in high relief, and that it
was adorned with various statues and groups, in-
cluding a number of lions. Some idea of the col-
onnade of the Mausoleum may be gathered from the
Ionic column shown on the west side of the room,
while in the centre will be seen the chariot group
which is thought to have stood on the summit of the
monument. Behind the fragments of the two horses
are statues of Mausolus and Artemisia. Of the
frieze there are seventeen sections, depicting a bat-
tle between the Greeks and Amazons, some of the
latter being but lightly clad. The relief is much
higher than that of the Parthenon frieze, but in
other respects may be worthily compared with that
work. Other fragments include part of the chariot
frieze and a number of the lions which were prob-
ably grouped around the monument as guardians.
Retracing his steps to the Ephesus Room the vis-
196 The British Museum: Its Treasures
itor will there find the remains of two temples of
Artemis, or Diana. The first temple was built in
the sixth century and set fire to in 356 B. C. by a
citizen named Herostratos who wished in that way
to secure immortality. Undismayed by their loss
the Ephesians at once set to work rebuilding, de-
clining, however, the offer of Alexander to defray
the entire cost on the condition that his name was
inscribed on the temple. The new building is sup-
posed to have been completed by the end of the
fourth century, and by the time of the visit of the
Apostle Paul the worship of Diana was still suf-
ficiently vigorous to lead the populace to shout,
“Great is Diana of the Ephesians.” In view of
that New Testament association it could be wished
that the remains of the temple were less fragmen-
tary, but even the base of the sculptured column
will have an absorbing interest for all students of
New Testament history. Of the older temple the
remains include two Ionic capitals and a cornice
composed of small fragments. The other miscella-
neous sculptures of the room embrace a head of
Perseus, a torso of a Muse, a head of Venus, and a
striking portrait head of Alexander the Great. The
latter reproduces that slight twist of the head which
is said to have had its origin in a wound on the war-
rior’s shoulder, and recalls the reference of Plu-
tarch: “The statues of Alexander that most resem-
bled him were those of Lysippus, who alone had his
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Belics of Greece and Rome 197
permission to represent him in marble. The turn
of his head, which leaned a little to one side, and
the quickness of his eye, in which many of his
friends and successors most affected to imitate him,
were best hit off by that artist.”
Thus far the visitor has been wandering among
the ruins of ancient Greece alone; he will now, as
he passes into the third Graeco-Roman Room, real-
ize that the Greeks have lost their identity and be-
come associated with the fortunes of their Roman
conquerors. For the sculptures exhibited in this
and the two following galleries are in the main
thought to have been executed by Greek artists for
Roman purchasers. They are largely the work of
copyists rather than creators, and consequently
more notable for their technical qualities than for
original ideas. One of the most beautiful works in
this room is the bust known as “Clytiè,” but which
some authorities think may be a portrait of An-
tonia, the daughter of Mark Antony, who was so
celebrated for her beauty, virtue, and chastity.
That Emerson should have been specially attracted
by this bust is not surprising; it is distinguished
for that reposeful loveliness, that revelation of the
“secret of form,” which could not fail to com-
mend it to the seer who wrote: “The best of beauty
is a finer charm than skill in surfaces, in outlines,
or rules of art can ever teach, namely, a radiation,
from the works of art, of human character—a won-
198 The British Museum: Its Treasures
derful expression, through stone or canvas or mu-
sical sound, of the deepest and simplest attributes
of our nature, and therefore most intelligible at last
to those souls which have these attributes. . . . A
confession of moral nature, of purity, love, and
hope, breathes from them all.” -
Among the sculptures worthy of special note in
these three rooms are the relief tablet represent-
ing the Apotheosis of Homer, a figure of Endymion
asleep on Mount Latmus, a relief depicting the de-
struction of the children of Niobe by Apollo and
Artemis, a copy of the bronze Discobolos of Myron,
the Towneley Venus, and a head of Homer.
While all the foregoing are redolent of classical
mythology, and as such pleasant reminders of the
picturesque legends of old Greece, it may well be
that the visitor will turn with quickened interest
into the gallery of Roman Busts, for there he will
come face to face with the marble images of men
who belong not to the shadowy realm of fable but
to the realities of history.
Rightly is the brave procession headed by a life-
like bust of Julius Caesar, “the greatest man of
ancient times,” whom Macaulay placed higher than
Cromwell and Napoleon because he “united the
talents of Bonaparte to those of Cromwell; and he
possessed also, what neither Cromwell nor Bona-
parte possessed, learning, taste, wit, eloquence, the
sentiments and the manners of an accomplished
|
Relics of Greece and Rome 199
gentleman.” Of Augustus, the patron of Virgil,
the encourager of Horace, and to whom Maecenas
left the kindly poet as a legacy, — “Bear Horace
in your memory as you would myself,” — there
are three heads, one showing the future emperor
as a youth, and the others perpetuating the looks
of his prime. Near at hand is Tiberius, the em-
peror who ruled Rome at the time of the Cruci-
fixion, and the man who, in the words of Tacitus,
made his reign ‘‘ one scene of lust, and cruelty, and
horror.” Then there is Claudius, the conqueror of
Britain, whose marble presentment suggests not a
little of that uncouthness of deportment, that phys-
ical weakness and grotesqueness which made him
the butt of contemporary wits. Whether, however,
the bust of Nero would suggest the infamous char-
acter of the man to one unacquainted with his rec-
ord of crime and infamy is a question which each
must decide for himself. Indeed it might be a sug-
gestive exercise for the visitor to pass along this
gallery and, refraining from reading the names on
the busts, try to divine from the marbles alone some
estimate of the men they represent. He might in-
fer the martial qualities, the statesmanship of Tra-
jan, and the restlessness of Hadrian, and the devo-
tion of Antoninus, or the philosophic bent of Mar-
cus Aurelius. And yet he might not. One observer
has noted the “ look of painful thought '’ which is
certainly characteristic of Trajan, and on the other
200 The British Museum: Its Treasures
hand it would seem as though Walter Pater had
formed an independent conception of Marcus Aure-
lius and then come to these two busts of the philos-
opher-emperor to mark his “bland capacity of
brow,” his “gracious and courtly ’’ aspect. These
may be estimates founded, even if unconsciously,
upon previous knowledge; but the most indifferent
reader of character could hardly go wrong in form-
ing an appreciation of Commodus. It needs no
familiarity with the indictment of Gibbon to divine
that this was a man compact of selfishness and a
devotee of the grossest vice. It is a presentment
which gives colour to the story which credits his
paternity to a gladiator and not to the high-minded
Aurelius.
From the gallery of busts the visitor should pass
to the Hall of Greek and Latin Inscriptions, where,
on either side of the entrance to the Reading Room,
he will find casts or originals of stone slabs relating
to boundary disputes, national subscriptions, de-
crees, records of rebuilding of walls or bridges, and
other inscriptions of historic interest. Mingling
with these stones are busts of Greek poets and
others, including one of Euripides, and portrait stat-
ues of unknown Romans. There is also a spirited
group of Mithras slaying the bull.
It is now time to explore the galleries on the up-
per floor of the museum, to which access may be
gained by the main staircase leading off the entrance
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
GREEK TERRACOTTAS.


Relics of Greece and Rome 201
hall. On reaching the top and turning to the right
the first apartment to be entered is the Room of
Terracottas. So numerous and fascinating are the
objects displayed in this gallery that they alone
would provide occupation for a day’s study. The
terracottas, diminutive figures baked in clay and
representing the various stages of rough modelling
after the manner of Ruskin’s schoolgirl and her
flour paste, and then more careful treatment after
the manner of a sculptor’s model, and finally casting
from moulds, are arranged in historical order, the
earliest being in the show-cases on the left. These
are exceedingly primitive, but they are quickly fol-
lowed by examples which show marked growth in
skill, while the cases in the centre of the room have
an attractive collection of the charming little figures
found at Tanagra and Eretria. Various learned
theories have been advanced in favour of these fig-
ures having been made for offerings to divinities,
or as gifts to be enclosed in tombs with the dead,
but surely the Greeks were sufficiently lovers of the
artistic to utilize them for the decoration of their
homes. For the adornment of dining-room or draw-
ing-room, or, indeed, any other apartment in the
home, nothing could be more desirable than a few
of these charming little figures, some so full of
humour, others, typical of play, and all of them de-
lightful for their dainty qualities. Down the centre
of the Room of Terracottas will be found a series
202 The British Museum: Its Treasures
of terracotta decorations for houses, while at the
entrance and in the middle of the gallery are two
sarcophagi, one belonging to the archaic period and
the other dating from the second century before
Christ. The former is weirdly attractive for the
grotesqueness of the man and woman reclining on
the cover.
Objects illustrating the more graceful side of an-
cient art are displayed in abundance in a corridor
near the terracottas, and in the Room of Gold Orna-
ments and Gems to which that corridor gives en-
trance. That the silver rings in the former and the
dainty articles of the latter are of priceless worth
is indicated by the fact that here there are always
more attendants and policemen on guard than in the
galleries where the objects are less portable and
probably not so valuable. When, many years ago,
it was suggested to Sir Henry Ellis, that the mu-
seum could be opened on .public holidays under
proper safeguards, he objected that “there would
be something repulsive to Englishmen in knowing
that they were watched by the police.” Evidently
the English character has changed, for no one seems
to mind having their progress among the gold orna-
ments and gems followed by police eyes. Certainly
the objects are tempting, such as the famous Port-
land Vase, for example, or the thousand and one
pieces of exquisite and costly jewelry, the diadems,
the rings, the brooches, the cameos, and engraved
, , , , , By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
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THE PORTLAND
VASE.


Relics of Greece and Rome 203
intaglios and Scarabs. The gallery is small, but here
indeed are infinite riches in little room.
There are six other galleries to claim the visitor’s
notice, and these he will do well to explore in this
order: first the four vase rooms, then the bronze
room, and lastly the room illustrating the daily life
of the Greeks and Romans.
Concerning the vase rooms the museum authori-
ties are unusually frank. “A collection of Greek
vases,” says the official guide-book, “is apt to be
somewhat unattractive to those who visit it but
rarely. In vases of the earlier periods the grotesque
details and methods are more readily perceived than
the interest which attaches to all primitive and
archaic work in which the craftsman, by slow de-
grees, becomes master of his art. The meaning of
the subjects is often unfamiliar; moreover, the lan-
guage employed by the vase painters is so terse, the
economy of subordinate details, independent of the
figures, is so strict that some acquaintance with
vases is necessary to enable us to accept the conven-
tions employed — such as a column for a building,
a branch for an outdoor scene, a line of dots for
broken ground.” With this warning kept in view,
and remembering that the objects displayed are our
chief evidence for the history of art otherwise un-
known, the visitor will find much to instruct and
delight in the wonderful collection displayed in the
four vase rooms. In the first he is introduced to
204 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Greek pottery from pre-historic times to about
600 B.C.; in the second the period embraced is that
of the sixth century; in the third the objects belong
to the fifth century, with some white Athenian
vases; and in the fourth room the observer is made
acquainted with what is known as the period of de-
cline. On the archaic vases the decorations are
largely of a geometric nature, though occasionally
animals are introduced which betray an alien influ-
ence; but vases of the sixth century are richly
adorned with figure subjects mainly illustrative of
mythological incidents. Even the crudest examples,
and how much more those of the highest artistic
merit, are deeply instructive for the evidence they
afford of man’s onward movement from those far-
off days in which, wherever clay was found, he be-
came a clumsy potter. .
While the objects in the vase rooms are almost
wholly of Greek origin, those displayed in the
Bronze Room reflect once more the blending of
Greek and Roman influences. These exhibits have
been obtained from tombs and the ruins of temples;
in the former category are placed armour, weapons,
vases, mirrors, and personal ornaments, which it
was customary to bury with the dead; in the latter
are included statues small and large, and votive of
t ferings and inscribed tablets. The heroes and hero-
ines of mythology naturally figure largely among
the statues and enter profusely into ornamentation.
Relics of Greece and Rome 205
It is stated, however, that the isolated statuette,
such as is common in modern times and abounded in
Rome, was comparatively rare among the Greeks.
Their metal figures were nearly always associated
with a utilitarian purpose. It is notable as support-
ing Ruskin’s A. B. C. that the best examples of
Greek work in bronze relief belong to the beginning
of the fourth century B. C. One other gallery re-
mains, the Room of Greek and Roman Life, and this
may well prove the most arrestive of all the twenty-
one apartments devoted to the remains of Greek
and Roman civilization. Notwithstanding differ-
ences of country, of race, of language, of religion,
of manners and customs, after all, the varied mem-
bers of the great human family are held together
in one bond by certain fundamental traits. At the
root of all religions lies the religious instinct, and to
all men the spirit of play appeals, just as to all men
nothing is alien that concerns birth, and childhood,
and love, and life-partnership, and home, and death.
In the abstract the old Greeks and Romans may
seem far off from us, and as unrelated to our lives
as though they were denizens of another world; but
when in this room one gazes upon the mute relics of
their daily lives, the toys they played with, the dress
they wore, the tools they handled, the tables at
which they ate and the beds on which they slept, the
chariots in which they rode or the ships in which
they sailed, the coins they passed from hand to hand,
206 The British Museum: Its Treasures
the swords they wielded against the enemies of their
country, and the urns in which their ashes were laid
to an eternal rest, they become living members of
the great human family that knows no land or age.
Here, then, are objects which do not appeal to in-
terest on the ground of their mere antiquity, or
because they illustrate the progress of man; their
one bond is the bond of life. And so the Greek and
the Roman stand side by side; we see the two indis-
criminately in the market-place, at the council-cham-
ber, before the altar, in the theatre, watching the
circus or the arena, or dwelling in peace at home,
and finally passing into the great Beyond.
CHAPTER IV
EGYPTIAN ANTIQUITIES
MILTON rather than Old or New Testament theo-
logians is supposed to be responsible for the Satan
of modern Christian belief. And, so slowly do the
conclusions of scholars find their way into general
knowledge, it may be added that Shakespeare and
the Bible are still the chief sources of information
with most people for such ideas as they possess of
Egypt. Although Cook’s tours have made the Nile
accessible to thousands, and Baedeker has done his
best to instruct other thousands in the latest learn-
ing of Egyptologists, it is probably no exaggeration
to say that for nine persons out of every ten the
mention of Egypt starts a train of thought which
begins with Cleopatra and ends with Exodus.
Even the “ serpent of old Nile ” seems to most
people to be a person standing on the confines of
history; an ever-attractive type of the Scarlet
Woman no doubt, but far-removed from the modern
world. This remoteness of Caesar’s mistress and the
charmer of Mark Antony may be owing in part to
those New York and London obelisks known as
Cleopatra’s Needles, for not many are aware that
those granite monoliths were fashioned and erected
207
208 The British Museum: Its Treasures
some fifteen hundred years before Cleopatra was
born. As a matter of fact, to the Egyptologist the
reign of Cleopatra is an event almost as recent as
yester year.
Nor is the period of the Exodus an event of such
hoary antiquity as many of us imagine. According
to the most conservative scholars, the Egypt of the
Bible belongs to what they call the Middle Kingdom
of Egyptian history, when the country already had
behind it a record of several thousand years of ripe
civilization. The fact is, then, that when one reaches
the utmost verge of the backward-looking thought
of the majority, when the imagination penetrates
to the days of Moses, or to Joseph’s tribulations
with Potiphar’s lascivious wife, the beginnings of
Egyptian history are still a long, long way off.
Herodotus was told as much more than two thou-
sand years ago. In his devious wanderings the
father of history reached the land of the Nile, and
everywhere cultivated the friendship of the priests.
It was one of the latter, as he records, who remarked
to him, “You Greeks are only children.” And,
whatever may have been the thoughts of Herodotus,
to-day there is no denying the assertion. We are all
“only children '’ compared with the Egyptians.
As the visitor to the British Museum gazes upon the
ancient vellum of the Codex Alexandrinus and re-
calls that some fourteen hundred years have passed
away since it was written, or stands in front of the
Egyptian Antiquities 209
Theseus of the Elgin Marbles and realizes that the
sculptor who fashioned that stone has been in his
grave over two thousand three hundred years, he
will surely confess to a feeling that here indeed are
objects which dwarf his own three-score-years-and-
ten and make young again many a relic which he
deemed venerable. And yet that manuscript and
that marble are modern and almost contemporane-
ous compared with the relics of old Egypt.
No wonder, then, that Egyptology is as catching
as measles. It is also at least as instructive as or-
chid hunting. If it teaches nothing else, it does con-
duce to humility. Races which have fondly imag-
ined themselves to be the “heirs of all the ages ''
shrink into children of a day compared with the
sons and daughters of that really ancient land.
They are not merely the offspring of people who
specialized in pyramids and mummies; they are the
descendants of a race which had attained a high
state of civilization countless centuries before the
rest of the world had emerged from barbarism. All
this would be more a matter of common knowledge
than it is if it were not for the Egyptologists them-
selves. It really is time for those learned students
to codify their knowledge, or at least come to some
agreement about such matters as chronology and
Spelling. If the inquirer restricts himself to sitting
at the feet of one pundit, his case is not quite hope-
less. No doubt he will be prepared to move about
210 The British Museum: Its Treasures
in a region of thought wholly unfamiliar, to wrestle
with names and ideas that have all the elements of
novelty, and be open to a general readjustment of
his knowledge. Even so his task is not a light one;
but when he ventures further afield in his studies
and wanders to new teachers, his bewilderment will
begin. He will discover that the date of the begin-
ning of the first dynasty of Egyptian kings may be
placed anywhere between 3180 B.C. and 5510 B.C.,
that the arrangements of those kings are uncertain,
and that he can never be sure of his spelling. So
far as mere numbers go, it is a providence that
modern schoolboys are not required to learn the list
of Egyptian kings. Some of them have trouble
enough to memorize the twenty-seven Presidents of
the United States or the forty rulers England has
had since the Norman Conquest, but such mnemonic
exercises fade into insignificance compared with the
more than two hundred ‘‘principal kings ’’ of
Egypt, especially when it is borne in mind how out-
landish are the forms of their names.
After all, however, it must not be forgotten that
Egyptology is still in its infancy. It is only some
seventy years since Dr. Arnold of Rugby wrote: “Is
it not marvellous that they can now read the old
Egyptian readily? . . . These Egyptian discoveries
are likely to be one of the greatest wonders of our
age.” Much as is known, there is still more to learn.
The present condition of our knowledge is well put
Egyptian Antiquities 211
by Professor James H. Breasted when he writes:
“Tremendous as is the impression which we receive
from the monuments of the Old Kingdom, they are
but the skeleton, upon which we might put flesh, and
endue the whole with life, if but the chief literary
monuments of the time had survived. It is a difficult
task to discern behind these Titanic achievements
the busy world of commerce, industry, administra-
tion, society, art, and literature out of which they
grew. Of half a millennium of political change, of
overthrow and usurpation, of growth and decay of
institutions, of local governors, helpless under the
strong grasp of the Pharaoh, or shaking off the re-
straint of a weak monarch, and developing into in-
dependent barons, so powerful at last as to bring in
the final dissolution of the state — of all this we
gain but fleeting and occasional glimpses, where
more must be guessed than can be known.”
Reference has already been made to that acquisi-
tion of the Rosetta Stone by the museum which had
so large a share in the foundation of the department
of Egyptian antiquities. It, as the reader will re-
call, passed into the possession of the British nation
as the result of the defeat of the French at Alexan-
dria, when the British general insisted upon inclu-
ding among the spoils of war those antiquities which
had been unearthed by the French savants who had
been commissioned by Napoleon to make a thorough
study of the ancient remains of the country. That
212 The British Museum: Its Treasures
the French were reluctant to part with their treas-
ures was but natural, and when it became plain that
their protests would prove ineffectual they stripped
the Rosetta Stone of its soft cotton wrapping and
threw it on its face. Happily no further damage
was done, or otherwise the ancient language of
Egypt might have remained undecipherable to this
day. -
In the annals of learning there is no more roman-
tic chapter than that associated with the Rosetta
Stone, which, by the way, derives its name from the
fact that it was discovered among the ruins of a fort
near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile in 1798.
Even the most recent dictionary will inform its
reader that a secondary meaning of “hiero-
glyphic ’’ is a character or mark “hard to decipher
or understand.” But the time is not so far distant
when no one, whether of the Orient or the Occident,
could read or understand Egyptian hieroglyphics.
Which is hardly surprising. To be faced with a row
of signs which include here a sketch of what looks
like an immature tadpole, there with something that
resembles a chopper with an abbreviated handle,
and in other places with a wavy line that might be
intended for the teeth of a saw, or a kind of walking-
stick with the rudiments of an umbrella sprouting
from the bottom, or a species of lion that on the
other hand might be a dog or a cat, is enough to give
pause to the most adroit guesser of riddles.
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Egyptian Antiquities 213
But hieroglyphics were only one form of Egyp-
tian writing; there were two others. Notwithstand-
ing the abundant leisure of the ancient world, the
old Egyptians eventually came to the conclusion that
their time might be more profitably employed than
in laboriously sketching a sort of pipe, a wavy line,
a bird, a circle, and three upright strokes when they
wanted to write such a simple word as ‘‘ myrrh.”
So the scribes put their wits to work and in due time
evolved a form of writing known as ‘‘ hieratic,”
that is, the priests’ writing. This eliminated so
much of the pictorial flourishes that it became a
great time-saver. More centuries went by, and with
the increasing pace of life it seems to have dawned
upon the Egyptians that even more economy might
be practised in penmanship. This led the way to the
‘‘ demotic ’’ style, that is, the people’s writing. And
so it came to pass in ancient Egypt that if one
wished to inscribe a tomb, or record a decree, or
indite a letter, there were three ways of doing it, the
hieroglyphic, the hieratic, or the demotic. Later still,
in the period of the Ptolemies, Greek became the
language of the kings and ruling classes, and it was
not unusual for important decrees to be inscribed on
tablets in three forms, namely, hieroglyphic, demotic,
and Greek. As the centuries went by, however,
the hieroglyphic system grew more and more obso-
lete, and by the end of the fifth century of the Chris-
tian era even the priests had lost the ability to deci-
214 The British Museum: Its Treasures
pher that particular form of writing. Thencefor-
ward, for thirteen centuries, hieroglyphics was a
dead language. Neither Eastern nor European could
unravel its meaning. Throughout the length and
breadth of Egypt, on Obelisk and statue, on the
doorways to tombs and on the coffin-casings of
mummies, on scarab or sepulchral figure, the ancient
language of Egypt grew silent, dumb, voiceless.
Whereas in the far-off centuries, like the fabled
Memnon, those picturesque inscriptions had, in the
light of knowledge, whispered strange secrets of the
past, now for long generations they became mute to
the most obstinate questioning. Or like the Sphinx,
they kept their secret, and no Oedipus arose to guess
their riddle. -
All the while, however, there was safely buried in
the sands near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile that
slab of basalt which was to solve the problem.
Away back at the beginning of the second century
before Christ a general council of Egyptian priests
agreed to commemorate the coronation of their king,
Ptolemy V, and the decree passed to that effect was
duly inscribed on a stele in the three forms of hiero-
glyphic, demotic, and Greek, and a replica of that
stone set up in various temples by the side of the
image of the king. The sands at Rosetta preserved
one of those stones for the enlightenment of future
ages. For when scholars began to study it, they
were of course able to decipher the Greek, and then
Egyptian Antiquities 215
to worry out a few lines of the demotic text, and
finally, by minute examination and comparison, the
hieroglyphic text was made to give up its mystery.
That was in 1822, and from that date the work of
elucidating Egyptian hieroglyphics went steadily
forward; but it has been truthfully claimed that the
scientific excavation of Egyptian remains and the
fruitful study of their lessons dates from 1883, when
Flinders Petrie began his epoch-making work at
Tanis.
All this may seem a roundabout way of approach-
ing the Egyptian antiquities of the British Museum,
but the visitor will not be in a position to appreciate
the interest or instruction of those antiquities unless
he bears the foregoing in mind. Nay, he will be well
advised to prepare himself still further. He should
refresh his memory on the salient points of Egyp-
tian geography and history. He should visualize
the land to a certain extent, map out a rough scheme
of the sequence of its dynasties, and, above all, gain
Some general idea of that cult of the dead which
played so large a part in Egyptian history and has
been the means of throwing so much light on the
past. &
Egypt, the land, belongs to the small countries of
the earth. Apart from that section situated in the
Delta, so called because the two main streams of the
Nile branch to the sea after the shape of the Greek
letter so named, Egypt is but a straggling valley,
216 The British Museum: Its Treasures
some seven hundred miles long and fifteen broad.
To the south is, the sea; on either side are vast
deserts. It will be easily seen, then, how apt is the
phrase of Herodotus: ‘‘ Egypt is the gift of the
Nile.” Were it not for that river, the valley would
be as the sterile, inhospitable, waterless deserts of
Arabia and Lybia. Upon the annual rising of the
Nile, human life in Egypt is entirely dependent.
The Egyptian needs no gloss on the text of the
Preacher: “Cast thy bread upon the waters: for
thou shalt find it after many days.” Each year, as
soon as the early summer sun has begun to melt the
snows of Abyssinia, the river begins to rise, the
widening flood bringing with it a rich burden of
fertilizing mud, which, when the waters recede in
the autumn, is deposited over the valley and fits the
land for another harvest. The Egyptians were not
ignorant of their indebtedness to the Nile, or un-
grateful to Hapi, the god of the river. Two images
of that beneficient deity are preserved in the British
Museum, one in the Third Egyptian Room upstairs,
the other in the Southern Gallery on the ground
floor. For a complete acknowledgment of benefits
received it would be difficult to surpass that Hymn
to Hapi of which E. A. Wallis Budge has given this
spirited translation:
“Homage to thee, O Hapi ! Thou appearest in this
land, and thou comest in peace to make Egypt live.
Thou waterest the fields which Ra hath created, thou
Egyptian Antiquities 217
givest life unto all animals, and as thou descendest
on thy way from heaven thou makest the land to
drink without ceasing. Thou art the friend of bread
and drink, thou givest strength to the grain and
makest it to increase, and thou fillest every place of
work with work. Thou art the lord of the fish, thou
art the creator of barley, and thou makest the tem-
ples to endure for millions of years. Thou art lord
of the poor and needy. If thou wert overthrown in
the heavens, the gods would fall upon their faces,
and men would perish. When thou appearest upon
the earth, shouts of joy rise up and all people are
glad; every man of might receiveth food, and every
tooth is provided with meat. Thou fillest the store-
houses, thou makest the granaries to overflow, and
thou hast regard to the condition of the poor and
needy.”
Held captive by the Nile on either side, and re-
pelled by the sea on the south and by rocky barriers
on the north, the ancient Egyptians lived an isolated
life. That this environment influenced their charac-
ter, and reacted in a suggestive manner on their
mind and thought is beyond question. Their archi-
tecture would alone be a cogent witness to that fact.
Whence the Egyptians originally came, and when,
are questions which cannot be answered in a satis-
factory manner. As with other nations, their his-
tory shades off into a pre-historic period. But the
most conservative Egyptologists are agreed that at
218 The British Museum: Its Treasures
least four thousand five hundred years before Christ
the land was already settled, and its inhabitants
highly civilized. So far, however, as actual chronol-
Ogy goes, it is usual to divide the history of Egypt
into three divisions, representing the thirty dynas-
ties of kings that have ruled over the land from
4400 B.C. to 340 B.C. These three periods, are
known as the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom,
and the Empire, and it is usual to give eleven dynas-
ties to the first, eight to the second, and eleven to
the third. This may be a compromise, but the
scheme is the best available at present, and it at
least offers the visitor to the British Museum a
framework on which he can arrange the ideas gath-
ered on his journeys through the galleries.
One other fact must be borne in mind: the su-
preme importance of the Egyptian cult of the dead.
No attempt can be made here to give even an out-
line of Egyptian theology. When it is remembered
that there were more than fifty principal gods and
goddesses native to the soil, that there were nu-
merous alien gods who seem to have come in for
a fair share of adoration, and that in addition there
were many animal gods and goddesses, besides
sacred birds and reptiles and fish, it will be obvious
that any attempt to educe order out of this chaos
would be a formidable task. Dr. Wallis Budge re-
minds us that every district, city, town, and village
possessed a god, with a female counterpart and a
By Permission of
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the Trustees of the British Museum.
THE SKY - GODDESS NUT.


Egyptian Antiquities 219
son, and also a being of evil, or devil, to say nothing
of the creatures who in modern times would be
called vaguely spirits or fairies. He adds: “ The
names of a great many have been lost, but about
two hundred gods are mentioned in the Pyramid
Texts, about four hundred and eighty in the Theban
Recension of the Book of the Dead, and about twelve
hundred in the various works which deal with the
Other World.” The important thing to remember,
however, is that in one way or another these super-
natural beings were connected with that life after
death to which the Egyptians attached so much im-
portance.
As a consequence, in no other country of the
world has so much attention been devoted to the
equipment of the dead for their well being in the
unseen. This gradually resulted in the accumula-
tion of a multitude of mortuary customs unique in
the history of mankind. Dr. Breasted affirms that
the Egyptian was never able to detach the future
life entirely from the body; “it is evident that he
could conceive of no survival of the dead without
it. Gradually he had developed a more and more
pretentious and a safer repository for his dead,
until, as we have seen, it had become a vast and
massive structure of stone. In all the world no
such colossal tombs as the pyramids are to be
found.” A vizier of the Sixth Dynasty built a tomb
containing thirty-one rooms, upon the decoration of
220 The British Museum: Its Treasures
which immense pains were expended. Many of the
walls were adorned with scenes carved in relief,
which have contributed not a little to our knowledge
of those far-off days. The burial chamber was situ-
ated far below these massive structures and made
as secure as possible. “On the day of burial,”
says Dr. Breasted, ‘‘the body, now duly embalmed,
was subjected to elaborate ceremonies re-enacting
occurrences in the resurrection of Osiris. It was
specially necessary by potent charms to open the
mouth and ears of the deceased that he might speak
and hear in the hereafter. The mummy was then
lowered down the shaft and laid upon its left side
in a fine rectangular cedar coffin, which again was
deposited in a massive sarcophagus of granite or
limestone. Food and drink were left with it, besides
some few toilet articles, a magic wand and a number
of amulets for protection against the enemies of
the dead, especially serpents. . . . The deep shaft
leading to the burial chamber was then filled up to
the top by sand and gravel, and the friends of the
dead now left him to the life in the hereafter.” All
of which will explain how it has come about that
the modern world is in possession of so many mum-
mies and other relics of a time removed by so many
thousand years.
In the British Museum alone there are nearly fifty
thousand objects connected with the life of ancient
Egypt. As they differ so much in size and quality
>
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Egyptian Antiquities 221
it is obviously impossible to arrange them in exact
chronological sequence, but wonderful results have
been attained in the matter of orderly display. All
things considered, the best plan for the visitor to
adopt is to explore first the four apartments situ-
ated on the ground floor, and then complete his study
in the four rooms upstairs. And his natural start-
ing-point is in the Northern Vestibule where are
exhibited most of the relics belonging to the eleven
dynasties of the Old Kingdom.
Unfortunately the relics do not include any sur-
vivals of the First or Second dynasties, although
some eighteen kings ruled during those periods, un-
less the sandstone relief from the tomb of the priest
Shera belongs to the Second dynasty. In any case
this is one of the oldest Egyptian antiquities, dating
back some four thousand years B. C. The other re-
mains of the Third dynasty include a portion of a
sculptural stele, a red granite statue of Betchmes,
described as a “royal kinsman,” a limestone tablet
with hieroglyphics praying that the deceased may
have a “happy burial,” and other reliefs of royal
kinsmen. For the Fourth dynasty the survivals are
more numerous and important. These take the
visitor back to the ages when such notable monarchs
as Seneferu, Khufu (Cheops), Khafra, and Men-
kure ruled over Egypt. The monuments include the
stele of a prince who flourished in the reign of Sene-
feru, who, after the manner of the time, held numer-
222 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ous religious and civil offices, and was altogether a
person of considerable importance.
Perhaps, however, as more related to matters of
his own knowledge, the visitor will derive greater
satisfaction from inspecting three of the actual
casing-stones from the Great Pyramid built by King
Rhufu at Gizeh. It is a puzzle to Egyptologists to
understand how a mere noble of a provincial dis-
trict, such as Khufu was, forced his way to the
throne of the Pharaohs, but surely his famous pyra-
mid supplies a key to his masterful character. Evi-
dently his thoughts were on a large scale, for other-
wise he would have hesitated before appropriating
an area of more than twelve acres for the site of
his tomb. The Great Pyramid consists of over two
million blocks of stone, each weighing more than
two and a half tons on the average, and the story
of Herodotus that it represents the labour of a hun-
dred thousand men for twenty years has been
shown to be quite credible by modern computation.
“Not merely was this work quantitatively so for-
midable,” remarks Dr. Breasted, “but in quality
also it is the most remarkable material enterprise
known to us anywhere in this early world, for the
most ponderous masonry in the pyramid amazes
the modern beholder by its fineness. Some of the
masonry finish is so fine that blocks weighing many
tons are set together with seams of considerable
length, showing a joint of one ten-thousandth of an
Egyptian Antiquities 223
inch, and involving edges and surfaces ‘equal to
optician’s work of the present day, but on a scale
of acres instead of feet or yards of material.’”
Hence the interest of these three casing-stones, and
the cast of a stone statue of Khufu himself, the
builder of that mighty pyramid. It should also be
observed that there are in addition several mortu-
ary relics connected with the reign of that notable
king, such as the stelae of several officials and the
painted limestone figures of Katep and his wife.
The latter object is notable as an early example of
that affectionate hint which Egyptian sculptors
were prone to give in their groups of husband and
wife. It will be observed that the left arm of Mrs.
Ratep has been somewhat abnormally prolonged to
enable her to clasp her husband round the waist;
in other statues the husband is depicted as recip-
rocating the action. -
Whether Khufu were or were not the architect
of the famuos Sphinx, it seems agreed that that
massive monument may have been begun by his
orders. It is fitting, then, that the relics of the
Great Pyramid should have as near companions a
portion of the beard of the Sphinx and a fragment
of the serpent which once adorned its forehead.
On each can be traced some tinge of the red colour
with which they were originally painted. -
Khufu’s exploits as a pyramid-builder proved
infectious. His immediate successors, Khafra and
224 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Menkure, tried to emulate his example, with what
results may be seen in the second and third pyra-
mids at Gizeh. Neither of them can compare with
the Great Pyramid of Khufu, even though the pyra-
mid of Khafra does contain about sixty million
cubic feet of masonry and ladens the earth with a
burden of nearly five million tons. Menkure's tomb
is still Smaller, and is more scamped in its work-
manship. Judging from the monumental remains
in the Northern Vestibule, however, the pyramid of
Khafra had plenty of officials to superintend its
construction. One of the relics is a massive lime-
stone door from the tomb of Thetha, a royal kins-
man who in addition to overseeing the building of
the pyramid was master of the mysteries and mag-
ical ceremonies performed in connection with the
progress of that structure. But Thetha was an
idle man compared with Ptah-shepses, who, judging
from the inscription on his stele, was a shocking
pluralist. Not only was he a high priest twice over,
and chief libationer, and superintendent of the
royal storehouses and temple property, but he was
besides royal barge-master, and clerk of the works.
If his epitaph is to be taken as evidence, he was
able to please his kingly masters in all his multi-
farious occupations.
Surely it will lend additional interest to these
survivals of the Fourth dynasty to recall that this
is the period of Egyptian history to which belong
Egyptian Antiquities 225
some of those fascinating tales so admirably trans-
lated by Professor Petrie. The stories of the ma-
gicians are recorded as having been told to King
Khufu by his son, Khafra being responsible for that
tale which sets forth the sinful intrigue of a chief
official’s wife, who became enamoured of a royal
page and invited him to a dalliance in a garden
lodge. As the page acquired the habit of taking a
bath in the lake after enjoying his pleasure with the
lady, the outraged husband made a miniature wax
crocodile, which, on being cast into the lake, was
transformed into the genuine article, with disas-
trous results for the wayward page. He, however,
was not the only sufferer. At the king’s command,
the sinning wife was burned to death in front of her
master’s harem and her ashes cast into the river.
Another son of Khufu entertained his father
with an early variant of the legend of the king who
was wearied with his pleasures, and demanded
some new excitement. His chief scribe was equal
to the occasion: “Let thy majesty go upon the lake
of the palace, and let there be made ready a boat,
with all the fair maidens of the harem of thy palace;
and the heart of thy majesty shall be refreshed
with the sight, in seeing their rowing up and down
the water, and seeing the goodly pools of the birds
upon the lake, and beholding its sweet fields and
grassy shores; thus will thy heart be lightened.
And I also will go with thee. Bring me twenty oars
226 The British Museum: Its Treasures
of ebony, inlayed with gold, with blades of light
wood, inlayed with electrum; and bring me twenty
maidens, fair in their limbs, their bosoms, and their
hair, all virgins; and bring me twenty nets, and
give these nets unto the maidens for their gar-
ments.’’ Evidently that scribe was born to be a
ballet master, and, like all theatrical producers, was
determined not to miss any of the fun. The wan-
derer through the Northern Vestibule should re-
mind himself of these tales; they will help to assure
him that the ancient Egyptians were not altogether
Such solemn persons as their tombs and pyramids
and statues might lead one to suppose.
Incomplete as are the remains of the first eleven
dynasties, comprising what is known as the Old
Kingdom, the cumulative effect of these elaborate
sepulchral stelae, these statues, and all that they
suggest of those far-off people of whom they are
the chief memorial, is not inconsiderable. That
period of Egyptian history has left us, in the words
of Dr. Breasted, “ the imposing line of temples,
tombs and pyramids, stretching for many miles
along the margin of the western desert, the most
eloquent witness to the fine intelligence and Titanic
energies of the men who made the Old Kingdom
what it was; not alone achieving these wonders of
mechanics and internal organization, but building
the earliest sea-going ships and exploring unknown
waters, or pushing their commercial enterprises far
Egyptian Antiquities 227
up the Nile into inner Africa. In plastic art they
had reached the highest achievement; in architec-
ture their tireless genius had created the column
and originated the colonnade; in government they
had elaborated an enlightened and highly developed
state, with a large body of just law; in religion they
were already dimly conscious of a judgment in the
hereafter, and they were thus the first men whose
ethical intuitions made happiness in the future life
dependent upon character.’’
According to the best evidence available, the pass-
ing of the Old Kingdom took place in a period of
upheaval, which at last gave place to the Middle
Kingdom, the beginning of which is marked by the
reign of Amenemhat I, the founder of the Twelfth
dynasty. He appears to have carried out a kind of
Domesday survey of Egypt, and still to have left
a pleasant memory among his subjects, for in his
reign “ no man went hungry or thirsty.” He was
succeeded by his son, Usertsen I, of whose reign
the early bays of the Northern Gallery contain
some interesting relics. These include a red gran-
ite stele setting forth the gifts of the king to the
gods of the First Cataract of the Nile; a head of
a colossal statue of the monarch, found at Memphis;
and numerous stelae and other sepulchral memorials
of his many servants. One of these, Neferu, had
charge of the royal barges; another was responsi-
ble for the private apartments of the palace.
228 The British Museum: Its Treasures
In the first bay of the Northern Gallery the vis-
itor will discover a monument which revives the
long-completed struggles of a gold-searcher of a
type which has had many modern duplicates. It is
the tombstone of one named Sa-Hathor, who during
the reign of Amenemhat II, some two thousand five
hundred years before Christ, seems to have been
sent to the Sudan by his royal master in charge of
the mining works there, and proved so efficient a
servant in gold searching that when his labours
were over his memory was honoured by this preten-
tious stele. Under the same king lived that Sa-
Menthu whose many royal offices are duly recorded
on his monument in the sixth bay.
Of the ten kings who make up the Twelfth dy-
nasty the one who impressed himself most upon his
age was Usertsen III, to whom is credited the con-
quest of the Northern Sudan and the first invasion
of Syria by a monarch of Egypt. He set up a monu-
ment to mark the most southerly limit of his king-
dom, inscribed with a decree prohibiting the blacks
to enter Egypt without special permission. That
he was a sovereign of unusual importance may be
inferred from the numerous statues which are dis-
played in the Vestibule and the first and third bays
of the Northern Gallery. They show the king at
different periods of his life, one giving him a coun-
tenance of great strength and marked by individ-
uality not common in Egyptian sculpture. In close
Egyptian Antiquities 229
proximity to the statues of Usertsen III are stelae
commemorating the lives of some of the leading
officials of his reign. It should be noted, too, that
the statue of the king in the Vestibule depicts him
with his feet resting on nine bows, a symbol of his
conquest of the Sudan tribes. -
Among the other relics of the Twelfth dynasty are
countless stelae of high officials, sepulchral tablets,
statues of kings and royal kinsmen, and a formid-
able array of altars or tablets for offerings.
Between the Twelfth and Eighteenth dynasties is
another of those chaotic periods which not all the
researches of Egyptologists have yet availed to re-
duce to order. “Rapid dissolution followed, as the
provincial lords rose against each other and strove
for the throne. Pretender after pretender strug-
gled for supremacy; now and again one more able
than his rivals would gain a brief advantage and
wear his ephemeral honours, only to be quickly sup-
planted by another.” Then came the Hyksos kings
of Josephus, whose tyranny at last united the Egyp-
tians in one grand effort and led to the establishment
of another stable dynasty. Of this turbulent period
there are various relics in the Northern Gallery,
including some noble statues, numerous stelae of
private individuals, and a granite lion inscribed
with the name of Khian, a Hyksos king of about
1800 B. c.
Brighter days dawned with the accession of
230 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Amasis I, the founder of the Eighteenth dynasty, of
whom there is one remarkable memorial in the form
of a massive granite altar, situated in the sixteenth
bay. Then came Amenhetep, the founder of the
powerful brotherhood of the Priests of Amen, and
a great builder of temples. There is a striking
limestone statue of this king in the third bay, and
elsewhere in the gallery are other remains of his
period. Both these kings helped towards the quiet-
ing of the country, but their efforts were insignifi-
cant compared with the triumphs of Thothmes III,
who, beginning life as a priest in the temple of
Karnak, won the hand of the heiress of the old line
of princes, and gradually amassed such power as
no ruler of Egypt had ever acquired. He was per-
haps the most warlike of the rulers of the land of
the Nile, leading his armies into Palestine, Syria,
and other lands of Western Asia, and everywhere
proving victorious. The spoils of war so enriched
his treasury that he was able to undertake vast
building operations, including that mammoth col-
onnade in the temple of Amen at Karnak. He it
was, too, who set up those numerous “Cleopatra’s
Needles" which are to be found so plentifully in
all lands save that of their original home. Of this
masterful king the museum contains some deeply
interesting relics, chief among them being that mas-
sive red granite head of Thothmes himself which
dominates the centre of the upper portion of the
Egyptian Antiquities 231
Northern Gallery. When seen in profile this head
may be disappointing, having the appearance of
Weakness rather than strength; but when examined
full-face it will be found that this erroneous im-
pression has been caused by the loss of the chin,
and that the face is one of pronounced character,
even though the lips are markedly sensual and sug-
gestive of negro descent. In the second bay is a
massive granite monument set up by the king at
Karnak, and in the twelfth bay is exhibited a frag-
ment of a granite obelisk which he caused to be
erected at Heliopolis, being, in fact, a portion of
that “Cleopatra's Needle '’ which stands on the
Thames Embankment. Other remains which link
us to the reign of this potent monarch are a stele
depicting Thothmes in relief in the act of making
an offering to a god; a jamb of a door inscribed
with his name; and a memorial to the first prophet
of Osiris. -
Two kings of little note succeeded Thothmes, and
then the throne of Egypt was occupied by Amenhe-
tep III, better known perhaps as the Memnon of
the Greeks. To him must be credited the Colossi
of Memnon, and countless massive structures at
Thebes, at Karnak, at Luxor, and elsewhere. A
colossal statue of the king is to be seen in the eighth
bay, and in other bays will be found twenty-four
black granite statues of the fire goddess Sekhet
which owe their existence to Amenhetep. That god-
232 . The British Museum: Its Treasures
dess was evidently a favourite with the king, for in
addition to the series just named there are numer-
ous other statues of her from Karnak. In the sixth
bay is a tablet recording an expedition of the king
to the Northern Sudan, while other relics include a
head from his sarcophagus, a column from a temple
of his building, and coffins and other memorials of
officials who lived in his reign. Of the two red
granite lions in the tenth and eleventh bays, the
former bears an inscription stating that it was made
by Amenhetep for a temple in honour of himself
as the god of Nubia. These lions are worthy of
note if only for the fact that Ruskin declared them
to be the finest embodiment of animal majesty pre-
served in any works of the ancient world. It is
pleasant to see, too, as may be proved by a glance
at the statues of Arineferu and his wife in the third
bay, that nubile affection was still surviving in an-
cient Egypt, for the husband as well as the wife in
that painted group has stretched forth an arm in
search of a waist. As the monument was erected
by a daughter of the pair, to “keep alive ’’ her
parents’ names, the evidence may be accepted as
affording presumptive proof of a happy wedlock.
Save for Amenhetep IV, no other king of the
Eighteenth dynasty calls for much notice. He,
however, was notable as a dreamer, and appears to
have anticipated the German Kaiser's passion for
theology. Nay, he attempted to found an entirely
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
HEAD OF A PRIESTESS OF THE XVIII TH DYNASTY.



Egyptian Antiquities 233
new religion, with the inevitable consequence of
rousing priestly hostility. Consequently few relics
have survived from his time, for his temples and
shrines were demolished shortly after his death.
However, the base of one of his statues may be seen
in the Northern Gallery, and in the tenth bay is the
stele of one of his officials. The dynasty as a whole
has left nothing of greater merit than the monu-
ment shown in the Southern Gallery of a priest, or
other high official, and his wife. There is character
in both the faces, the workmanship is of a high or-
der, and at last one gains a sense not only of human-
ity in the subjects but of genius in the sculptor.
Two kings of the succeeding dynasty, the Nine-
teenth, played a conspicuous part in ancient history.
Rameses II occupied the throne for sixty-seven
years, enjoyed himself with countless wives, re-
joiced in the paternity of more than a hundred and
sixty sons and daughters, waged war with zest, and
eclipsed all his predecessors in passion for build-
ing. Than his no name so frequently crops up on
buildings all over Egypt, for he believed thoroughly
in taking credit for all he did, even if it were merely
the carrying out of slight repairs. Consequently
the British Museum galleries are rich in examples
of his monuments, while the statues of the tireless
monarch are almost beyond count. A somewhat
battered wooden effigy may be found in the Central
Saloon, and in close proximity is the upper portion
234 The British Museum: Its Treasures
of one of his colossal statues. One of the most enor-
mous casts in the building, too, that, namely, which
dominates the Vestibule, also perpetuates the fea-
tures of Rameses II. His successor, Menephthah,
deserves attention because he is thought to have
been the king who oppressed the children of Israel.
Among the survivals of his reign is a door-jamb
from his temple at Memphis.
With the last kings of the Nineteenth dynasty the
Middle Kingdom came to an end, giving place to
the Empire which was to be protracted to the year
340 B. C. Of the eleven dynasties included in that
period there are countless relics in the Central Sa-
loon and the Southern Gallery, including the strik-
ing Hathor-headed capital from a temple at Bu-
bastis, the magnificent sarcophagus of the queen of
Amasis II, the voluptuous statue of governor Uah-
ab-Ra, and the richly-decorated sarcophagus of
Ring Nekht-Heru-hebt. The outside of the latter
is closely inscribed with texts and pictures from
the Book of the Other World, and the inside with
figures of numerous gods. The latter, however, are
practically effaced, owing, perhaps, to the sarcoph-
agus having been used as a bath for several cen-
turies. One of the most attractive relics of the
Twenty-sixth dynasty, is the mummified effigy of
an inspector of scribes shown in the twenty-seventh
bay. He was evidently a person of more fleshly
build than the average Egyptian and flourished on
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
- AB - R.A.
SARCOPHAGUS OF UAH



Egyptian Antiquities 235
his office. In view of his substantial girth, it pro-
vokes a Smile to learn that his inscription antici-
pates that he would “ rise like a lily ’’ on a lake of
the unseen world. That he would float without any
effort might have been taken for granted.
Reminders of other phases in the history of
Egypt are provided by the stone circular vessel in
the twenty-ninth bay inscribed with the name of
Alexander the Great, the numerous reliefs and
edicts and stelae of the Ptolemaic period, not for-
getting the famous Rosetta Stone, and the countless
tablets which recall the Roman and Arab periods of
supremacy. Owing to the prevailing sombre colour
of the exhibits, and the massiveness of their pro-
portions, the explorer of the four galleries on the
ground floor of the museum will probably gain a
gloomy impression of Egyptian life. The straight
lines of which their sculptors were so enamoured,
and the heavy masses favoured by their architects
were, no doubt, eminently suited to the special fea-
tures of Egyptian landscape and the refulgent Sun-
shine of the country, but they are apt to be some-
what trying when arranged in a museum and re-
peated without end. Happily in the four upstair
galleries, the visitor has an opportunity to supple-
ment his experiences in the downstair rooms.
And yet it should be noted that, as was the case
in the apartments on the ground floor, the contents
of those galleries on the first floor are largely con-
236 The British Museum: Its Treasures
cerned with the death rather than the life of the
ancient Egyptians. In the First and Second Egyp-
tian Rooms the principal objects are some fifty
mummies, over a hundred coffin cases, and numer-
ous examples of the Canopic jars which were placed
in tombs, and countless figures of gods and other
fabled persons such as were usually bestowed in the
chamber of death. It has been shown earlier in this
chapter that the Egyptian could not conceive of a
future life separated from his mortal body, and all
the contents of these two rooms, and most of the
objects shown in the Third and Fourth Rooms, are
so many conclusive proofs of that fact.
Holding so strongly to the belief that life in the
hereafter had a close likeness to life as it was en-
joyed in the visible world, it followed as a natural
result that the Egyptians exerted themselves to the
utmost in preserving the bodies of the dead from
corruption. Hence their elaborate system of em-
balming. According to Herodotus, there were three
methods employed, the first representing a cost of
nearly two hundred and fifty pounds, and the sec-
ond an outlay of about ninety pounds. The third,
the use of which was restricted to the poor, was
quite inexpensive. The most expensive method in-
volved the extraction of the brain through nostrils,
the removal of the intestines, the filling of the body
with fragrant and astringent substances, and its
immersion in natron for seventy days. Then came
Egyptian Antiquities 237
the Swathing process, which is thus described by Dr.
Budge: “The linen bandages employed to swathe
the body were three or four inches in width; the
length varied according to circumstances; as many
as four hundred yards are said to have been em-
ployed for one mummy. They are generally coars-
est near the body, and finest outside. Some mum-
mies have an outer linen shroud dyed red, and over
that a network of porcelain bugles, amidst which
figures of sepulchral deities and other emblems are
introduced. On a few mummies of the earlier dy-
nasties and of the age of Ptolemies, portions of the
Book of the Dead (the ancient funeral liturgy of
the Egyptians) were written on the outer bandages
after they had been laid on. A very common, but
generally late, mode of ornamentation of the
mummy was the cartonnage, composed of twenty
to forty layers of linen tightly pressed and glued
together like pasteboard, and covered with a thin
layer of stucco. This was modelled in shape of the
figure of the dead, and appropriately painted, with
figures of deities and inscriptions.”
As will be seen from the examples in the First
and Second Rooms, the coffins were also elaborately
decorated with inscriptions and pictures, generally
highly coloured. In one series of wall-cases in the
Second Room are exhibited numerous examples of
the Canopic jars in which the intestines were placed,
while close at hand other wall-cases are filled with
238 The British Museum: Its Treasures
rows of the quaint little figures known as “answer-
ers,” because it was their duty to obey the orders
of the dead with whom they were buried. This
curious habit illustrates once more the material
nature of the Egyptian's heaven; he was under
the impression that in the hereafter he would be
liable to have physical tasks to perform, and in that
belief it was essential that he should have servants
to whom he could turn for substitutes. Some of
these little images belong respectively to the Sixth,
Twelfth, Eighteenth, and later dynasties. The old-
est coffin shown dates back to about 3600 B.C., while
the oldest mummies belong to the Twenty-second
dynasty, that is, about 900 B. c.
In the Third and Fourth Rooms the exhibits in-
clude sepulchral furniture; mummied animals; fig-
ures of the gods; articles of daily life whether for
work or adornment; vases in earthenware, porce-
lain, and alabaster; scarabs and amulets; and fur-
niture and jewelry. The formidable array of fig-
ures of the gods will give the visitor some concep-
tion of the crowded condition of the Egyptian the-
ogony and inspire him with gratitude for his own
more simple theology. Of more human interest are
the examples of the writing materials used by these
ancient people, and the samples of their tools and
weapons, and the specimens of their shoes and san-
dals. Is it possible that the latter include that
lady’s shoe, discovered in Egypt, the nails of which
Egyptian Antiquities 239
were so arranged as to leave indented in every
footprint of the fair wearer the alluring invitation
of, “ Follow Me '’?
On the testimony of one of the cases in the Fourth
Room it is demonstrable that Egyptian children,
notwithstanding the solemn statues amid which
they passed their lives, were not able to repress the
play-instinct of their kind, for here are wooden
dolls, and tiny animals, and balls, and model houses,
and other toys of a kind warranted to appeal to
children of any race or age. It is a relief to have
such assurances that the ancient Egyptians did not
concentrate all their thoughts and care on the king-
dom of Osiris and worry themselves all their days
as to whether they could save up enough money to
ensure their proper equipment for their death
chamber. And the toilet articles shown here too,
the combs and hairpins, the razors and mirrors are
welcome proofs that those long-dead sons and
daughters of the Nile were not proof against other
human weaknesses. It is a strange world the vis-
itor has been living in as he has explored among
these Egyptian antiquities, a world wholly foreign
to his own, with little to make him realize that he
has been gazing upon mementoes of his own kind,
but the toys of childhood and the tell-tale spoils of
the toilet-table should assure him that after all the
natives of old Egypt had passions akin to his own.
CHAPTER V
BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN ANTIQUITIES
“SINCE I last wrote you I have been employed
like the veriest mole in grubbing up the earth.”
Such was the opening sentence of a letter ad-
dressed by the writer to his mother in 1845. The
place from which it was dispatched on its long jour-
ney to England was a small village near the banks
of the Tigris and within a couple of miles of the
mounds of Nimroud. The writer was Austen Henry
Layard.
Some six years earlier Layard had obtained his
first sight of those vast and shapeless mounds; and
again two years later he passed that way on a jour-
ney to Constantinople. In the interval he had not
forgotten Nimroud; he had, too, frequently dis-
cussed with his friends the advisability of excava-
ting those mounds. That a French consul named
Botta had made a start on such work quickened his
own desire to try his fortune in searching after the
long-buried ruins of ancient Assyria. And now, in
1845, he was at last at work, “like the veriest
mole.”
Ten years prior to that date, however, another
young Englishman, Henry Creswicke Rawlinson by
240
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 241
name, a subaltern in the British army, was stationed
at Kirmanshah in the Kurdish mountains of Per-
sia, some two hundred and fifty miles distant as the
crow flies. Although but in his twenty-fifth year,
Rawlinson had mastered the Persian language and
was a keen student of Eastern history. At Kirman-
shah he was in the heart of a district rich in anti-
Quarian treasures, and some twenty miles distant
stood the famous rock of Behistun on which Darius
-the Great had caused to be inscribed in three lan-
guages — Persian, Elamite, and Babylonian —
some of the most notable events of his reign. This
was the Rosetta Stone of cuneiform discovery; it
held the key to that ancient form of writing affected
by the Babylonians and Assyrians, the secret of
which had been lost for some twenty-five centuries.
Many efforts to probe that secret had been made
before Rawlinson's time. The rock and its sculp-
tures and its triple inscription arrested the atten-
tion of a traveller in 1734; then of another some
sixty years later; and then of several other explor-
ers down to 1818, when one, more daring than the
rest, climbed half way up and sketched some of the
figures. For it should be remembered that the
story of Darius and his exploits was engraved in
the face of the Behistun rock some three hundred
feet above the level of the plain. The rock was
slippery, too, and bare, and almost precipitous.
But that did not daunt Rawlinson. By repeated
242 The British Museum: Its Treasures
efforts of his own, and finally by the assistance of
a wild Kurdish boy, he at last, after visits spread
over twelve years, secured copies of the three in-
Scriptions and a sketch of the principal sculpture.
From the results thus obtained, Rawlinson, with the
co-operation of other scholars, read the riddle of
the cuneiform writing and so gave to the world a
vast mass of knowledge relating to the ancient
kingdoms of Babylonia and Assyria. *
Between them, then, these two men, Rawlinson
and Layard, added a new volume to the history of
the World, the pages of which — in clay tablets and
massive sculpture — are open for all to read in the
Assyrian and Babylonian galleries of the British
Museum. It was indeed a happy chance which
brought two such men together: “Layard, the ex-
cavator, the effective task-master, the hard-working
and judicious gatherer together of materials; and
Rawlinson, the classical scholar, the linguist, the
diligent student of history, the man at once of wide
reading and keen insight, the cool, dispassionate
investigator and weigher of evidence.”
Other men have since supplemented their labours,
but theirs is the honour of pioneers, and to Layard
especially belongs the credit of having uncovered
the mounds of Nimroud (the ancient city of Calah),
and explored the remains of old Nineveh. Various
other sites have also been explored, such as the
Birs Nimroud mound, the traditional site of the
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 243
Tower of Babel, and the ruins of Babylon city, and
other mounds which mark the places where once
stood famous towns of the two kingdoms. From
all these enterprises a rich harvest has accrued; in
the six galleries on the ground floor and in the one
spacious apartment upstairs the British Museum
has an unrivalled collection of Babylonian and As-
Syrian antiquities representing a period of four and
a half millenniums and dating back to about 4000
B. C. The objects are exceedingly varied, ranging
from massive sculptures to tiny carved ivories,
from baked clay bricks to alabaster vases, from the
bronze decorations of palace-gates to ladies’ mir-
I’OI’S.
Although, compared with the ignorance of sev-
enty years ago, so much is now known concerning
the ancient kingdoms of Babylonia and Assyria,
the time has not even yet arrived when it is possi-
ble to present that knowledge in a definite form.
Some years must elapse before scholars can have
digested and co-ordinated the raw material pro-
vided by the countless inscriptions and the innu-
merable clay tablets and cylinders. What is prac-
tically agreed, however, is that of the two kingdoms
Babylonia came first in the order of time, and that
Assyria was settled by colonists from Babylonia.
Some centuries later Assyria became an independ-
ent kingdom, and waged war, not only on other
peoples, but also on the land of its origin, attaining
244 The British Museum: Its Treasures
at last the predominance of power in Western Asia.
In fact, the relations between England and America
furnish a rough parallel. The colonists of England
went forth and founded a new nation across the
Atlantic, taking with them the culture, religion, and
literature of their native land, and then, when
waxed in strength, broke away from the parent
stem. If America should ever conquer England and
rule that land from Washington, D. C., the situation
would be parallel with what took place in that re-
gion of the world now known as Mesopotamia.
And the illustration may be taken a step further.
Just as the natives of America are credited with
being a more pushful, alert race than the people
left behind in the “Old Home,” so the Assyrians
developed qualities of vigour, even of fierceness,
altogether alien from the more pastoral traits of the
Babylonians.
One other fact needs to be noted. So far as the
rulers of the two countries were concerned, the
kings of Assyria took the lead for the spectacular
nature of their doings. To the extent to which the
history of the two countries has been tabulated, it
is the monarchs of Assyria who are nearly always
in the foreground. The explorer of the British
Museum, then, must be prepared to find the north-
ern monarchs most constantly in evidence, espe-
cially Tiglath-Pileser I and III, Ashur-nasir-pal,
Shalmaneser II, Sargon, Sennacherib, Esarhaddon,
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 245
and Ashur-bani-pal. These are the names most fre-
Quently met with in connection with the monuments
in the Babylonian and Assyrian galleries, and it
may be well to bear in mind that their reigns cover
a period from 1100 B.C. to about 609 B. C. Of course,
as will be discovered, the clay tablets take the vis-
itor much further back into the ancient history of
the two kingdoms.
Seeing that the Babylonian and Assyrian antiq-
uities vary in size from colossal figures in stone to
tiny tablets of clay such as could be carried in a
vest pocket, it is obvious that a strictly chronolog-
ical arrangement is impossible, but for all that the
relics have been grouped in such a manner that the
visitor will not have any difficulty in fitting them
into a rough scheme of the history of the two king-
doms. Here and there he may have to cast his
thoughts forward and backward, but in the main
he will have before him at a given time relics suf-
ficiently related as to form a section in themselves.
Perhaps, then, his best plan will be to start in
the Assyrian Transept, the eastern side of which is
given up to antiquities from the palace of Sargon
at Khorsabad, while the objects in the western sec-
tion consist mainly of monuments from Nimroud.
Than the colossal figures which are shown on the
eastern side of the Transept it would be impossible
to find any sculptures more typically Assyrian.
The “Three Fates ?’ of the Parthenon are not more
246 The British Museum: Its Treasures
characteristically Greek, the colossal head of
Thothmes III is not more emphatically Egyptian,
than these winged and human-headed bulls with
their mythological attendants are assuredly As-
Syrian in their general effect and their smallest
details. They stand apart from the sculpture art
of any other land; in every line one may see the
stamp and individuality of the Assyrian artist. As
has been stated, this pair of gigantic figures was
discovered at Khorsabad, not far from Nineveh,
and had stood originally on either side of an en-
trance to a chamber of King Sargon’s palace. The
name and titles of that monarch, together with a
brief narrative of his buildings and his military
expeditions and conquests are inscribed under the
bodies of the bulls in cuneiform writing, and con-
sequently these figures belong to a period more than
seven centuries before Christ. More than two thou-
sand six hundred years, then, have elapsed since
they were shaped into their present form, but not-
withstanding their venerable age the figures have
lost surprisingly little of their original sharp-cut
outlines, for their elaborate beards, the feathery
scales of the bull, the details of the attendant's
tunic, richly embroidered at the edges, are still won-
derfully crisp.
So ample and ornate are the beards of the attend-
ant and the man-like head of the bull, and these are
so characteristic of Assyrian male toilets, that it
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 247
will be instructive to recall Layard’s remarks on
the attention paid by the Assyrians to the adorning
of their persons. Besides wearing numerous or-
naments, “they most carefully and elaborately
platted their hair and beards. The hair was parted
over the forehead, and fell from behind the ears on
the shoulders, in a large bunch of ringlets. The
beard was allowed to grow to its full length; and
descending low on the breast, was divided into two
or three rows of curls. The mustache was also
carefully trimmed, and curled at the ends. The
hair, as well as the beard, appears to have been
dyed, as is still the custom in Persia; but it has
been doubted whether the hair, represented in the
sculptures, was natural or artificial. The Egyp-
tians were accustomed to wear large wigs, elab-
orately platted and adorned; and even false beards
were not unknown. The Persians, also, at a later
period, adopted this artificial coiffure; but we have
no evidence of its having been in use in Assyria.
On the contrary, according to Herodotus, the Baby-
lonians wore their hair long. The great regularity
of the curls in the sculptures would certainly lead
to the impression that part of the hair, at least, was
false; but we can scarcely suppose that the war-
riors, as well as the king, and all the principal of
ficers, wore false beards; the sculptured beards
being equally elaborate and studied in the arrange-
ment. The treatment, however, of the hair in the
248. The British Museum: Its Treasures
bas-reliefs may be purely conventional.” On the
other hand some of the authorities insist that by
the fulness or otherwise of the beard it is possible
to distinguish between Assyrians and Babylonians,
the latter being to the last less addicted to that
appendage than the former. It is agreed that the
use of cosmetics was widely spread, and that many
of the stone vessels which have been found by ex-
cavating may have been used for hair-oil.
Two other problems are suggested by the figure
depicted by the side of each of the man-headed bulls.
It will be observed that each of these figures is, the
one with his left hand and the other with his right
hand, apparently offering to the bull what looks like
a fir-cone, and that the hand not so employed holds
a small square basket. These objects will be seen
frequently in the sculptures. On the older reliefs
the basket looks as though it were made of metal;
on the more recent it has the appearance of wicker-
work. And sometimes it is elaborately adorned,
now with a kind of honeysuckle design, at other
times with corner decorations in the form of eagles.
What do these things mean — the fir-cone and the
basket? No final answer has yet been given. As
the fir-cone is frequently depicted in the hands of
priests, it must have been a sacred emblem, and a
Trench writer has pointed out the connection be-
tween the cone of the cypress and the worship of
Venus in the religious systems of the East. Lay-
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 249
ard, however, hesitated to identify the object held
by the figures of the Assyrian monuments with the
fruit of the cypress, or to assign any emblematical
meaning to its shape. He adds, however, that it
has been suggested that, from its inflammable na-
ture, the fir-cone being an apt emblem of fire, whilst
the square vessel held the holy water, the two were
introduced into sculptures as typical of the sacred
elements.
Each of the man-headed bulls in the Transept has
an anatomical peculiarity which will hardly escape
the visitor’s notice. When he gazes at them almost
full-face, he will see that each animal has the usual
Quota of four legs; but if he assumes a standpoint
which will enable him to comprehend the side and
front views in one glance he will observe that in
reality each animal has five legs! Instead of two
front legs, there are three; the object of this out-
rage on nature’s plan being a desire to make the
animal look symmetrical when seen from the side.
Had the artist confined himself to the two sturdy
front legs, which are depicted without any bend, a
side view which hid one of those legs would have
given the impression of one front and two hind
legs. The curious device by which that impres-
sion is corrected is often repeated in Assyrian
reliefs. -
On the other side of the Transept, for example,
it is repeated in the pair of colossal man-headed and
250 The British Museum: Its Treasures
winged lions which were found by Layard at Nim-
roud guarding an entrance to the palace of Ashur-
nasir-pal. He was wont, he has told us, to contem-
plate for hours these mysterious emblems, and muse
over their intent and history. “What more noble
forms could have ushered the people into the temple
of their gods? What more sublime images could
have been borrowed from nature, by men who
sought, unaided by the light of revealed religion,
to embody their conception of the wisdom, power,
and ubiquity of a Supreme Being? They could find
no better type of intellect and knowledge than the
head of the man; of strength, than the body of the
lion; of rapidity of motion, than the wings of the
bird. These winged human-headed lions were not
idle creatures, the offspring of mere fancy; their
meaning was written upon them. They had awed
and instructed races which flourished three thou-
sand years ago. Through the portals which they
guarded, kings, priests, and warriors, had borne
sacrifice to their altars, long before the wisdom of
the East had penetrated to Greece, and furnished
its mythology with symbols long recognized by the
Assyrian votaries. They may have been buried,
and their existence may have been unknown, before
the foundation of the Eternal City. For twenty-five
centuries they had been hidden from the eye of man,
and now they stood forth once more in their ancient
majesty! ” That this was not the interested emo-
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Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 251
tionalism of the discoverer is illustrated by the rec-
ord which has been left by one who paid a visit to
the scenes of excavation in Assyria while the work
was in progress. “It was of course,” he wrote,
“with no little excitement that I suddenly found
myself in the magnificent abode of the old Assyrian
kings; where, moreover, it needed not the slightest
effort of imagination to conjure up visions of their
long-departed power and greatness. The walls
themselves were scrowded with phantoms of the
past; in the words of Byron, ‘Three thousand years
their cloudy wings expand; ' unfolding to view a
vivid representation of those who conquered and
possessed so large a portion of the earth we now
inhabit. There they were in the Oriental pomp of
richly embroidered robes, and quaintly-artificial
coiffure. There also were portrayed their deeds in
peace and war, their audiences, battles, sieges, lion-
hunts, etc. My mind was overpowered by the con-
templation of so many strange objects; and some
of them, the portly forms of kings and vizirs, were
so life-like, and carved in such fine relief, that they
might almost be imagined to be stepping from the
walls to question the rash intruder on their privacy.
Then, mingled with them were other monstrous
shapes — the old Assyrian deities, with human bod-
ies, long drooping wings, and the heads and beaks
of eagles; or, still faithfully guarding the portals
of the deserted halls, the colossal forms of winged
252 The British Museum: Its Treasures
lions and bulls, with gigantic human faces. All
these figures, the idols of a religion long since dead
and buried like themselves, seemed actually in the
twilight to be raising their desecrated heads from
the sleep of centuries: certainly the feeling of awe
which they inspired me with, must have been some-
thing akin to that experienced by their heathen
votaries of old.”
By a small doorway in the northwestern corner
of the Transept the visitor gains access to the Nim-
roud Gallery, which in turn leads into the Nimroud
Central Saloon, the principal contents of both hav-
ing been rescued from the mound of Nimroud or
Calah. Round the walls of the first of these two
rooms is arranged a series of sculptures in low re-
lief, each section being crowded with incident or
fascinating detail. First in order come the reliefs
from the ruins of the palace of Ashur-nasir-pal,
king of Assyria from 885 to 860 B. C. As with the
other sculptures, it is noteworthy that in almost
every case the figures depicted in these reliefs are
remarkable for their sturdy physique. Whether
the Assyrians of the eighth century before Christ
were above the average human stature is difficult
to decide in the absence of standards of comparison,
but if the evidence of these sculptures is to be relied
upon it is manifest that they were men of great
physical strength and muscular build. Most of the
figures are so robed that at least one leg is bare to
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 253
the knee, and it will be observed that those legs are
well proportioned and notable for their calf devel-
opment. .
Ashur-nasir-pal was evidently a man of heavy
physique, apparently tall, and with strong arms.
He is seen in duplicate in the second panel of the
Nimroud Gallery, and is made of equal stature to
the mythological being in attendance on either side.
The scene is supposed to represent the king in the
act of worshipping the god Ashur, who is depicted
in a winged circle hovering over the sacred tree, a
design which looks something like a primitive fly-
ing-machine. In reality, of course, the winged disc
is symbolical of the sun, for Ashur was originally
a solar deity. Who the winged attendants are sup-
posed to represent is unknown; it will be seen, how-
ever, that each carries the small basket referred to
above, and that each is thrusting forward with his
other hand that unfailing fir-cone. The figure of
Ashur-nasir-pal, taken in conjunction with the
statue of the king in the same gallery, is instructive
for the light it throws on the costume affected by
the rulers of Assyria. By comparing these two fig-
ures, and then extending the collation by an exam-
ination of other sculptures elsewhere, it will be
found that the variations are few even over a long
period, and that the essential garments differ but
little. What kind of linen or silk underwear the
kings of Assyria may have favoured must be a mat-
254 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ter of speculation, but that they wore two outer
robes is obvious. The first was a long flowing gar-
ment, which reached to his ankles, the edges of
which were richly decorated, while often bands of
embroidery were worked across the portion below
the waist. Over this was another robe nearly as
long, but with an open front. This too was elab-
orately ornamented at the edges and sometimes
over the entire surface; and over both garments
at the waist was tied a girdle which was generally
finished off with heavy tassels. The statue of
Ashur-nasir-pal in the Nimroud Gallery, which is
of great interest as being the only example of a
statue in the round belonging to its particular
period, will mislead the visitor as to the royal foot-
wear if he is not careful to make comparisons with
other carvings. Judging from the bare toes of the
king protruding from under the hem of his long
robe, it might be concluded that the rulers of As-
syria were accustomed to go about barefoot. If,
however, other figures are studied it will be seen
that the usual regal footwear consisted of sandals
which had “uppers ” high enough to cover the heel
but which sloped down to a junction with the sole
by the side of the little toe. This type of sandal
is depicted on the feet of the king's mythological
attendants and is shown also on the feet of his prin-
cipal officers, while other forms worn by the eu-
nuchs, warriors, and other figures vary from a
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 255
simple leather covering for the heel to what has all
the appearance of a high-top boot.
On no account should the explorer of these gal-
leries omit a careful examination of the entire series
of sculptures round the walls. The set beginning in
the western side of the Nimroud Gallery depicts
Ashur-nasir-pal engaged in hunting both the bull
and the lion, gives a vivid picture of the siege of
a city, shows a crowd of fugitives swimming a river
on inflated skins, and, among other incidents, the
capture of prisoners and spoil, the forcing of a
river passage, the capitulation of a city, the count-
ing of the slain, the king and his army passing
through mountains, and the enemy in full flight be-
fore the pursuit of Assyrians in chariots. In the
panels 24 to 26 Ashur-nasir-pal is shown perform-
ing some religious rites, a bow in his left hand and
arrows in his right, while behind him once more is
a winged attendant with the inevitable basket and
fir-cone. This relief of the king illustrates the rich
bracelets he was accustomed to wear on his wrists,
an ornament repeated on the wrists of his attendant.
Other panels are instructive for the light they throw
on Assyrian religious beliefs, for, apart from the
strange fish and eagle-headed deities, and represen-
tations of ceremonies in connection with the worship
of the sacred tree, such panels as 28 and 29, depict-
ing a conflict between the god Marduk and an evil
demon, give spirited form to Assyrian mythology.
256 The British Museum: Its Treasures
The particular conflict portrayed by this relief is
of special interest in view of the fact that it plays
a prominent part in those legends of the Creation
which lend such value to so many of the clay
tablets.
Apart from the bas-reliefs illustrating the wars
of Shalmaneser II and his triumphs, and other
sculptures relating to the conquests of Tiglath-
Pileser III, perhaps the chief object of interest in
the Nimroud Central Saloon is the famous Black
Obelisk erected by Shalmaneser II in the central
palace of Nimroud. The day of its discovery was
an exciting one for Layard. He was under the im-
pression that his workmen were getting near to
some important “finds,” but business in Mosul
called him away from the Nimroud mound. Hardly
had he mounted his horse and started on his journey
when a corner of black marble attracted the atten-
tion of the superintendent and an Arab was sent
after Layard at once. On his return he found the
obelisk completely exposed to view. “I descended
eagerly into the trench, and was immediately struck
by the singular appearance, and evident antiquity,
of the remarkable monument before me. We raised
it from its recumbent position, and, with the aid of
ropes, speedily dragged it out of the ruins. Al-
though its shape was that of an obelisk, yet it was
flat at the top and cut into three gradines. It was
sculptured on the four sides; there were in all
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 257
twenty small bas-reliefs, and above, below, and be-
tween them was carved an inscription two hundred
and ten lines in length. The whole was in the best
preservation; scarcely a character of the inscription
was wanting; and the figures were as sharp and
well defined as if they had been carved but a few
days before. The king is twice represented, fol-
lowed by his attendants; a prisoner is at his feet,
and his vizir and eunuchs are introducing men lead-
ing various animals, and carrying vases and other
objects of tribute on their shoulders, or in their
hands. The animals are the elephant, the rhinoce-
ros, the Bactrian or two-humped camel, the wild
bull, the lion, a stag, and various kinds of monkeys.
Amongst the objects carried by the tribute-bearers,
may perhaps be distinguished the tusks of the ele-
phant, shawls, and some bundles of precious wood.”
Since that memorable day the inscription on the obe-
lisk has been deciphered and translated, with the
result of showing that the scenes and text are de-
voted to a record of the military expeditions and
victories of Shalmaneser II during the thirty years
of his reign, and that the reliefs, as Layard thought,
depict the bringing of tribute to the conquering
king. Two of the kings introduced link this ancient
stone with Biblical history, one being Jehu, that
king of Israel who won his way to the throne by the
murder of Ahab; the other Hazael, the king of
Syria, whose army, including nearly seven hundred
258 The British Museum: Its Treasures
horses and over a thousand chariots, became the
booty of Shalmaneser.
Before passing into another gallery the visitor
should examine the table-cases which are arranged
down the centre of the Nimroud Gallery. They con-
tain many interesting small objects recovered from
the ruins of Nimroud, including iron locks and spear-
heads, reaping-hooks and axe-heads; while the ob-
jects in bronze embrace various kinds of bells, mir-
rors, and numerous bowls, the insides of which are
decorated with engraved or relief designs of ani-
mals. The latter are said to be the work of Phoeni-
cian artists and are thought to be not older than
about 700 B. C. Two of the other cases are given
up to ivory carvings, which, apart from their ad-
mirable workmanship, are of great interest for the
light they throw on Assyrian methods of toilette, etc.
They also reveal the influence of Egyptian art.
Low relief sculptures depicting incidents in the
reigns of three kings are the principal objects dis-
played in the Assyrian Saloon, the entrance to which
is off the Nimroud Gallery. If he wishes to pre-
serve the chronological order the visitor should first
seek out the reliefs connected with Tiglath-Pile-
ser III, whose reign extended from 745 to 727 B. C.
These include a spirited representation of an as-
sault by the king on an enemy's city, with the cap-
ture of the city gods, and a scene in which the mon-
arch is shown receiving his surrendered foes. Next
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 259
in order come twelve slabs depicting the siege, at-
tack, and capture of the city of Lachish by Sennach-
erib, king of Assyria from 704 to 681 B. C. These
Sculptures are crowded with figures and incident.
Bowmen appear in flocks, with serried ranks of
Spearmen in front, and here and there are groups
of slingers in the act of aiming their missiles at the
city’s defenders, while battering-rams are being
hurled against the walls. Of course the perspective
of these reliefs is entirely ludicrous; soldiers are
briskly ascending impossible slopes in defiance of
the law of gravitation, the towers of the city walls
are less in height than the stature of the assaulting
warriors, and altogether the besieged and the be-
siegers are jumbled and mixed together in a man-
ner which would have made it inconceivable for the
first to defend or the second to attack. Yet the in-
terest of these stone pictures is undeniable. They
give the impression of living men in action, while
the wealth of detail is informing in a hundred mat-
ters of Assyrian warfare. Practically the climax
of the series is that panel in which Sennacherib is
shown upon his throne outside the city walls receiv-
ing tribute from his defeated enemies, and that there
may be no mistake as to the purport of the picture
a legend inscribed at the top reads: “Sennacherib,
king of hosts, king of Assyria, sat upon his throne
of state, and the spoil of the city of Lachish passed
before him.” Here again the figures of the Assyr-
260 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ians convey the impression of muscular, well-built
IſleIl. -
But the chief interest of the Assyrian Saloon cen-
tres in the splendid sculptured panels which depict
various scenes in the hunting adventures of Ashur-
bani-pal, king of Assyria from 668 to 626 B. C. Pic-
torially these are the most fascinating of all the
Assyrian sculptures; artistically they may be
grouped with the marbles of the Parthenon, for they
represent the high-water mark of Assyrian achieve-
ment; and historically they are of absorbing inter-
est for their connection with the career of the ruler
who was the prototype of the Greek Sardanapalus
and is familiar to the student of English literature
through Byron’s tragedy. For his facts relating to
the career of Ashur-bani-pal, otherwise Sardana-
palus, the poet relied upon the highly-coloured state-
ments of Diodorus Siculus, not anticipating that
modern research was to discredit the assertions of
that Greek historian. His picture of Ashur-bani-pal
has no relief; in his judgment that Assyrian mon-
arch was nothing but a degraded voluptuary. He
exceeded, Diodorus affirmed, all his predecessors in
sloth and luxury; “ for besides that he was seen of
none out of his family, he led a most effeminate life:
for wallowing in pleasure and wanton dalliances, he
clothed himself in woman’s attire, and spun fine
wool and purple among the throngs of his whores
and concubines.” This frank historian goes on to
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 261
charge Ashur-bani-pal with painting his face like a
woman, with simulating a woman’s voice, etc. And
all this Byron took for gospel. In his excuse it
might be argued that when he wrote Assyriology
was unborn and Nineveh still buried in its mound.
Ashur-bani-pal probably did indulge his flesh
when the occasion warranted, but that he was wholly
a wanton can no longer be believed in view of what
the excavations at Nineveh have brought to light.
He has been aptly described as the grand monarque
of Assyria, and there are proofs beyond number
that if he was distinguished for cruelty and sensu-
ality, he was also not the less remarkable for his
energy in war and his patronage of literature and
the arts. No ruler of Assyria raised the power of
that kingdom to the height it attained under his
Sway.
Had Ashur-bani-pal left no other record of his
reign than the slabs in the Assyrian Saloon he would
have deserved well of posterity. They are the most
moving picture we possess of many phases of an-
cient Assyrian life, and their value is not lessened
because the artist who carved them may have ideal-
ized his principal subject. Of course the king is
always successful in his hunting expeditions, and his
varied poses show him in a heroic light. Now he is
seen thrusting a knife into the throat of a lion as
it springs up at the back of his chariot, anon the
arrows from his bow are hurtling in all directions
262 The British Museum: Its Treasures
and finding a target in the bodies of lions wherever
they fly, or elsewhere he is meeting his prey on the
level ground and holding his throat with one hand
while he deals him a fatal sword-thrust with the
other. No doubt these are highly-coloured episodes,
and somewhat reminiscent of other and more mod-
ern mighty hunters who do not shrink from the
camera's recording eye at the climax of their ex-
ploits; but with all deductions the sculptures are
invaluable for their record of the pursuit of big
game in ancient Assyria. Particularly enjoyable
are the pictures which show the lion being released
from a kind of cage, or the spirited scene depicting
the hunting of wild asses, or that other panel where
attendants are driving deer into a widely extended
net. In all these panels the craft of the artist
reaches a high level. His drawing is firm and sure,
there is no mistaking what animals are meant, and
every figure, whether of beast or man, is instinct
with life. Everywhere the details are adroitly
carved and rich in information; the kinds of dress,
the varieties of weapons, the different forms of
shields, the divers types of sandals, the mules with
their platted tails, the nets and stakes borne by the
servants — all these and countless other particulars
are portrayed in a consummate manner.
One of the most attractive panels is that — num-
ber 118 — in which Ashur-bani-pal is shown after
the hunt pouring out a libation over the dead bodies
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Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 263
of his prey. The inscription reads: “I, Ashur-bani-
pal, king of hosts, king of Assyria, whom Ashur and
Bélit have endowed with might, slew four lions.
The powerful bow of Ishtar, the lady of battle, over
them I held, and I poured out a libation over them.”
That sums up the scene so far as the king is con-
cerned, though of course it makes no reference to his
beautifully embroidered robe, or his richly-deco-
rated tiara, and naturally there is no allusion to
the other details of the picture. The four lions at
the king’s feet are admirably carved, while no less
skill has been bestowed on the altar before which the
libation is taking place, and on the group of singers
to the left and the little band of attendants on the
right.
In the same saloon, but round the walls of the
lower compartment, are sculptures of other scenes
in the long reign of this remarkable monarch. They
preserve pictures of his camp, a busy scene of the
preparation of food and the bringing in of spoil;
episodes of Ashur-bani-pal’s campaign against his
twin brother, the revolting king of Babylon; and a
view of the king in his garden where he is disclosed
drinking wine with his queen. The latter panel is
one of the very few in which a woman is introduced
in the Assyrian sculptures. Had Ashur-bani-pal
been altogether the libertine of Diodorus is it not
at least probable that he would have perpetuated
in stone many of the sirens who held him captive?
264. The British Museum: Its Treasures
Not only are these Nineveh reliefs barren of such
figures, but the visitor will probably note how
rarely Women are portrayed in the Assyrian monu-
ments.
While exploring the lower floor of the Assyrian
Saloon special attention should be given to the large
case at the end of the apartment containing thirteen
bronze bands made for the gates of a palace of
Shalmaneser II. The metal is embossed with
scenes of the king’s battles and victories, the sub-
jects including representations of the siege of a city
of Ararat, an expedition to the land of Nairi, the
passage of the Assyrian army over the Euphrates,
an interior of an Assyrian camp, and various other:
warlike themes. Although the nature backgrounds
are quaintly and sometimes crudely suggested, the
figures of the men are lifelike and the horses and
chariots are depicted with much spirit. One band,
that which portrays an attack upon a city, affords
another illustration of the hazy notions of perspec-
tive entertained by the Assyrian artists, for the at-
tacking bowmen are again twice the height of the
walls of the city against which they are directing
their arrows, while the figures of the defenders are
amusingly diminutive.
Turning now to the Nineveh Gallery the visitor
will find the walls of that room lined with reliefs
excavated by Layard from the site of ancient Nine-
veh and can hardly fail to observe that these sculp-
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 265
tures still bear traces of the fire to which they were
subjected when that city was destroyed by the Baby-
lonians and Medes about 609 B. C. Once more the
warlike Ashur-bani-pal is greatly in evidence, for
five of the panels are taken up with his conquest of
Elam and the slaying of its king, Te-umman. These
sculptures are notable for their wealth of detail and
set forth all the chief incidents of the campaign to
the beheading of the Elamite king and the carrying
of his head to Assyria. Other slabs portray the tor-
turing of prisoners, the cooking of food in the
Assyrian camp, a battle on marshy land, a galley
with a ram and two banks of oarsmen, and the re-
ception of ambassadors.
Interesting as these monuments are, however,
they cannot compare with the contents of the mine
table-cases ranged down the centre of the gallery.
These are filled with clay tablets, representative of
the more than twenty thousand such relics which
have been acquired by the museum during the past
half century. They came from the royal library
at Nineveh, which was founded by Sargon but
largely augmented by his great-grandson, Ashur-
bani-pal. That supposedly licentious and aban-
doned monarch was evidently a great lover of learn-
ing, and during his reign and by his special com-
mand many thousands of clay volumes were added
to the shelves of the royal library. Clay, it must
be remembered, was to the Assyrians what papyrus
266 The British Museum: Its Treasures
was to the Egyptians and paper is to the modern
world. It was practically the only material on
which they wrote the incidents of history and the
records of such learning as they had attained. The
cases in the gallery will show that the tablets varied
considerably in size, some being large enough to con-
tain several columns of writing, while others meas-
ured only an inch or two. The clay was of a reddish
colour, and when the inscription had been made on
its smoothed surface it was baked in an oven and
the writing thus made permanent. Such were the
books and letters of the Assyrians; and here in
these cases are countless examples which have with-
stood all the vicissitudes of more than two thousand
six hundred years. -
Ashur-bani-pal was proud of his library; no plu-
tocratic bibliophile of the present day takes greater
delight in his richly-bound paper treasures than did
the Assyrian king in his clay volumes. And he had
his book-plate too. Nearly every tablet of any im-
portance bore this inscription: “The palace of
Ashur-bani-pal, king of hosts, king of Assyria, who
putteth his trust in the gods Ashur and Bělit, on
whom Nabû and Tashmetu have bestowed ears
which hear and eyes which see. I have inscribed
upon tablets the noble products of the work of the
scribe, which none of the kings who have gone
before me had learned, together with the wisdom of
Nabā in so far as it existeth. I have arranged them
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 267
in classes, I have revised them and I have placed
them in my palace, that I, even I, the ruler who
knoweth the light of Ashur the king of the gods,
may read them. Whosoever shall carry off this tab-
let, or shall inscribe his name upon it with mine own,
may Ashur and Bélit overthrow him in wrath and
anger, and may they destroy his name and posterity
in the land.”
Ashur and Bélit seem to have been powerless to
protect their worshipper’s books. For here they
are, thousands of miles from their home, and the
posterity of Layard not a penny the worse. But if
the king could have known how his clay volumes
were destined to add to the knowledge of the world
he would probably have qualified his denunciations
against whoever should remove them from his pal-
ace. That the authorities of the British Museum are
undisturbed by their possession of these literary
relics is obvious from the unblushing frankness in
which they have translated their royal owner’s male-
dictions.
Of course the ordinary visitor must not expect to
read these tablets for himself. Not that many of
them are not fully exposed to his view; but that it
needs the lore of the Assyriologist to translate the
curious cuneiform characters into words which he
can understand. He must, then, take the contents on
trust as he bends over these ancient clay volumes
and finds himself face to face with, among other rec-
268 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ords, the Assyrian version of the creation and the
deluge. The most competent Biblical scholars admit
that the points of likeness between the narratives
of the creation as given in Genesis and the version
inscribed on these tablets are such that, in view of
the greater antiquity of the Assyrian tablets, it
would be idle to deny that the Hebrew version is de-
pendent on that which has been rescued from the
library of Ashur-bani-pal. That, surely, is sufficient
to invest these reddish-clay tablets with absorbing
interest, for their surfaces reveal the crude material
which the Hebrew writer was to fashion into a
legend that has moulded the thoughts of countless
millions of the human race. In the same case,
marked A, as that in which the tablets bearing the
creation legend are displayed may also be seen other
tablets inscribed with the Assyrian version of the
deluge. The Noah of that story is one named Sit-
napishtim, a dweller by the Euphrates who also
built his ark, and took into its shelter his wife and
family and the beasts of the field, and survived the
floods, and sent out a dove and a swallow and a
raven when the waters subsided.
Other cases, from B to I, are stored with tablets
of various kinds. There are primers of grammar
and dictionaries, historical and moral works, official
reports of astronomers, contracts for the sale of
slaves and houses and lands, and countless letters
addressed to the king and other members of the
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
STELE WITH CHARTER OF NEBUCHADNEZZAR
I.
:
:
---

Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities 269
royal family. Notwithstanding the bulk of their
writing material and the labour it must have been
to fill its surface with these tricky characters, the
Assyrian scribes were past masters in the art of
circumlocution. Here, for example, is a typical as-
tronomical report: “To the king my lord, thy serv-
ant Ishtar-nadin-apli the chief of the astronomers of
Arbela. Greeting to the king my lord. May Nabû
and Marduk and Istar of Arbela be propitious unto
the king my lord. We kept watch on the twenty-
ninth day. The sky was cloudy and we did not see
the moon.” Another scribe who simply wished to
remind the king that he had not answered his letter,
wrote forty-two words as an introduction to his real
epistle of eleven words.
There are prayers here as well as reports about
the moon and contracts for the sale of slaves —
prayers which would have made Diodorus arch his
eyebrows. For one supplication is that of Ashur-
bani-pal, and it betrays a spirit wholly at odds with
the character sketch of Diodorus. Besides, if
Ashur-bani-pal had been the depraved sensualist of
Diodorus surely he would have ground into powder
the tablet of moral precepts which warned kings
against the evils that come in the train of misgov-
ernment and injustice. *
Not all the literary or historical records of an-
cient Assyria are shown in the cases of the Nineveh
Gallery; the succession is continued at great length
270 The British Museum: Its Treasures
in the Babylonian and Assyrian Room on the upper
floor of the museum. This is the last of the apart-
ments devoted to the antiquities of the two king-
doms, and is reserved for the smaller relics and a
large selection of Babylonian inscribed bricks,
boundary-stones, memorial-tablets, stone and ala-
baster vases, cylinder-seals, engraved stones, finger-
rings, etc. The boundary-stones are well repre-
sented by the stele of Nebuchadnezzar I, king of
Babylon about 1120 B.C., which is engraved with a
charter and sculptured with divine emblems. The
clay cylinders are numerous and vary greatly in the
number of their sides; that of Sennacherib, king of
Assyria, has six sides on which are inscribed ac-
counts of eight campaigns of the king, including the
siege of Jerusalem in the reign of Hezekiah, king of
Judah. The record says: “The fear of the majesty
of my sovereignty overwhelmed Hezekiah, and the
Urbi and his trusty warriors, whom he had brought
into his royal city of Jerusalem to protect it, de-
serted. And he dispatched after me his messenger
to my royal city of Nineveh to pay tribute and to
make submission with thirty talents of gold, eight
hundred talents of silver, precious stones, eye-paint,
ivory couches and thrones, hides and tusks, precious
woods, and divers objects, a heavy treasure, to-
gether with his daughters, and the women of his
palace, and male and female musicians.” How
startlingly this accords with the verse in Isaiah:
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
BAKED CLAY CYLINDER OF SENNACHERIB.
-
--
-
-
º
º

Babylonian and ASSyrian Antiquities 271
“Thus Saith the king of Assyria: Make an agree-
ment with me by a present, and come out to me.”
And also with the lines in the second book of Kings:
“And Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of
Assyria to Lachish, saying: I have offended; return
from me; that which thou puttest on me will I
bear.” These things account for the vigour with
which the Hebrew prophets were wont to denounce
Nineveh, and illustrate to how remarkable a degree
the antiquities of Babylonia and Assyria augment
our knowledge of the ancient world.
CHAPTER VI
PREHISTORIC MAN
IN the course of his wanderings through the
King's Library, the visitor to the British Museum,
it will be remembered, was able to gaze upon many
printed books dating back considerably more than
four hundred years. Then his explorations of the
Manuscript Saloon brought him face to face with
ancient vellums which were written more than ten
centuries ago. Even those venerable documents,
however, must have lost some of their antique inter-
est when he turned to the show-cases containing
fragments of papyri with Greek handwriting of the
third century before the Christian era.
But those survivals of a dim and distant past
became in their turn almost contemporaneous when
contrasted with Greek sculptures belonging to the
sixth century B. C., which, in the visitor’s backward
glance, must in succession have seemed quite mod-
ern in comparison with those Egyptian relics which
are attributed to a period at least four thousand
years before the birth of Christ. Having reached
such a far-off age, he probably came to the conclu-
sion that his backward journey was at an end, espe-
cially if he recalled the fact that on the first page
272
Prehistoric Man 273
of his Bible by the side of the first chapter of Gene-
sis the creation of the world is definitely stated to
have taken place four thousand and four years be-
fore the birth of Christ.
Alas for the precise chronology of the learned
Archbishop Ussher! A passion for exactness,
such as he possessed, is a laudable trait, but when
that careful Irish prelate elaborated his system of
Biblical chronology which clings like a limpet to all
editions of the Authorized Version, he unconsciously
erected for his own memory an unenviable monu-
ment. While his undoubted learning is forgotten
save by students, his “4004 B. C.” survives on mil-
lions of printed pages as a warning against the dan-
ger of applying arithmetic to imagination.
Doubtless Archbishop Ussher is not to be blamed
for his inability to forecast the restless curiosity of
modern ages. In the seventeenth century man had
not developed that questioning spirit which was to
characterize him in the nineteenth; his respect for
ecclesiastical authority, his acceptance of theological
dictum, his faith in things as they were, remained
undisturbed. Not yet had he arrived at that inquir-
ing state of mind which refuses to be satisfied even
when documentary and monumental evidences of
history have been exhausted. That was to come at
a later age, and consequently when “4004 B. C.” was
inscribed by the side of the first chapter of Genesis
the seventeenth-century Englishman accepted the
274 The British Museum: Its Treasures
date as the last word of exact learning and bothered
himself no more about the matter.
Nor was he agitated by the discovery made in
London a little more than thirty years after Dr.
Ussher’s death. During some excavations made in
Gray’s Inn Lane about 1690 the workmen brought
to light an elephant’s tooth and a strange, pear-
shaped object of flint, which the learned of those
days described as a British weapon. This pointed
stone, which was about two inches broad at its base
and some three and a half inches long, passed into
the collection of Sir Hans Sloane, and so became
one of the earliest treasures of the British Museum.
But for many a year its real nature was unsus-
pected. In fact a century and a half passed away
before its likeness to other shaped flints was recog-
nized. To-day it is held in honour as the first of
its kind of which there is any record either in Eng-
land or any other country.
Whoever wishes to gaze upon that historic flint
will be able to gratify his desire by glancing over
the contents of case 105 in the Central Saloon of
the British Museum. That gallery is situated on
the first floor at the head of the main staircase, and
is divided into three sections, the division to the left
being reserved for pre-historic antiquities, the cen-
tral section for British and Romano-British antiq-
uities, and the compartment to the right for antiqui-
ties from France. It is in the first of these divisions,
H 28 29
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BRITISH MUSEUM.
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. Principal Staircase
. Central Saloon
. Anglo-Saxon Room
. Waddesdon Bequest Room
. Mediaeval Boolm
. Asiatic Saloon
. English Ceramic Ante-
Roon
8. Glass and Ceramic Gallery
9. Studies
10. Prints and Drawings
Gallery
11. Prints and Drawings
Students' Room
12 to 16. Ethnographical Gallery
17. North East Landing
18. North East Staircase
19. American Room
20 to 24, North Gallery
25. North West Landing
26. North West Staircase
27. Studies
28. First Egyptian Room
29. Second Egyptian Room
30. Third Egyptian Room
31, Fourth Egyptian Room
32. Babylonian & Assyrian Rn.
33. Studies & Students' Room
34. First Vase Roon
35. Second Vase Room
36. Third Vase Room
87. Fourth Vase Room
88, Bronze Room
39. Italic Room, etc.
40. Coin and Medal Room
41. Corridor
42. Studies [and Gems
43. Room of Gold Ornaments
44. Students' Room
45. Studies
46. Room of Terra-cottas
:
9

Prehistoric Man 275
however, that the oldest remains are exhibited, and
particularly in the Wall show-cases arranged around
the gallery of the room. The access to this gallery
is by a narrow spiral staircase on the left, at the
foot of which there hangs on the wall a map of Eng-
land thickly dotted with black pins. This is not a
war-map, as might be imagined by the careless ob-
server, but is intended to show the situations of the
cave-dwellings of prehistoric man. Several of the
black pins, it will be noticed, are dotted about the
county of Devonshire, and others over the surface
of Derbyshire. Before exploring the gallery up-
stairs the visitor should make a careful study of
this map.
And he needs to remind himself emphatically of
the fact that in these days man is not content with
such history of his origins as is preserved in written
documents or on inscribed stones. He has reached
a stage where he will no longer be denied the effort
to penetrate that veil of mystery which hides the
beginnings of his kind. To-day, where the historian
concludes his labours, the quest is taken up by other
students, and notably by the archaeologist and the
geologist. The latter appropriates for his province
the evolution of the earth towards a condition when
it became suitable for the habitation of man. “ The
geologist,” writes Professor Boyd Dawkins, “be-
ginning his story of the earth at the time when the
rains first descended and the seas first began to beat
276 The British Museum: Its Treasures
on the coast-lines, has laid, as it were, in a map
before us the revolutions in climate and geography
that it has undergone. He tells of continents sub-
merged, and of ocean bottoms lifted up to become
mountains; and he points out to us that side by side
with the ever-changing conditions of life there were
corresponding changes in the living forms. Group
after group of animals and plants pass over the field
of vision, each connected with that which preceded
it, and each becoming more and more highly organ-
ized, until man appears the last born as well as the
highest and the noblest creature in the realm of
geology.” -
Where the geologist ends his labours those of the
archaeologist begin. In this dim realm there is no
room for the historian, with his dependence upon
printed or written documents, or upon inscribed
monuments. It is the borderland where history
fades away into the prehistoric. But to appreciate
the labours of the archaeologist it is necessary to
take a brief glimpse at the world as the geologist
has pictured it. His examination of the earth’s
crust has led him to the conclusion that there have
been four well-marked periods in its history, which
he has named after the Latin numerals, that is,
Primary, Secondary, Tertiary, and Quaternary,
the latter representing the face of the globe as we
know it to-day. But the Quaternary division is
again divided into sections, consisting of historic,
Prehistoric Man 277
prehistoric, neolithic, and palaeolithic compartments.
It is generally held that man does not make his ap-
pearance in the geological record prior to the palaeo-
lithic period. Some authorities contend that there
are evidences of his existence in the Tertiary period,
but there is no agreement on that point. What is
established, however, is that he was certainly pres-
ent in the palaeolithic age.
From the map of the geologist the archaeologist
has taken two names as representing periods in the
history of , man, that is, palaeolithic, meaning the
older Stone Age, and neolithic, or the newer Stone
Age. To these he added the Bronze Age and the Iron
Age, which bring the story of humanity down to
where it can be continued from monumental and
then documentary sources. Of these periods, as Dr.
James Geikie has pointed out, ‘‘the earliest was the
Stone Age, when implements and ornaments were
formed exclusively of stone, wood, horn, and bone.
The use of metal for such purposes was then quite
unknown. To the Stone Age succeeded the Age of
Bronze, at which time cutting instruments, such as
swords and knives and axes, began to be made of
copper, and an alloy of that metal and tin. When
in course of time iron replaced bronze for cutting-
instruments, the Bronze Age came to an end and
the Iron Age supervened.” Useful as these names
are, however, it must be borne in mind that they do
not represent any sharp division of time; they are
278 The British Museum: Its Treasures
rather convenient phrases representative of a gen-
eral stage of attainment than Scientific definitions
of a rigid character. As a matter of fact, there are
still races of men which are yet in the Stone Age of
existence.
But it is time to return to that pear-shaped flint
which was discovered in Gray’s Inn Lane toward
the end of the seventeenth century. As has been
noted, for a century and a half it was regarded as
a British weapon. Some three years before the
eighteenth century ended, however, John Frere, a
Norfolk antiquary, wrote a paper entitled, “On the
Flint Weapons of Hoxne in Suffolk,” which he as-
signed “ to a very remote period, even beyond that
of the present world.” But even that startling
statement created no excitement, and for another
sixty years Dr. Ussher’s exact chronology of the
creation was unchallenged. Then came a portentous
change. In the quiet little town of Abbeyville, in
the valley of the river Somme, there was living a
retired French physician, Boucher de Perthes, who
spent his many leisure hours in the study of antiq-
uities. Near his home the sluggish river Somme
flows through a wide stretch of peat bogs, wherein
from time to time the peat diggers discovered nu-
merous strange-shaped flints which they christened
‘‘ cats” tongues.” Some of these curiosities were
taken to M. de Perthes, who speedily came to the
conclusion that they betrayed marks of human work-
Prehistoric Man 279
manship. Interested in the discovery, he began to
make investigations on his own account, which were
soon rewarded by the unearthing of other similarly-
shaped flints. And in a few years he acquired a
large collection, which he made the subject of an
essay. At first, however, his discoveries were dis-
regarded, but in due time his collection was visited
by several notable English geologists, who speedily
recognized its importance as furnishing evidence of
man’s existence upon the earth at a period im-
mensely anterior to Dr. Ussher's “4004 B. C.”
What has to be particularly noted is that M. de
Perthes found his flints in a river valley, and that
the same may be said of the discovery in Gray’s Inn
Lane. Other early discoveries were also made in
river valleys, and hence the name of “river-drift ''
given to the flints of the older Stone Age. “It is
a remarkable fact about these river-drift imple-
ments,” says S. Laing, “ that they are all nearly
of the same type and found under similar circum-
stances, that is to say, in the gravels, sands, brick-
earths, and fine silt or loess deposited by rivers
which have either ceased to run, or which ran at
levels higher than their present ones and were only
beginning to excavate their present valleys. Also
they are always found in association with remains
of what is known as the Quaternary (as distin-
guished from recent or existing fauna) represented
by the mammoth or woolly-haired elephant, the
280 The British Museum: Its Treasures
thick-nosed rhinoceros, and other well-known types
of extinct animals. The general character of these
implements is very rude, implying a social condition
at least as low as that of the Australian savages of
the present day. They consist mainly of the flake;
the chopper, or pebble roughly chipped to an edge
on one side; the scraper, used probably for prepar-
ing skins; pointed flints used for boring; and by
far the most abundant and characteristic of all, the
häche or celt, a sharp or oval implement, roughly
chipped from flint or, in its absence, from any of
the hard stones of the district, such as chert or
quartzite, and intended to be held in the hand and
used without any haft or handle.”
Countless examples of these river-drift imple-
ments are displayed in the gallery of the Central
Saloon. They are arranged in cases 99, 100, 101,
102, 103, and others in succession to case 110. The
specimens have been obtained from all parts of Eng-
land, including Bedfordshire, Essex, Oxfordshire,
and Dorsetshire; and also from many districts in
France. The latter include an interesting series
presented by M. de Perthes, which are of more than
ordinary value owing to their connection with the
early discoveries of the Stone Age.
As the visitor passes from case to case, he will
probably, unless he is an expert, be conscious of a
certain feeling of scepticism. To some extent he
can hardly help sharing the incredulity of those to
Prehistoric Man 281
whom these flints were first shown as examples of
human handicraft. Many of the stones are so
rudely fashioned that it is difficult to believe their
forms are not due to natural causes. For the
proper study of these relics, as is pointed out in the
guide to the department, a knowledge of the dis-
tinction between natural and artificial fracture
is necessary. But it is claimed that in nearly every
case the method is unmistakable. “By natural
fracture is meant the splitting of the flint by some
means other than a direct blow from the hand of
man; and this may occur before the flint leaves its
original bed, through earth-movements that crack
and produce ‘faults in the chalk.” There are the
factors of alternate heat and cold, or fire, or light-
ning, or frost, or falls from a great height — by all
of which flints may be naturally fractured. But it
is added that “the effect on flint of a sharp blow,
such as that of a hammer, is easily recognized, and
may be regarded as proof that the stone has been
handled by an intelligent being. The ‘bulb of per-
cussion * is the characteristic mark of a worked
flint.” Yet all this does not exhaust the evidence of
human workmanship. There have been discovered
numerous “factories '' of prehistoric man, that is,
sites rich in flint where he could work on a large
scale at the manufacture of his primitive imple-
ments. His rough flakes, and cores, and hammer-
stones have been found in abundance just as he left
282 The British Museum: Its Treasures
them, and not only have hundreds of flakes been
fitted together again in their original position, as if
they were a kind of puzzle-picture, but when on one
occasion the inner portion was missing the pouring
in of plaster gave a form akin to that common
among the older Stone Age implements.
But the discoveries have not been confined to
river valleys. On the contrary, many of the most
instructive “finds '’ have taken place in caves.
And of such discoveries few can compare in absorb-
ing interest with those made in the famous Kent’s
Cavern of Devonshire. On examining the contents
of case 121 the visitor will find that they consist
to a large extent of objects obtained from that cave,
and include implements ranging from the most
primitive form up to the polished flints of the neo-
lithic period. *
As Kent’s Cavern was among the first to be in-
vestigated in a scientific and cautious manner, and
as an account of its excavation will throw a flood of
light upon the Stone Age relics of the Central Sa-
loon, a brief account of that work will be read with
interest. The entrance is situated in the side of a
small limestone hill about a mile to the east of
Torquay, and the cave had been an object of curios-
ity so far back as 1824. From that date to 1841 it
was frequently explored by the Rev. J. MacEnery,
but in 1865 an exhaustive examination was under-
taken by William Pengelly on behalf of the British
Prehistoric Man 283
Association for the Advancement of Science. The
work was continued for some fifteen years, during
which time Mr. Pengelly visited the cave almost
daily for an average period of five hours, and then
continued the examination of his specimens at home
often into the early morning hours.
What did all this labour disclose? First that the
floor of the cave consisted of a layer of black mould
in which were discovered articles of stone and
bronze, mixed with the remains of a number of ani-
mals all of which are still represented by living
specimens; next that beneath this black mould there
was a floor of stalagmite varying in thickness from
an inch to five feet, and containing relics of various
extinct animals, bones and teeth of man, and flint
flakes and cores; thirdly a band of black deposit
four inches thick, rich in human relics and flint tools
and some implements of bone; fourthly a floor of
red earth abounding in animal remains of living and
extinct species and relics of man’s handiwork; and
then a layer of crystalline stalagmite followed by
what is called breccia in which were discovered flint
and chert implements but of a much ruder form
than those found in the red earth or the black band.
But some may wonder how all this throws any light
upon the antiquity of man. Well, it so happens that
a visitor to the cave in 1688 inscribed his name on a
boss of stalagmite in the upper floor, and although
there has been a constant dripping from the roof
284 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ever since that inscription is still perfectly legible.
The film indeed is less than one-twentieth of an inch
in thickness after the constant dripping of more
than two hundred years. But when it is remem-
bered that this is on the upper floor of the cave, and
that there are so many stages beneath that, each
representing untold centuries of slow growth, and
that yet at the bottom of all there are evidences of
the existence of man, it will be seen that the antiq-
uity of man must be numbered by hundreds of
thousands of years. On the lowest computation
it has been estimated that the signs of human
existence discovered in the lowest section of the
cave date back for at least two hundred thousand
years
Do not these facts lend a thrilling interest to the
contents of the gallery cases of the Central Saloon?
On the surface these impassive flints may seem to
have no story to tell. Unlike the Rosetta Stone, or
the Assyrian clay tablets with their curious indenta-
tions, they bear not a trage of anything which might
be interpreted as human writing; their virgin sur-
faces are utterly blank. If there had been but one
discovery of such relics it might have been possible
to pooh-pooh their importance, but when it is re-
membered that the discoveries are thousands in
number, that they all tell the same tale, that their
sequence is ever the same, and that the implements
can be paralleled by implements still in use among
Prehistoric Man 285
the savage races of the world, the evidence is irre-
sistible.
That the objects displayed in the gallery and in
the table cases below are eloquent of man’s progress
in the manufacture of implements for domestic use
or for hunting will be obvious to the careful ob-
server. He will find it an instructive task to trace
the development for himself, and yet he must hardly
expect to always be able to decide which belong to
the older Stone Age and which to the new. In many
cases, of course, there will be no question, for some
of the implements are exceedingly crude. So crude,
indeed, that the experts often seem in doubt as to
how to describe them. It will be observed that at
times they are driven to employ such phrases as
“ probably used for,” and the like, or have to take
refuge in such vague terms as “implement,’’ ‘‘ tri-
angular implement,’’ ‘‘ flint disc,” and so on. But
once the river-drift stage is left behind, it becomes
much easier to divine the purposes for which pre-
historic man shaped these countless stones. It is
not difficult to see that this was designed as a pick,
that as a scraper, and these many others as spear-
heads and arrow-heads, hammers, axes, daggers,
and knives. And in cases 114 to 119, and in other
isolated cases, the observant visitor will discover
additional evidences of the progress of man. He
will see, for example, numerous examples of pre-
historic skill in the manufacture of javelin-heads
286 The British Museum: Its Treasures
from reindeer horn, and bone needles, and bone
piercers, and near these are little groups of per-
forated shells, showing that prehistoric man or
woman — perhaps both — was not innocent of a
weakness for personal adornment. Nay, further;
it is clearly demonstrated that the cave-man was no
mean artist. What he did with his time might have
been a puzzle had there not been brought to light
numerous examples of his prowess in drawing. In
the cases last enumerated there are many specimens
of cave-man art, vivid pictures of that part of his
life which most appealed to his memory. His sharp
flint implements provided him with admirable en-
graving tools, and the bones of the animals he had
slain and eaten served him liberally with material
on which to etch his pictures. In case 123 will be
seen a piece of bone engraved with the head of a
horse, which was found in the caves of Creswell in
Derbyshire. It is the first trace of art in England,
and shows that prehistoric man in that land pos-
sessed much the same skill in drawing as was en-
joyed by his contemporaries in France and else-
where in Europe. In the Kesserloch cavern was
discovered a portion of an antler bearing a wonder-
fully truthful incised sketch of a buck grazing, in
which, too, an attempt — the only one of its kind—
has been made to represent the herbage on which
the animal is feeding.
These spirited outline etchings do not exhaust the
Prehistoric Man 287
art of the cave-man. He also tried his hand at
sculpture in the round and some of the results may
be seen in cases 114 and 115. The examples in-
clude a point of mammoth tusk carved into the form
of a reindeer’s head, and a dagger handle repre-
senting the mammoth. These both reveal a sur-
prising skill in portraiture and a wonderful adroit-
ness in utilizing the material employed. The ani-
mal models have been observed with close attention;
the treatment is full of grace. Considering the
rude tools with which he worked, the faithfulness
of the cave-man's sculpture is amazing. It is obvi-
ous that he had a keen sense of the beauty of the
animals he hunted, and no mean ability in repro-
ducing their forms.
Whether neolithic man followed immediately on
the heels of palaeolithic man, or whether there was
a transitional race, or whether palaeolithic man be-
came extinct and was then, after a long interval,
succeeded by neolithic man, are questions to which
no definite answer can be given. Search is now
being carried on for transitional implements, but
in the meantime the curious student must be satis-
fied to pass to those cases in the Central Saloon in
which are displayed the relics now apportioned to
the neolithic age, that, is the new Stone Age. They
represent a period when climatie and other changes
had modified the old manner of human life. “Man
had now learned,” remarks Reginald A. Smith in
288 . The British Museum: Its Treasures
the guide to the department, ‘‘to tame animals and
train them to his domestic use; he cultivated ce-
reals for food, and textile plants to provide material
for woven garments; he used the bow as his ordi-
nary weapon; he had developed the art of making
pottery; and he often constructed dwellings raised
on piles in lakes and rivers to secure himself against
danger of attack. The burial of the dead now be-
came a matter of ceremonial importance; and from
the chambered sepulchral mounds (long barrows)
erected over the bodies of chiefs, as well as from
other megalithic monuments, we may perhaps de-
rive evidence of the birth and increase of primitive
religious beliefs. In the provision made by man for
his defence and for the needs of every-day life,
there had also been a great development. Imple-
ments and weapons were now commonly hafted and
made in a greater variety of forms; while by the
adoption of grinding and polishing, it became pos-
sible to employ other hard stones in addition to flint
or quartzite.”
How marked was the change which came over the
weapons and implements is illustrated by countless
examples. In cases 129 and 130 are some typical
examples of lance and arrow-heads found in Ire-
land. The makers of these weapons may not have
had the straightest of eyes, for they are often at
fault in their lines, but it is plain that the careful
manner in which the arrow-heads are shaped for
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Prehistoric Man 289
fastening to their wooden shafts represents a great
advance on the roughly fashioned implements of
palaeolithic man. And the same is true of the lance-
points. In cases 143-146 are shown some remark-
able flint implements from Denmark. Here is a beau-
tifully shaped and carefully worked dagger which
would do credit to man in any stage of civilization,
and close at hand are scrapers and celts and chisels
and sickle-shaped knives of first-rate workmanship.
As illustrating the methods employed by neolithic
man in making his various weapons and implements
the contents of cases 125 and 126 are full of inter-
est. They include many examples of the picks made
from the antlers of deer, one of which still retains
the impression of a miner’s thumb in the clay which
had gathered on the handle.
Further advances towards perfecting different
kinds of implements are illustrated by relics from
Russia, Holland, and the Nile valley. In case 150
the various stages in the manufacture of a flint
armlet are illustrated by several specimens, these
examples thoroughly supporting the assertion that
the finest chipped flint instruments in existence
come from Egypt. How wide-spread was this neo-
lithic industry is shown by samples from Japan,
India, Burmah, and other lands. As he passes
from case to case, too, the visitor will note that
many of the smaller weapons, and especially the
arrow-heads, gradually took on a superstitious
290 The British Museum: Its Treasures
value, as illustrated by those arrow-heads in table-
case L, which have been mounted as charms or amu-
lets. The variety of weapons seems constantly on
the increase; there are harpoon-heads with flint
barbs, and pierced axe-hammers, and stone adze-
blades which have all the appearance of metal, and
even fish-hooks. Mingling with these evidences of
a more perfect provision for the chase and for the
needs of domestic life are many examples of crude
pottery, etc. From all these silent witnesses Dr.
Boyd Dawkins has conjured up an arrestive picture
of neolithic man.
“If we could in imagination take our stand on
the summit of a hill commanding an extensive view,
of almost any part of Great Britain or Ireland in
the neolithic period, we should look upon a land-
scape somewhat of this kind. Thin lives of smoke
rising from among the trees of the dense virgin
forest at our feet would mark the position of the
neolithic homesteads, and of the neighbouring
stockaded camp which afforded refuge in time of
need; while here and there a gleam of gold would
show the small patch of ripening wheat. We enter
a track in the forest, and thread our way to one of
the clusters of homesteads, passing herds of goats
and flocks of horned sheep, or disturbing troops of
horses or small short-horn oxen, or stumbling upon
a swineherd tending the hogs in their search after
roots. We should probably have to defend our-
\
Prehistoric Man 291
\.
selves against the attack of some of the large dogs,
used as guardians of the flock against bears, wolves,
and foxes, and for hunting the wild animals. At
last, on emerging into the clearing, we should see
a little plot of flax or small-eared wheat, and near
the homestead the inhabitants, clad some in linen
and others in skins, and ornamented with necklaces
and pendants of stone, bone, or pottery, carrying
on their daily occupations. Some are cutting wood
with stone axes with a wonderfully sharp edge, fixed
in wooden handles, with stone adzes and gouges,
or with little saws composed of carefully notched
pieces of flint about three or four inches long, split-
ting it with stone wedges, scraping it with flint
flakes. Some are at work preparing handles for the
spears, shafts for the arrows, and wood for the
bows, or for the broad paddles used for propelling
the canoes. Others are busy grinding and sharpen-
ing the various stone tools, scraping skins with im-
plements ground to a circular edge, or carving vari-
ous implements out of bone and antler with sharp
splinters of flint, while the women are preparing the
meal with pestles and mortars and grain rubbers,
and cooking it on the fire, generally outside the
house, or spinning thread with spindle and distaff,
or weaving it with a rude loom. We might also see
them at work at the moulding of rude cups and ves-
sels out of clay which had been carefully prepared.”
An imaginary sketch, no doubt, yet each of its
292 The British Museum: Its Treasures
details is supported by objects displayed in the
Central Saloon. When they are studied with intel-
ligence in their relation to one land alone, Great
Britain for example, they illustrate the steady prog-
ress of a country without inhabitants to a country
in which man first appears in the rudest form and
then works his way to a more ordered and settled
form of life.
Up to the present, as must have been observed,
the attention of the visitor has been directed exclu-
sively to objects made of stone or bone. Among the
thousands of implements and weapons passed in
review not one has been of metal. But now it is
time to turn to the Bronze Age, the relics of which
are displayed in the wall-cases under the gallery
of the Central Saloon and in the table-cases stand-
ing on the floor. At the outset the visitor will no
doubt be puzzled at this transition from stone to
bronze. Does it represent a new race of men, or
a discovery of the value of metal on the part of the
stone-users? And why should the metal have been
bronze? Why not copper or iron? These are per-
tinent questions, and open a field of discussion in
which no final conclusions have been reached. Some
authorities hold that the Bronze Age does not rep-
resent a development of the civilization of the Stone
Age, but the appearance in Europe of a new race.
'And with regard to the arguments which have been
advanced in favour of iron having preceded bronze
Prehistoric Man * 293
the answer is made that the contention is not borne
out by archaeological discoveries. Sir John Evans
sums up the question thus: “When barrow after
barrow is opened, and weapons of bronze and stone
only are found accompanying the interments, and
not a trace of iron or steel; when hoards of rough
metal and broken bronze, together with the moulds
of the bronze-founder and some of his stock-in-
trade, are disinterred, and there is no trace of an
iron tool among them — the presumption is strong
that at the time when these men and these hoards
were buried, iron was not in use.”
Like the discovery of fire, which was probably
man’s first step towards civilization, the discovery
of the use of metal belongs to an age of which there
is no record. But when bronze was discovered the
first use to which it was put, was the manufacture,
not of swords and spears, but of the multifariously
useful axe. While chronology of an exact kind is
impossible in this connection, it is instructive that
when the bronze antiquities of any country are ex-
amined and sorted into progressive series, the axe-
forms are first in evidence. It is difficult, as has
been remarked, to overestimate the work done by
the axe in advancing civilization. Hence it was
natural that it should be the first implement made
by prehistoric man when he discovered metal. And
in case 11 there may be seen a deeply interesting
series illustrating the development of the bronze
294 The British Museum: Its Treasures
axe from its stone model of the Stone Age. The
earliest are evidently close copies from the stone
examples, but they in time give place to designs
which could never have been attempted in stone.
With the advent of the bronze axe man was on the
highway to greater conquests over nature than had
ever been possible before. “The stone axes, easily
blunted and broken, could have made but little im-
pression on the vast forests of pine, oak, and beech
covering the greater part of Britain and the Con-
tinent in the Neolithic age. Clearings necessary
for pasture and agriculture must unquestionably,
then, have been produced principally by the aid of
fire. Under the edge of the bronze axe, clearings
would be rapidly produced, pasture and arable land
would begin to spread over the surface of the coun-
try.” What this meant in relation to other phases
of man’s life must be obvious. If in the Bronze
Age he could not compete with the artistic skill of
his forerunners of the Stone Age, he soon advanced
far beyond those primitive men in other respects.
A glance round the wall-cases under the gallery and
the table-cases scattered over the floor, the latter
being lettered from A to S, will soon convince the
visitor of the enormous strides towards civilization
made in the Bronze Age. He will see weapons of all
kinds, including swords, daggers, and spear-heads;
articles of personal adornment, such as decorated
pins, and buttons, and beads and necklaces; and
Prehistoric Man 295
knives evidently intended for domestic use, and
pottery in the form of drinking-cups, food-vessels,
cinerary urns, and incense cups. .
Happily, too, it is possible to almost watch th
men of the Bronze Age at work. In case B are
shown several moulds of prehistoric man, made of
bronze and stone, and beside them are casts of other
moulds preserved in different collections. With
these interesting objects are shown some long in-
gots of copper produced by flowing the molten metal
into grooves cut in stone, and there are also some
lumps of copper. Such discoveries as these, many
of which have been made in England, dispose of
the theory that the bronze weapons and implements
found in Great Britain were imported from other
countries. In the next case but one, that marked
D, is displayed one of the most interesting groups
of the collection. In a cave in County Durham,
hunters came upon a set of bronze weapons and
implements which were evidently the belongings of
one family, who may have fled to the cave for refuge
and there met their death. The objects include a
Spear-head, knives, razors, chisels, awls, pins, rings,
and a bronze mould. They belong, it is thought, to
the time when the Bronze Age in England had
reached its highest development. -
Many countries are represented in the various
cases, including Ireland, India, Germany, Hungary,
Denmark, Russia, Italy, the Greek Islands, Egypt,
296 The British Museum: Its Treasures
France, and Switzerland. The “finds '' in the lat-
ter country, which are shown in case S, include
numerous objects from lake-dwellings, such as
knives, razors, chisels, fish-hooks, and pottery. As
belonging to records of the Bronze Age special
note should be taken of the six cases in the centre
of the Saloon containing the Greenwell collection
presented to the museum by J. Pierpont Morgan.
It is one of the most notable collections in existence
and is remarkable for the wide geographical area
covered by its numerous objects.
When iron was discovered is as much a mystery
as the date of the discovery of bronze. The su-
perior merits of the former metal render it unthink-
able that any race acquainted with it should have
returned to the use of bronze, and consequently
there is ample foundation for making the dawn of
the Iron Age the close of man’s prehistoric period.
Roughly speaking the introduction of iron is placed
Somewhere about one thousand years before
Christ, though of course the date will vary with
different countries. In various cases of the Cen-
tral Saloon, and notably in the wall-cases 51 to 60,
the early Iron Age is strikingly illustrated by va-
ried collections. There are swords and their scab-
bards, chariot-wheels, ornaments, and all kinds of
implements. Of course there was much over-lap-
ping between the two ages, for the use of bronze
would not be immediately abandoned. Rather, it
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Prehistoric Man 297
was reserved for more ornamental uses, the harder
metal being employed for weapons and implements
likely to be put to greater tests. Hence the visitor
must not be surprised to find bronze persisting in
the Iron Age for brooches, bracelets, hairpins, and
many other articles.
It seems fairly well established that with the in-
troduction of iron changes gradually took place in
the burial customs of prehistoric man. The old
method of cremation was not wholly abandoned,
but it became increasingly common to inter the
dead unburned in stone chambers or shallow pits
and with them were buried many of the objects as-
sociated with their living days. These changing
customs find ample illustration among the antiqui-
ties of the Iron Age, which, by the way, include
some remarkable collections from different dis-
tricts of France. Many of the latter, too, pass
beyond the prehistoric period of man’s history, and
thus become an instructive link between the past
and the present. In the case of Great Britain, too,
the relics of the Saloon as a whole include survivals
from the period of Roman occupation. There are
countless objects which were either brought to
Britain by the soldiers of Julius Caesar or made by
them in the country after their arrival. They have
been found in various parts of England, including
London, Winchester, Colchester, and the sites of
other Roman stations, and include keys, and spoons,
298 The British Museum: Its Treasures
and mirrors, and bronze vessels, and numerous
other articles.
Eminently appropriate is it that these collections
devoted to illustrating the life of prehistoric man
should shade off in this way to a period where the
haziness of the far-off past should begin to give
place to the light of clear knowledge. With the in-
vasion of Julius Caesar, Britain was brought into
touch with that civilization which had been pro-
gressing for many centuries in other parts of the
world, and henceforward its prehistoric period was
at an end. The Roman historians have left us many
pictures of what kind of people the early Britons
were, of their villages and towns, of their ways of
life and their personal appearance, but after all the
mute witnesses of the countless objects in the Cen-
tral Saloon are of still greater interest to the in-
quiring student. They may not have the exactitude
of written history or inscribed monuments, but they
are so suggestive of primitive life and afford such
convincing proofs of the onward march of man
that they must always retain a unique place in the
annals of mankind. + -
By Permission of th
BRITISH SEPULCHRAL POTTERY.



:
CHAPTER VII
CIVILIZATION IN THE MAPKING
THAN the Ethnographical Gallery of the British
Museum there is no department the educational sig-
nificance of which is so likely to be unappreciated.
With the possible exception of the Egyptian mummy
rooms, the ten bays and numerous cases in which are
exhibited the objects illustrating the manners and
customs of what are known as savage races seem to
hold most attraction for the majority of visitors.
On the quietest days there are always little groups
in this gallery, indulging usually in laughter and
jokes. The impression seems general that is the
really comic side of the museum; not intended for
instruction but solely for amusement.
Perhaps the hilarity with which the ordinary
visitor regards the object-lessons of ethnography
arises from his overweening conceit of the value and
importance of his own particular form of civiliza-
tion. No doubt he has much in common with that
traveller who lost his way on his journey and de-
scribed the climax of his experience in these words:
“After having walked eleven hours without having
traced the print of a human foot, to my great com-
fort and delight, I saw a man hanging upon a gib-
299
300 The British Museum: Its Treasures
bet; my pleasure at the cheering prospect was inex-
pressible, for it convinced me that I was in a civil-
ized country.” Finding, as he wanders from case
to case, everything so alien to what he is accustomed
to, the thoughtless visitor preens himself upon the
superiority of his own environments and concludes
that the grotesque idols, the rude clothing, the primi-
tive weapons and implements, and the vulgar orna-
ments of savage man, are fit subjects for ridicule
and merriment.
But the more philosophical observer will regard
these strange objects in quite another mood. He
will hardly fail to recall those hours of depression
or foiled endeavour when he has questioned whether,
after all, civilization is not a failure, and whether
he might not find greater happiness in some far-off
island of the sunny Southern seas.
“There methinks would be enjoyment more than in this march of
mind, -
In the steamship, in the railway, in the thoughts that shake
mankind.
“There the passions cramp'd no longer shall have scope and
breathing space;
I will take some Savage woman, she shall rear my dusky race.”
He may not have had personal experience of the
“breadths of tropic shade,” of the “lustrous wood-
land,” of the “ Summer isles of Eden,” but, over-
weighted with the stress of his own civilization, he
may easily pine for a life less hedged round with
Civilization in the Making 301
convention, and long to ‘‘ burst all links of habit.”
But to this mood there may, on reflection, succeed
that other point of view which Lecky put on record:
“The superiority of a highly civilized man lies
chiefly in the fact that he belongs to a higher order
of being, for he has approached more nearly to the
end of his existence, and has called into action a
large number of his capacities. And this is in itself
an end. Even if, as is not improbable, the lower
animals are happier than man, and semi-barbarians
than civilized men, still it is better to be a man than
a brute, better to be born amid the fierce struggles
of civilization than in some stranded nation apart
from all the flow of enterprise and knowledge.”
Something more than mere amusement, then, should
be derived from these relics of uncivilized man; in
fact, the extent to which they minister to merriment
may be the measure of the laugher’s own lack of
civilization.
For the multifarious objects in the Ethnograph-
ical Gallery represent so many starting-points in the
world’s civilization. Their true value is to afford
the visitor to the museum an opportunity of experi-
encing the feeling which came over Darwin when he
first found himself face to face with barbaric man.
“The astonishment which I felt,” he wrote, ‘‘ on
first seeing a party of Fuegians on a wild and
broken shore will never be forgotten by me, for the
reflection at once rushed into my mind—such were
302 The British Museum: Its Treasures
our ancestors. These men were absolutely naked
and bedaubed with paint, their long hair was tangled,
their mouths frothed with excitement, and their ex-
pression was wild and distrustful. They possessed
hardly any arts, and like wild animals lived on what
they could catch; they had no government, and were
merciless to every one not of their own tribe.” Dar-
win drew from his experience the moral that he
would sooner be descended from a “heroic little
monkey ’’ than from such beings; it is just as legit-
imate and perhaps more conducive to humility to
deduce the lesson that but for civilization our own
case would be as deplorable as that of the Fuegians.
Accustomed from the earliest dawn of conscious-
ness to the heritage of the centuries, the natives of
civilized lands rarely pause to consider what their
environments represent of human conflict and dis-
covery. They take for granted the ample food of
their tables, the generous shelter and comfort of
their homes, the protection and adornment of their
clothing, the aesthetic pleasure of the arts, the happi-
ness of family life, the security of their communal
relations with their kind, not realizing that all these
things have been wrested one by one from the an-
tagonism of nature and the inhumanity of man to
man. For all such the objects displayed in the Eth-
nographical Gallery are rich in suggestion. They
are intimately linked with the present, for, as Dr. E.
B. Tylor has remarked, every human thought, no
Civilization in the Making 303
matter how primitive, has a bearing upon the
thought of the day; none is so ancient that it has
severed its connection with modern life.
Representing as it does the spoils of four con-
tinents, namely Asia, Oceania, Africa and America,
it is obvious that the arrangement of the Ethno-
graphical Gallery must of necessity be geographical.
Chronology, then, must for once be thrown to the
winds; the only sequence is that of place. The gal-
lery is on the upper floor of the museum, and runs
the entire length of the eastern side. By means of
the tall wall-cases which project into the room at cer-
tain intervals the apartment is divided into a series
of ten bays, five on each side of the gallery; and in
addition there are numerous table-cases and stand-
ard cases and screens, the contents of which har-
monize as far as possible with those of the bays in
their vicinity. The only inconvenience of the ar-
rangement is that owing to the bays being paired,
the numbering of the cases is misleading. Thus the
objects from Asia begin in the first bay on the left,
and are continued in the first bay on the right, but
as the numbering of the cases runs up the gallery
and not in a criss-cross manner, the consequence is
that while the first wall-cases of Asiatic objects are
numbered 1 to 17, the continuing cases are numbered
149 to 166. To cite numbers of cases, then, will be
of no assistance to the explorer; he must bear in
mind that the relics from a given continent are to be
304 The British Museum: Its Treasures
looked for on either side of the gallery and in the
centre, and that the geographical order of the bays
is that given above, that is, Asia, Oceania, Africa,
America. In addition, owing to the constant re-ar-
rangement of the cases necessitated by fresh acquisi-
tions, it would be misleading to locate specific ob-
jects in specific cases; the only safe indication is to
point out the division of the earth’s surface to
which certain specimens belong.
As it would entail much passing to and fro in the
gallery to study its objects in a comparative way,
the explorer will doubtless find it the wisest plan to
frame for himself a few general principles for which
he can seek out illustrations in the specimens of the
different continents. He may think, for example,
as the handbook to the department suggests, of man
in relation to nature, then of man in connection with
human nature, and lastly of man in his attitude to
supernature. This is a better division than that of
Aristotle, namely, personality, property, and the
estimation of others. It is more useful to start
where Epicurus begins, that is, with those natural
and necessary needs of man which when not satisfied
produce pain. That makes the starting point to be
hunger and its satisfaction, — hunger which, as the
Persian proverb has it, is “ the teacher of arts and
the bestower of genius.”
So far as the untutored natives of Asia are con-
cerned the food favoured by those people ranges
Civilization in the Making 305
from fish to game and includes the milk of mares and
camels, reindeer products, beans and millet and
potatoes, turtle and wild pig, rice and Sugar-cane,
and honey and yams. And the objects associated
with the satisfying of the first and chief need of man
embrace a curiously carved wooden stick used by
the Ainus for raising the moustache when drinking,
and many quaint implements for making fire. Ex-
amples of the crude flint and steel used in Burmah
are not lacking, and there is a specimen of the in-
genious fire-piston of Borneo. This consists of a
small cylinder something like a garden syringe, with
a closely-fitting piston, the friction of which in the
cylinder generates heat and fires a piece of tinder
carried in a hole at the end of the piston. From
Tibet comes an ornate little pouch designed for car-
rying flint and tinder, while the Sumatra curiosities
include a brass belt from which a fire-steel is sus-
pended.
Objects associated with the food of barbaric man
are more fully illustrated in the exhibits from
Oceania. These range from the poi pounders of
Polynesia to the elaborately decorated food-funnel
of New Zealand. There are several examples of
food bowls, one, wooden and inlaid with shell, from
the Pelew Islands; another, also of wood and inlaid
with shell and bone, from the Hawaiian Islands;
and a cleverly carved wooden vessel from the Solo-
mon Islands. All these were evidently intended for
306 The British Museum: Its Treasures
individual use, but the Solomon Islands are also
represented by two huge food bowls which have
adorned many a cannibal feast. They are so capa-
cious that they would easily find room for all the
fleshy parts of a human victim, and have all the
appearance of having been put to constant use.
When one recalls the history of the Solomon Islands,
the murder of missionaries and the disappearance of
Benjamin Boyd, and the penchant of the natives for
head hunting, it is not difficult to conjure up a vision
of a group of loathsome cannibals at their gruesome
feast around these bowls. On the other hand the
carved funnel from New Zealand has a curious in-
terest. It represents in a partial manner that habit
of fasting for various reasons which is so wide-
spread among uncivilized tribes. So much impor-
tance is attached by the Maori chiefs to the correct
manner in which tattooing is carried out that while
the process is in execution they will take only such
food as can be supplied to them through a funnel.
This is an interesting illustration of the belief in
the efficacy of fasting in connection with the per-
formance of a magical or religious ceremony. As
fasting or abstention from certain kinds of food at
particular seasons enters so largely into the rule of
some divisions of the Christian Church, this food-
funnel becomes an object for serious thought rather
than ridicule. -
'Africa supplies many objects connected with the
Civilization in the Making 307
food of its natives. The Congo is responsible for
minutely carved wooden cups of varied designs; and
Uganda is represented by a milk-vessel and an in-
genious pottery furnace for fumigating the same.
The latter is of unique interest as showing that even
savages may arrive at some kind of sanitary knowl-
edge. The little furnace takes the form of a round
bowl ending in a tapering neck, the side of the bowl
having a hole in which the fumigating grass can be
placed and ignited. The milk-vessel also has a
tapering neck, but large enough to fit over that of
the furnace. It is a clever arrangement and is prob-
ably as effective as the more scientific appliances of
the civilized dairy. American food vessels are rep-
resented by a handsomely carved wooden bowl from
Queen Charlotte Islands and an Iquitos pottery
vase for holding cassava-wine. In connection with
the latter, too, it should be noted that the American
exhibits include an example of the board studded
with stone chips which is used for grating cassava.
As bearing upon man’s efforts to satisfy his hun-
ger it will be observed that all the continents pro-
vide numerous examples of the devices used to catch
fish and all kinds of wild animals. The fish-hooks
of different tribes are a study in themselves, the
simplest of which have a close family likeness to
the bent pin of the boy who is new to the gentle
art. Those from Oceania show that while the na-
tives of the Solomon Islands had learned the neces-
308 The British Museum: Its Treasures
sity of giving a pronounced inward curve to their
hooks, the fishermen of Hawaii had gone a step
further and added the barb. From Tonga is a
huge hook made of whale’s bone, turtle-shell and
pearl-shell; from New Zealand are bone and shell
hooks in which the barb is in a rudimentary stage;
while the Indians of the northwest coast of
America are represented by some business-like de-
vices which must have been fatal to any fish that
took them into their mouths. Some of these hooks
are cleverly pointed with bird’s claws, but most of
them are equipped with sharp pieces of bone.
Savage man so quickly turned his hunting weap-
ons against his own kind that it is difficult to dis-
tinguish between those intended for the slaughter
of game and those reserved for an enemy’s body,
but it is no doubt safe to include in the food-cap-
turing category many of the simplest forms of bows
and arrows, and spears, and missile weapons. To
these must in the main be added the blow-guns of
the Kenyahs and other tribes. The blow-gun seems
to be widely spread among uncivilized races, and
the visitor will come upon examples in most of the
bays in the gallery. There are numerous speci-
mens from the Malay Peninsula, which are accom-
panied by many types of quivers for the darts, most
of which are carefully decorated. The long bow of
the Andaman Islander, with its iron-tipped arrow,
must have been a formidable weapon for the chase
Civilization in the Making 309
or battle, and the harpoon used for capturing turtle
or large fish looks as though it should have been
particularly effective. In different parts of the gal-
lery the visitor will find numerous examples of
traps, some intended for rats, but the majority de-
signed for the capture of fish. The latter are not
strikingly different from the wicker traps used by
civilized man.
Cooking-pots are generously illustrated, and the
devotees of afternoon tea should take special inter-
est in the curious churn used by the Tibetans for
brewing the cup that cheers but not inebriates. The
entire process is exemplified by samples of the ket-
tle, strainer, and churn alluded to in the following
description from the handbook to the gallery:
‘‘‘ Brick Tea 'is first pounded in a mortar and then
placed in a kettle of hot water which is allowed to
boil for five minutes. It is then poured through a
small wicker-work strainer into a long wooden cylin-
der or ‘tea-churn 'provided with a piston. A piece
of butter and some parched barley are now added,
and the whole is vigorously churned for a minute
or two, after which it is poured into a teapot of red
earthenware or tinned copper. Each person then
produces from the bosom of his gown a little wooden
bowl, lined or otherwise ornamented with silver.
A little tea is then sprinkled as a libation, and the
cups are filled. Taking with his fingers a lump of
butter from a bladder or wooden butter-box, the
310 The British Museum: Its Treasures
drinker lets it melt in his bowl, drinking some of the
tea, and blowing the butter on one side. When only
a little tea is left in the bottom of the bowl, a hand-
ful of barley-meal is added, and the various ingre-
dients are worked with the fingers into a lump of
brown dough which is swallowed and washed down
with a fresh draught.” If the English “four
o'clock ’’ ceremony had not developed considerably
beyond the messy process in which the Tibetan de-
lights, Parisians would doubtless have shunned that
form of Anglomania at all costs.
Alien to civilized ideas as are the feeding-funnel
of the Maoris, and the cannibal feast-bowl of the
Solomon Islanders, the explorer of the gallery will
discover one proof of the kinship of barbaric and
civilized man. Whether the savage indulged in the
adulteration of food is not illustrated by these ob-
jects, but that he was not ignorant of the devices
of the manipulator of weights and measures is
proved beyond question. Among the articles from
Borneo is a measure used for selling rice, and a
fraudulent measure at that, for it has numerous
holes in the bottom, the purpose of which was to
cheat the purchaser of his rightful quantity.
According to Epicurus, the second great natural
need of man is clothing. That depends. There are
of course some parts of the globe where the constant
heat of the sun puts the question of clothing en-
tirely beyond the pale of necessary things, so long;
Civilization in the Making 31i
that is, as the question of decency and indecency
does not arise. As ea; nihilo nihil fit, it would be a
work of supererogation to search the gallery for
examples of the wardrobe of those tribes which have
no wardrobe; but it is exceedingly rich in speci-
mens of uncivilized garments, from the scanty loin-
cloth to the superabundant ceremonial dress. Nay,
in the Asiatic section the gallery has a marvellous
collection of Oriental armour, including a steel hel-
met of a Shah of Persia and a suit of iron scale-
armour from Tibet. These, however, and the won-
derful range of Oriental weapons — swords and
daggers and battle-axes — by which they are accom-
panied, are of less interest in the present connection
than the ruder garments which illustrate the early
stages of man’s efforts to supply himself with an
outer covering.
Although somewhat transparent, tattooing must
probably be given the first place in the wardrobe
of barbaric man. Tahiti provides a set of tattooing
instruments, which include a vicious looking needle
and a paddle-shaped striker used to drive the needle
home. The mask of a Haida woman from Queen
Charlotte Islands shows an intricate tattoo pattern,
and the curious in such matters will find further
examples in the dried Maori heads from New Zea-
land. Coming to more substantial wearing apparel,
the gallery is well equipped with garments of all
kinds, ranging from the abbreviated bark-belt worn
312 The British Museum: Its Treasures
by men in N. W. Australia to the ample ceremonial
robes from Tahiti. Between these are such types
as the feather head-dress of the Masai, the bark
hats of Alaska Indians, and the gorgeous red and
yellow feather cloaks affected by the chiefs of Ha-
waii. Bark-cloth plays so large a part in the tailor-
ing of Savage man that a description of its manu-
facture will be read with interest, especially as the
process is so much akin to the method adopted by
the Egyptians in making papyrus. “The branches
and roots of straight young saplings, usually of the
Paper Mulberry, but sometimes of other trees,”
states the handbook to the department in giving an
account of the method adopted in Polynesia, “were
cut off, and the bark detached in long strips. These
strips were then immersed in water for several
hours, and when they were sufficiently soaked were
taken out and laid on a flat piece of wood. The
inner bark was now detached from the outer by
scraping with a piece of shell, and carefully washed.
The strips were laid out side by side until they
covered a space of the required size, three layers
being placed one above the other. They were left
thus until the following day, by which time the per-
colation of the water which they had absorbed
through the washing caused them to adhere to-
gether. The whole piece was now taken to a flat-
tened beam or board, and beaten or felted together
by repeated blows from short mallets of hard wood,
º
Civilization in the Making 313
the sides of which are usually grooved in different
ways. During this operation water was continually
thrown upon the cloth. When the piece had been
felted to a uniform consistency, it was dried, and
finally ornamented with coloured designs, either ap-
plied with the free hand, or more rarely by means
of large frames or stamps, as in Samoa and Fiji.”
In the Oceania division the visitor will find inter-
esting examples of the blocks used for printing pat-
terns on bark-cloth, and will doubtless make a men-
tal comparison between those primitive appliances
and the elaborate cloth-printing machines of his
own world. If he shares Ruskin’s passion for in-
dividualism in artistic work, the comparison may
not be wholly to the detriment of barbaric man.
Even more pains must have been spent on the
manufacture of the red and yellow feather cloaks
used by the Hawaiian chiefs, many admirable ex-
amples of which are in the Oceania bays. As the
feathers are fastened to a groundwork of net, the
process of completing a cloak must be lengthy and
tedious. The amount of labour, too, expended upon
such an involved garment as the ceremonial dress
worn at burials in Tahiti must be considerable. On
a first glance this robe may seem ludicrous, with
its porcupine-looking headpiece, and its suggestion
of the scarecrow figures of corn-fields, but, after
all, is it in the abstract more inartistic than Some
of the gorgeous regalia favoured by some friendly
314 The British Museum: Its Treasures
societies? Everything depends upon custom, and
to the native of Tahiti the sashes and medals of
friendly societies may appear just as grotesque as
his ceremonial dress does to the civilized man.
From dress to personal ornaments is a natural
transition. In this department the gallery can show
some fashions which are hardly likely to set the
style in Europe or the United States. Asia, for
example, provides a human skull painted and dec-
orated as worn by a friend of the deceased in token
of his affection. This is an Andaman Islands cus-
tom, and it is reassuring to learn that those who
observe it are rapidly becoming extinct. More
tolerable is the brass brooch worn by the women of
Western Tibet, though their sisters in civilized
lands would probably vote it a trifle too bulky and
heavy. From Assam there are slighter ornaments,
such as necklaces of shell and glass beads and a
brass head band with shell pendants, while the
African bays illustrate in a generous manner those
formidable nose and ear ornaments in which the
natives of the dark continent take so much asthetic
pleasure. The American specimens include some
ornate feather tiaras and several rudely-carved
hair-combs.
That savage man is not oblivious to the play-
instinct is demonstrated at every turn. The Java-
nese are particularly addicted to puppet-shows, an
amusement which has furnished the gallery with a
;~.
Civilization in the Making 315
large collection of quaint figures and masks; in
Oceania idle hours are devoted to cat’s-cradle, to
tops and balls, and numerous “make believe '’
games; while in Africa the gentle savage indulges
in a form of backgammon. Dancing, of course,
plays a large part in the recreation of untutored
man, and the gallery is naturally rich in objects
relating to that amusement. The dancing-clubs
include a high ornamented specimen from the Santa
Cruz group, wooden shields worn at dances by na-
tives of East Africa, and a wooden bear-headed
dancing-rattle from the Queen Charlotte Islands.
The native musical instruments, too, are beyond
counting. The xylophone appears in an elaborate
form among the Java objects, while Africa is well to
the fore with lizard-skin drums, wooden gongs,
primitive harps, and “pianos '’ which usually have
gourd resonators but sometimes fall back on a hu-
man skull for that purpose. Not without surprise
will the visitor note that the Azandeh tribe of the
Congo have evolved a musical instrument which has
a strong resemblance to the fiddle, though the mel-
ody produced may have little kinship with the ef-
forts of a Paganini.
Owing to considerations of space the gallery is
not able to exhibit much by way of illustrating the
houses affected by savage man. However, there
are several attractive little models of the varied
types of habitations characteristic of different parts
*>
316 The British Museum: Its Treasures
of the world, and the Oceania section is notably well
equipped with examples of Maori houses and the
rich carving with which they are adorned. Apart
from the models, however, it should be noted that
on the screens down the centre of the gallery are
numerous large photographs of native scenes, many
of which are full of information as to the dwellings
favoured in different lands. Some of the wall-cases,
too, in addition to exhibiting maps of the countries
from which the objects shown have been gathered,
display numerous little sketches from which a good
idea of the aspect of native villages can be ob-
tained.
To the trained eye countless objects in the vari-
ous bays will suggest much information as to the
communal relations of uncivilized tribes; if the
visitor is well read in Maine’s “Ancient Law '' and
kindred books he will find something to interest
him at every turn. Even such a seemingly unre-
lated object as the wooden figure from the Congo
which is used for purposes of divination is really
communal in its suggestion, for it implies disagree-
ment between men and so opens up the way to the
Question of ordeals and oaths. Again, the fine col-
lection of African currency is a reminder that the
savages using these curious coins — such as con-
ventional axe-blades and hoe-blades—were not liv-
ing to themselves alone, but had reached a stage
when their relations with their fellows were such as
Civilization in the Making 317
to render necessary a standard of value, no matter
how crude that standard may seem. Of course the
original trader at first made a direct exchange of
definite objects, but in time there arose the need
of formulating some system which would obviate
the bother of driving around an ox or a sheep.
But it is too plain from the innumerable weapons
in the gallery that in the main savage man’s rela-
tions with his kind were generally those of antag-
onism. Darwin noted that the Fuegians were mer-
ciless to every one not of their tribe, and the same
is probably true of most uncivilized races. Hence
the brutal looking clubs from Fiji, the murderous
war-adzes from New Zealand, and the deadly
swords and daggers of the Orient, the vicious blow-
gun of the Kenyahs, the lethal spears of the Poly-
nesians, and the multifarious shields which keep
them company. The ostrich-feather head-dress of
Masai warriors is a pertinent reminder that that
tribe has advanced so far towards civilization that
it has developed a regular military system and may
be said to have a “standing army.” Yet lest the
visitor should carry away a wrong impression from
all these implements of slaughter, it is seemly to
recall Dr. Tylor’s assertion that “no known tribe,
however low or ferocious, has ever admitted that
men may kill one another indiscriminately.” That
is, the savage can generally produce a reason for
going out to murder his kind, which, to the cynic,
318 The British Museum: Its Treasures
may seem another proof that after all he is not so
far removed from what is known as civilization.
All the objects alluded to in the foregoing pages
have been connected with man’s relations to nature
or to his own kind; there are countless other ex-
hibits which bear upon his attitude to the super-
natural. They illustrate conclusively that unciv-
ilized man makes a distinction between extraordi-
nary and every-day occurrences and the unusual
and ordinary objects of nature, and that those which
cannot be accounted for fill him with mysterious
awe. It is quite possible, then, to imagine the gal-
lery becoming a battlefield among the theorists who
hold diverse views as to the origin of religion. As
the semi-infinite aspects of nature, and the infinite
aspects, such as the seen but unapproachable moon
and sun, cannot be illustrated here, there is nothing
to support Max Müller’s theory that, given man
such as he is, with his five senses such as they are,
and nature such as it is, then religion is a natural
growth. On the other hand the views of those who
hold that all religion is a development from the
worship of the dead are exemplified to a certain
extent. For example, in the African section of the
gallery the visitor will observe a strange-looking
three-mouthed drinking vessel from Uganda, which
was used at human sacrifices. The theory of the
tribe postulates that the spirit of their victim might
after death be all-powerful to work them injury, and
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By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
WOODEN FIGURE OF TANGAROA. CONTEMPORARY PORTRAIT-FIGURE
FROM THE CONGO.



Civilization in the Making 319
hence before he is slain he is given a draught from
this vessel, the object of which is to kill his soul.
From Oceania come the curious ancestral figures
which are intimately related to the theory of ances-
tral worship.
So far as Savage man gives visible shape to his
conceptions of the powers of the supernatural
world, it will be concluded from an inspection of the
numerous idols in the gallery that those conceptions
are not flattering to his deities. Nearly all the
figures are hopelessly grotesque and hideous. The
wooden image used in the Nicobar Islands for scar-
ing away evil spirits, the wooden figure taken from
a sacred enclosure in Hawaii, the effigy of Tangaroa,
the Polynesian sea-god, the war-gods of red feather
from the Hawaiian Islands, the fetish from the
Congo, the monster from Mendiland, and many
other specimens, are all of unrelieved ugliness ac-
cording to the notions of the civilized world. But
that is the savage way all over the world; it is the
unusual or the grotesque which is selected for wor-
ship. Hence it must not be hastily concluded that
the wooden carved figure of Tangaroa, with its
abortion of a head, its four-fingered hands, and its
unrecognizable little figures, symbolical of the god
in the act of creating other gods and men, is insult-
ing to the physical qualities of that god. And it is
betraying a sad lack of appreciation of the mental
processes of Savage man to see cause for laughter
320 The British Museum: Its Treasures
only in the numerous red feather-work war-gods of
Hawaii. The mouths of these deities are certainly
capacious and well filled with teeth, and their eyes
of plates of pearl-shell adorned with wooden pupils
are undoubtedly obtrusive, but all this is intentional
and in keeping with the savage idea that what is
unusual must be placated in some way or another.
Of course these figures are ludicrous to those who
have been taught that God is a spirit, and that He
is one instead of many, but in their crude way they
speak of the groping of man after God if haply he
might find Him. And it might be added that in their
apparently repulsive aspects they are not so far
removed from conceptions of the divine nature
which have been held even by civilized men.
Juvenile visitors to the gallery, and especially
those who are fresh from the pages of “Robinson
Crusoe,” find much to interest them in the various
canoes and models of canoes which are specially
prominent in the Oceania bays. They are of all
types, from the highly-finished vessels of New Zea-
land to the less ornate but equally useful models
from Tahiti. The latter include examples of the
single and double canoe, many of which are adorned
with sternposts carved with the figure of a god.
The Micronesians were skilful boat-builders, and
their business on the great waters led them to con-
struct charts of an exceedingly ingenious kind. One
from the Marshall Islands deserves special atten-
Civilization in the Making 321
tion. It is made of open cane-work, to which small
shells are attached here and there to indicate the
position of the islands. Nor is that all. It will be
observed that the chart is crossed in different places
with bent strips of cane, which represented the di-
rection of the prevailing winds. To the modern
navigator it may seem a primitive form of chart,
but that it served its purpose is proved by the fact
that the Micronesians made many voyages of a dar-
ing nature. A recent traveller in New Guinea has
placed on record the fact that some natives in their
canoes were able in a few minutes to overtake a
steamer of modern construction.
As even in the civilized world it is often difficult
to decide where textile craftsmanship shades off
into art, it is not surprising that it is still more of
a puzzle to distinguish the two in the work of sav-
age man. Many of the objects already mentioned
are remarkable for the manner in which they are
decorated, for there is hardly an object made by
native tribes which has not some kind of adornment.
The boomerangs of Australia, the clubs of Fiji, the
shields of New Guinea, the priestly staves of Su-
matra, the house-boards of Borneo, the drums from
the Congo — all these and countless other objects
are notable for the skill of their carving and other
decoration. It has been shown in a previous chap-
ter that even prehistoric man sought some outlet
for his artistic feelings, and it is not surprising that
322 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Savages dwelling amid environments conducive to
a less stressful life turned to the decoration of their
belongings as an enjoyable occupation.
- Early pottery is of course rudely shaped, but once
the potter had mastered the utilitarian side of his
craft he seems to have devoted his attention nat-
urally to an expression of his ideas of the beautiful.
The vases from Uganda illustrate how savage man
went to nature for his models of form, for their
shape is reminiscent of the gourd; and it was to
nature also that the savage looked for his decora-
tions, as is obvious from the many ornaments which
have been copied from the insect world or from the
shapes of leaves and flowers. The Maori specimens
of native art are particularly striking. The carved
figure-head of a canoe would tax the skill of a civ-
ilized craftsman, and the jade ornaments exhibited
on one of the screens are finished in a masterly man-
ner. What, too, could be more effective than the
carving on the clubs and dancing-shields from New
Guinea, or the minute detail of the shale pipe from
Queen Charlotte Islands? If all these examples are
to be regarded as merely applied decoration, the
contemporary portrait-figure of Bope Pelenge from
the Kasai district of the Congo is a convincing proof
that savage man is capable of establishing a claim
to be considered an artist. There is no denying the
assertion that “ the art of the Bushongo is re-
markable: not only are their wood-carvings exceed-
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
WOODEN DANCING - RATTLE FROM QUEEN
CLUBS AND DANCING - SHIELD FROM NEW
ISLANDS.
CHARLOTTE
GUINEA.




Civilization in the Making 323
ingly graceful in outline and covered with patterns
of singular beauty, similar to the embroidered de-
signs on their cloth (which often recall our “Late
Keltic ’ period), but the art of portraiture is prac-
tised amongst them, and the wooden statues of their
early kings are the most striking products of indige-
nous African art.”
Perhaps, however, the most astonishing examples
of native art are provided by the remarkable bronze
castings from the city of Benin in British West
Africa. They were acquired by the museum as the
result of a primitive expedition in 1897. Early in
that year the consul-general and a party of Euro-
peans were ruthlessly massacred, but their deaths
were speedily avenged by a British force, which
also brought away the numerous plaques and other
works of art exhibited in one of the wall-cases and
several of the central screens of the gallery.
Although of pure negro descent, the Beni proved
apt pupils when, in the sixteenth century, they were
taught the art of casting in metal by the Portuguese.
A native account of the event sets forth how “when
the white men came, in the time when Esige was
king, a man named Ahammangiwa came with them.
He made brasswork and plaques for the king, he
stayed a very long time — he had many wives but
no children — the king gave him plenty of boys to
teach. We can make brasswork now, but not as he
made it, because he and all his boys are dead.”
324 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Perhaps that unidentified “white man,” or one of
the most apt of his pupils, was responsible for the
striking head of a young woman which is a conspic-
uous object among the Benin treasures. It is obvi-
ous that it belongs to an earlier period than most
of the plaques, for the modelling and casting are
alike admirable. The conical head-dress of coral,
with its coral pendants, and the necklace, are not
more carefully finished than the four cicatrices over
each eyebrow, or the details of the eyes, nose, and
mouth.
Judging from the evidence furnished by the
bronzes, which is strengthened by the information
of an officer who has been on active duty in the city,
the Benin plaques were produced by the wax proc-
ess of casting. The model to be reproduced is first
carefully finished in wax, and then gradually coated
with clay in a liquid state until by successive layers
a sufficiently substantial mould has been made.
Then, when the whole is thoroughly dry and hard,
a hole is made in the clay and the wax inside run
off by the application of heat. The same hole is
used for the pouring in of the molten metal, and
when that has cooled the outer covering is broken
off. That, notwithstanding the death of their orig-
inal tutor and his first pupils, the Beni have re-
tained remarkable skill in manipulating the process
is demonstrated by these numerous examples of
their work. The plaques include many representa-


Civilization in the Making 325
tions of European figures, which are of great value
for the information they give as to the dress, weap-
ons, and ornaments affected by the Portuguese of
the sixteenth century. And the figures of the king
of Benin and his various attendants are not less
interesting. It is agreed that all these bronzes are
of native production throughout and hence they are
extremely valuable as illustrating the latent artis-
tic capacity of uncivilized man. As might be ex-
pected, there is a certain crudeness about the draw-
ing, and proportion is rarely well observed, but that
the bronzes are instinct with spirit and show keen
observation on the part of the artists will be gen-
erally admitted. The animals and fishes are more
than conventional creatures, and the transcripts
from nature, such as the palm-tree, need no labels.
When it is remembered, too, that the process by
which they were produced gave no opportunity for
the correction of original blunders, and that the
plaques do not bear any evidences of finishing
touches subsequent to the casting, it will be agreed
that these metal reliefs must be accorded a high
place in the annals of untutored art. And they are
a fitting climax to the objects of a gallery so rich
in proofs of man’s steady advance in civilization.
CHAPTER VIII
TEIE ARTS OF LIFE
AMPLE evidence has been adduced in a previous
chapter to show that even prehistoric man was not
content that his belongings should be merely useful.
His roughly-shaped axe of stone was probably as
fatal in its blows as the polished model by which it
was succeeded, and his rude splinter of flint as pene-
trating a point as the deftly-modelled arrowhead to
which it gave place. And there was no necessity for
him to take up a fragment of bone and decorate it
with an animal form, or spend laborious hours over
carving a mammoth tusk into the likeness of a rein-
deer’s head. But to say there was “no necessity '’
is doing prehistoric man an injustice. Near akin as
he was to the brute creation, he had a sense of
beauty, and that he was not content with the mis-
shapen forms of his weapons or with the bare sur-
faces of the bones scattered around his cave is suf-
ficient proof that that sense of beauty demanded
some sort of expression. -
How that feeling persisted through the ages has
been fully illustrated in the foregoing chapter. The
Australian’s boomerang did not find its mark in a
more unerring manner because it was adorned with
326
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
BRONZE HANDLE OF LITTER.

The Arts of Life 327
complicated patterns, nor did the knife of the Amer-
ican Indian prove more deadly because its handle
bore a carved resemblance to a human head. It
matters not to what period of human history we
turn; in some form or other evidence will be forth-
coming to show that man’s sense of beauty has been
struggling for expression through countless cen-
turies. As he advanced in power to give form to his
thoughts and in his command over his material, it
was natural that his tribute to his sense of beauty
should become more marked. The further removed
he was from the stress of life, the more attention
he paid to the arts of life.
Thanks to the speculations of the philosophers,
we have now reached a stage in the theory of aesthet-
ics when the fine arts are hedged around and re-
stricted to objects which have no relation to utility,
but in earlier years man bothered himself not at all
about such distinctions. This was so even in the
sixteenth century, for Benvenuto Cellini was re-
garded as an artist even if he did design articles
which were useful as well as beautiful. To-day a
designer of salt-cellars would probably be dubbed
a craftsman; in Cellini’s age he was a comrade of
Michel Angelo. As to whether it is a gain or loss
to have so sharp a distinction drawn between the
absolutely beautiful and that which is useful as well
as beautiful, need not be discussed; what is to the
point is that there are several departments of the
328 The British Museum: Its Treasures
British Museum which illustrate the happy blend “jº
of the two.
As showing how useful objects gradually took an
artistic form the department of coins and medals
has undeniable claims upon the visitor’s attention.
Here, of course, is a case where utility was the prime
original motive. A world without money is un-
thinkable to the natives of civilized lands. Take
away the medium which provides a standard of
comparative value, and social organization falls to
pieces. Imagine the case of the tailor who “ had
only coats and wanted to buy bread or a horse; ”
how is he to decide how much bread he ought to
receive for a coat, or how many coats he should give
for a horse? “It is interesting,” writes Dr. Tylor,
“ to see trade in its lowest form among such tribes
as the Australians. The tough greenstone valuable
for making hatchets is carried hundreds of miles
by natives, who receive from other tribes in return
the prized objects of their districts, such as red
ochre to paint their bodies with.” The savage still
has to barter in kind, but the civilized world has for
so long enjoyed the convenience of money or its
equivalent that little thought is paid to what it rep-
resents. .
Practically nothing is known of the long process
by which man eliminated cumbersome articles of
exchange and arrived at the use of metals. It is
agreed, however, that the Greek coinage is the old-
The Arts of Life 329
est in existence, a fact which lends unique interest
to the frames of Greek coins which may be found
in the Room of Greek and Roman Life. The earli-
est of these dates from about 700 B.C., and is a piece
of electrum shaped somewhat like a bean. Here we
have utility and nothing more. Much the same may
be said of all the other coins in Frame I, even though
they may include a Persian gold daric, and exam-
ples from Macedon with a figure representing a lion
devouring a bull, for all these belong to what is
known as the archaic period. But the examples in
Frame II take us a step further toward the combi-
nation of the beautiful with the useful. The coins in
this case were minted at Athens, Thrace, and Syra-
cuse, and are characterized ‘‘ by an increased deli-
cacy in the rendering of details, and a true under-
standing of the anatomical structure of the human
body, and, towards the close of the period, by
greater freedom of movement, every effort being
then directed to realize ideal conceptions, a com-
plete mastery of technical skill having been already
attained.” But the climax is reached in Frame III,
the contents of which belong to the period 400-
336 B. C. It was now the custom to adorn the ob-
verses of the coins with heads of mythological char-
acters, which have proved of great value for the
light they have thrown on contemporary concep-
tions of the various gods. “ Not only is the memory
of lost statues preserved to us in the designs of an-
330 The British Museum: Its Treasures
cient coins, but those of Greece afford admirable
examples of that skill by which her sculptors at-
tained their great renown. The excellence of the
designs of very many Greek coins struck during the
period of the best art is indeed so great that, were
it not for their smallness, they would form the finest
series of art studies in the world.” How deserved
is this eulogy will be admitted by all who study the
tetradrachm of Amphipolis with its wistful head of
Apollo, the silver stater of Pandosia with its finely
modelled head of Hera Lakinia, or the dekadrachm
of Syracuse with its spirited obverse and reverse.
The other frames from IV to VII represent further
stages in the history of Greek coinage and are spe-
cially instructive for the proof they afford of the
possibility of decline in artistic expression even
when the designers have superb models to guide
them. But the contents of Frame VIII make
amends, for here are some admirable examples of
Greek portraiture, including striking if idealized
heads of Ptolemy I, Lysimachus, Mithridates VI,
Perseus of Macedon, Alexander, and Cleopatra.
Although not so artistic, the Jewish coins in the
lower portion of Frame VIII are of supreme inter-
est for the assistance they give in attaching concrete
ideas to the various kinds of money mentioned in
the Bible. Those familiar with the New Testament
will recall that three kinds of money are mentioned
therein, that is, gold, silver, and brass, and it is of
The Arts of Life 331
absorbing interest to gaze upon specimens of the
Roman denarius or “penny ” of the Gospels, the
drachm of the parable of the woman who had ten
of those pieces, the “mite ” of the poor widow, and
the “uttermost farthing ” of Matthew.
Further examples of the coins of many nations,
including those of the Romans, ancient and mediae-
val India, Great Britain, etc., may be inspected in
great numbers in the room of the department. The
British examples start from Anglo-Saxon times and
are continued down to our own day. This series
will illustrate once more the possibility of decadence,
for when one compares the artistic nobles of Ed-
ward III and the three-pound pieces of Charles I
with the jubilee coins of Victoria it is painfully ob-
vious that in modern days the element of beauty
has been entirely ignored. That fact, however, must
not be allowed to outweigh the many proofs which
other coins have afforded as to the possibility of
blending beauty with utility. -
If the visitor passes now to the Asiatic Room on
the upper floor of the museum he will find himself
surrounded by a bewildering wealth of examples of
pottery and porcelain and other works of art from
Japan, China, India and Persia. As was the case
in the department of coins, these objects will illus-
trate once more how articles of utility were at first
made in the rudest form and then gradually as-
sumed shapes and decorations which gave them the
332 The British Museum: Its Treasures
added element of beauty. For example, in wall-
cases 1 to 9 there is a collection of utensils used
in ceremonial tea-drinking most of which are ex-
ceedingly primitive, but the forerunners of utensils
which would adorn any table. Perhaps, however,
the most convincing proofs of the application of art
to objects intended primarily for a practical pur-
pose are provided by the series of Japanese ne-
tsukés. Notwithstanding its unfamiliar name, the
netsuké was nothing more nor less than a button,
and was used to fix in the girdle of the Japanese that
little medicine-box which used to be an essential ar-
ticle of his wardrobe, as unfailing a companion, in-
deed, as the pocket-knife of the Westerner. Now
it is obvious that there was no necessity for the
netsuké being different from an ordinary button
so far as its utility was concerned, but that doctrine
did not commend itself to the art-loving Japanese.
Hence the pains which were spent on carving the
netsuké, and transforming its diminutive surface
into pictures of mythology, folk-lore, and represen-
tations of national life. This tribute to the sense
of beauty is also illustrated by the beautifully-
carved sword-guards which are in the succession of
the decorated Australian boomerang.
In the Glass and Ceramic Gallery and in the
ante-room of that apartment the arts of life are
still further illustrated. The wall-cases of the latter
are given up to a remarkable collection of English
The Arts of Life 333
pottery and porcelain, the first eight cases exhibit-
ing numerous specimens dating from Norman times
to the beginning of the seventeenth century. At that
early period the potter’s art was not confined to
specific localities as in later years, so there is no
question of ‘‘ schools '' to bother the visitor. He
is free to study the various forms from the evolu-
tionary standpoint and will doubtless find much in-
terest in tracing the gradual development towards
more artistic examples. The style of pottery
known as “slip-ware '’ because of the liquid form
of the clay while it was being ornamented, is copi-
ously illustrated in wall-cases 9 to 20, the examples
including dishes, candlesticks, bowls, and other ar-
ticles. Other varieties such as Staffordshire ware,
Fulham stoneware, Chelsea and Derby ware, etc.,
are represented by numerous specimens. In the
gallery itself worthy prominence is given to a fine
collection of Wedgwood, the work of the famous
potter who holds so distinguished a place in the his-
tory of ceramics for his inventive faculty and the
artistic products of his kilns. Many of the examples
of English Delft are quaintly interesting, particu-
larly those which are inscribed with the doggerel
lines so popular in past generations. -
Continental and other foreign pottery is well rep-
resented by examples from Holland, Germany, Italy,
Spain, France, Turkey, and Persia. The gallery
is also notable for its collection of glass, which
334 The British Museum: Its Treasures
ranges from specimens of ancient Egyptian manu-
facture to the exquisite cups and vases of the Vene-
tian school. It will be observed that in the majority
of cases these glass objects were designed as much
for use as ornament, particularly the drinking-
glasses, the bottles, the lamps, and even the cinerary
urns of Roman make. Than the examples of Vene-
tian glass it would be difficult to imagine any arti-
cles more worthy to be regarded as art products.
It is well known of course that glass-making was
practised in Egypt, Assyria, and Rome, but it
reached its greatest perfection in Venice, where it
began to be followed in the fifth century. By the
thirteenth century the glass-makers of Venice had
reached the dignity of an incorporated body, and
in their processions were wont to carry decanters,
scent-bottles, and even weights and measures as ex-
amples of their skill. It has been well pointed out
that the peculiar merits of Venetian glass are the
elegance of form and the surprising lightness of the
substance of which the vessels are made, qualities
which are notably illustrated by the examples in the
museum. Those examples also show how perfectly
art may be blended with utility. -
For diversified interest none of the sections of
the museum devoted to the arts of life can compare
with the Mediaeval Room, which is also situated on
the upper floor of the building. The wall and table-
cases of this apartment are particularly rich in ob-
|
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
ENGLISH AND OTHER CHALICES. -
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
SARACENIC EWERS.


The Arts of Life 335
jects related in the main to the more aesthetic side
of civilized life, embracing as they do examples of
religious art and ornate specimens of the utensils
and implements of daily existence. The room is ad-
mirably arranged, most articles of a specific kind
being grouped conveniently together. The one ex-
ception, that of table-case A, may be forgiven in
view of the historical interest of its contents. Here
are numerous relics of past ages which conjure up
visions of fair and unfortunate ladies and brave
knights and immortal poets. There lies a pocket-
dial engraved with the arms of the Earl of Essex,
the passionate and impulsive favourite of Elizabeth;
near by is the astrolabe made for Henry VIII; in
another corner is the coffin-plate of Mary of Mo-
dena, keeping company with a garter-plate of Sir
Anthony Browne. That state-sword once knew the
hand-clasp of Edward V, that dress-sword was worn
by Edward Gibbon, this punch-bowl, carved from
the wood of Shakespeare's mulberry tree, has been
raised full often to the lips of Robert Burns. And
yonder “pretty bowl of wood '' is the same that
stood before Shelley when he indited his poetical
letter to Maria Gisborne:
“A pretty bowl of wood—not full of wine,
But quicksilver; that dew which the gnomes drink
When at their subterranean toil they swink, -
Pledging the demons of the earthquake, who
Reply to them in lava.” -

336 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Perhaps, however, believers in the occult will find
more to interest them in that orange-shaped and
Orange-sized piece of solid pink tinted glass, the
wonder-working crystal of the notorious Dr. Dee,
whose circular wax-tablets fittingly keep it company.
That is the holy stone which the astrologer declared
was given him by an angel.
We shall never learn when man first became con-
scious of time, or when he began dividing the year
into months, the month into weeks, the week into
days, and the days into hours and minutes; all that
is known is that the sun-dial, his most primitive
measurer of the fleeting hours, dates back at least
two thousand years. In its earliest form it was a
fixed instrument, and although that type has long
been obsolete for practical purposes it yet survives
as an adornment of Old World gardens. Long after
it had been perfected for use on a church-wall or a
garden pedestal, the dial was made in a portable
form, and examples of the various shapes it took
in the olden days are exhibited with the old clocks
and watches preserved in wall-cases 21 to 26 and
in table-cases G and K. Among the specimens are
examples of the cup-dial, the form of which is indi-
cated by its name; the pillar-dial, an upright cylin-
der with a movable style; the ring-dial, and the
armillary-dial; and the nocturnal, which was in-
tended to tell the time at night. In connection with
these devices for telling the time o’ day attention
ish Museum.
By Permission of the Trustees of the Brit
CLOCK MADE FOR THE EMPEROR RUDOLPH II.

The Arts of Life 337
should also be given to the examples of the astro-
labe, which, in addition to its use for taking the alti-
tude of the sun at sea, was sometimes employed as
a sun-dial. Some of the portable dials were com-
plicated enough, and difficult to read, but they were
simplicity itself compared with the astrolabe. For
proof whereof let the curious turn to Chaucer’s
treatise on the astrolabe, written for the edification
of his “litell Lowis,” but puzzling enough for a
mature man. It is pointed out that the prime de-
fect of the early portable dials was ‘‘ that when
they were used about midday it was first necessary
to determine whether noon was already past or
not,” but even in their better forms the dials of the
good old times were evidently tricky things to ma-
nipulate.
As was the case with the earliest dials, the first
clocks were fixtures in church-towers or castle-walls.
In that form they date back to about the thirteenth
century. Exactly when a substitute for the driving-
weights and long chains was discovered is unde-
cided, but the portable clock was certainly in exist-
ence by the beginning of the sixteenth century, and
the wall and table-cases mentioned above contain
numerous examples by which the visitor can trace
its subsequent evolution. The fantastic time-piece
in the form of a ship, which is thought to have been
made for the Emperor Rudolph II, is a pertinent
illustration of man’s passion to adorn the useful.
338 The British Museum: Its Treasures
Some of these time measures have an added inter-
est from the fact of their having been in the posses-
sion of famous owners, for one of the small English
watches is said to have been the property of Oliver
Cromwell and another belonged to George III.
Apart from the too ornate timepiece of Rudolph II,
it will be observed that numerous examples are re-
markable for their artistic appearance. One of the
most atttactive models, too, that made by Bartholo-
mew Newsum about 1590, illustrates the early
custom of providing only an hour-hand. Other
models show the quaint forms affected in the six-
teenth century, such as skulls, books, flowers,
crosses, and animals. It will also be noted that the
earliest clocks were innocent of covering glasses,
their place being taken by perforated metal covers.
How greatly the prices of timepieces varied in the
sixteenth century is illustrated by entries in the ac-
counts of the Rutland family of that period, which
show that while a stone dial cost five shillings and a
watch and two compass-dials cost three pounds, five
pounds ten shillings were paid for ‘‘ a clocke and
quarter clocke.” -
Interesting as are the associations connected with
some of the objects mentioned above, none of them,
nor any other specimens exhibited in the room, can
compare with the Crystal of Lothair, an engraved
gem of the ninth century, for the stirring vicissi-
tudes through which it has passed. The inscription
The Arts of Life 339
on the crystal, which is shown in table-case F, sets
forth that it was engraved by order of Lothair,
Ring of the Franks, but in the tenth century it had
passed into the possession of the wife of the Count
of Florennes. Acting on the principle that what
was his wife’s was his, the count one day handed
the crystal to a canon of Rheims in pledge for a
horse to which he had taken a liking. Shortly after-
wards, having raised the money to redeem the jewel,
the count repaired to the monk, who, however, de-
nied all knowledge of the transaction. And it was
not until the count summoned his retainers and be-
sieged and set fire to the church that the defaulting
churchman, in his effort to escape, ran into the
count’s arms and was discovered to have the crys-
tal on his person. But remorse overtook the soldier
in his old age, and to placate his conscience for his
sacrilege he bequeathed the crystal to the Abbey of
Waulsort, where it remained for eight centuries.
The French Revolution led to the scattering of the
monks, and the jewel disappeared until the middle
of the last century, when it was sold for twelve
francs to a French collector who was informed that
it had been found in the river Meuse. That it has
survived all its adventures at the small expense of
a crack across its surface is not the least wonderful
part of its history. Happily the blemish has not
defaced any material part of the scenes connected
with the exciting adventures of Susanna with which
340 The British Museum: Its Treasures
it is decorated. The other engraved gems of the
room include some exquisite cameos and reliefs in
pearl-shell.
No fewer than five wall-cases, in addition to one
table-case, are devoted largely to objects in enamel.
While it requires the knowledge of an expert to ap-
preciate to the full the value of this collection, many
of the articles are of such rare beauty that they
must appeal to even those who are ignorant of the
shades of difference between champlevé or any other
variety. There are numerous examples of all kinds
of work, cloisonné, enamel in openwork, translucent
enamels, incrusted and mixed enamels, and painted
enamels. The articles are even more varied than the
processes, including as they do brooches, plaques,
reliquaries, panels, candlesticks, portraits, cibori-
ums, medallions, etc. And the subjects depicted
range from Old Testament episodes to the legends
of mythology. The enamels, indeed, are a picture
gallery in themselves, now portraying the labours
of Hercules or a group of Jupiter, Juno and other
deities; anon the history of Psyche or the Sibyls;
and then a maternal moment in the life of the Vir-
gin, or the tragic scenes of the Crucifixion. The
collection is specially rich in examples of the four
periods of the painted enamels of Limoges, from the
earliest products of the late fifteenth century to the
decadent work of the eighteenth century.
Another type of vertu, namely carvings in ivory,
º
§
*.
*
*
**.
º
º
º
º
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
ITALIAN CASKET.

The Arts of Life 341
is also richly illustrated in the Mediaeval Room.
These objects will be found in wall-cases 35 to 43
and in table-case F. The ivories of the pre-Gothic
period include some striking examples of the fifth
and sixth centuries, while the later ivories are
representative of the work done from the thirteenth
to the fifteenth centuries. At first the sculptors con-
fined themselves to the decoration of writing tablets
and caskets, but subsequently they directed their
labours to the adornment of pastoral staffs, combs
used by churchmen in connection with the celebra-
tion of the mass, crucifixes, buckets for holy water,
and then, still later, chessmen, draughtsmen, and
portrait medallions. Naturally the earliest exam-
ples had for their subjects incidents connected with
Biblical characters and episodes, or episodes from
the lives of the saints, but when art broke away from
the influence of the church the ivory carvers turned
to mythology or romance in much the same way as
the workers in enamel.
As may be expected, jewelry of all kinds figures
largely among the exhibits in this department.
Bells and bracelets, brooches and buttons, chains
and pendants are here in varied types; and the col-
lection of rings is replete with interest for its com-
pleteness. The types of the latter range from the
bow-rings of horn or crystal which were worn by
archers on the thumb of the left hand and used for
releasing the bow-string, to poison-rings such as
342 The British Museum: Its Treasures
s;X--º-º
--$º.--
-.s
play so conspicuous a part in the stories of the
olden time. There are cramp-rings, so called be-
cause, having been touched by a king, they were held
to be a remedy for cramp and other ailments;
decade-rings, which take their name from the ten
knobs on their circumference which were used as an
abbreviated rosary; episcopal and papal rings;
magical rings, worn as a protection against disease
or the enmity of man; and posy rings, that is those
engraved with a motto or verse of a religious or
affectionate nature.
Further illustration of the artistic skill which
man has expended upon objects for the adornment
of his person or his home is provided in the Wadde-
son Bequest Room. For the valuable collection
preserved in that gallery the museum is indebted
to the noble generosity of Baron Ferdinand Roths-
child, a former Trustee, who stipulated that the ob-
jects should be preserved together in one room
named after his Waddeson mansion where they
were originally kept. These art specimens number
upwards of two hundred and sixty, and are natu-
rally of a kind obtainable only by a collector of un-
limited wealth. They include remarkable and costly
examples of cups and vases of rock crystal, jewels
and personal ornaments, enamels, carvings in wood,
glass vessels, arms and armour, and silver standing
cups. The value of the collection may be judged
from the fact that one single object, the Lyte jewel,
The Arts of Life 343
cost Baron Rothschild nearly three thousand
pounds. Apart from its price, however, the jewel
is of interest for its association with the “wisest
fool in Christendom.” It has already been seen that
James I had a weakness for antiquities and was
keenly interested in pedigrees, especially his own.
No doubt Thomas Lyte counted upon that fact when
he drew up the “most royally ennobled genealogy ''
of James, which he had engrossed on vellum “fairer
than any print ’’ and illuminated with “admirable
flourishes and painting.” That the king studied
this formidable family-tree with avidity goes with-
out saying, and probably Thomas Lyte was not sur-
prised when his labours were rewarded with a gift
of the king’s portrait in gold richly set with dia-
monds. Such was the origin of the Lyte jewel,
which still survives while the genealogy for which
it was the reward has wholly disappeared.
In artistic merit if not in cash value the Lyte
jewel is exceeded by the circular medallions designed
originally as adornments for the handles of a Greek
litter. They belong to the third century before
Christ and it is well affirmed that “the serene
beauty of these heads places them in quite a differ-
ent category from the great proportion of the rest
of the collection.” The wood carvings include a
little tabernacle which is notable for the minute
nature of its details, and two German portrait busts
which were bought originally for four shillings.
344 The British Museum: Its Treasures
One of the most ornate objects is a fine specimen of
an ostrich egg elaborately mounted as a cup in sil-
ver, the date of which is 1554.
Some captious critics might be disposed to resent
the use of the word “art ’’ in connection with the
objects described in the foregoing pages; if they
agree with Ruskin in nothing else they subscribe to
his dictum that ‘‘ portable art — independent of all
place — is for the most part ignoble art,” and to
his assertion that “ the wild boar of silver which
you use for a seal, or lock in a velvet case, is little
likely to be so noble a beast as the bronze boar who
foams forth the fountain from under his tusks in the
market-place of Florence.” Whatever may be the
truth of such assertions, no one will question the
application of the term “art '’ to the contents of
one other division of the museum which remains to
be noticed, that is, the Department of Prints and
Drawings.
So far as the general visitor is concerned the
riches of that department are for the most part
hidden from view. It will be observed that on the
east side of the Asiatic Saloon there is a vestibule
leading to another apartment but that it is guarded
by one of those barriers which warn off all save stu-
dents. That is the entrance to the students’ room
of the Prints and Drawings department, for the
constant use of which, as in the case of the Reading
and Manuscript Rooms, a ticket is necessary. If,
By Permission of the Trustees of the British Museum.
OSTRICH - EGG CUP.
- -
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
:
-
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-
-
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:







The Arts of Life 345
however, the visitor is interested in the engravings
and drawings of artists, knows what he wants to
see, and intends but a brief stay, he is free to the
courtesy of the department by signing his name and
address in the book kept for such records. This is
an arrangement designed specially for the conve-
nience of such as have but a limited time to spend in
London, and is not generally known. Those, how-
ever, who wish to make frequent use of the room
must, as stated above, apply to the Director in the
usual way. The regular student’s ticket is avail-
able for six months, but is subject to renewal on
request.
Postponing for the moment a brief survey of the
contents of the department, attention should be
directed to the fact that in the gallery leading off
the Glass and Ceramic Room there are held peri-
odical exhibitions of prints and drawings which are
open without restriction to all visitors. Now and
again the happening of some notable event is made
the occasion of a special exhibition of pictures bear-
ing upon that event, but as a general rule the con-
tents of the gallery are changed every two or three
years. Thus in the last decade there have been
exhibitions of the drawings and etchings of Rem-
brandt, of drawings and sketches by various old
masters of the English school, and of mezzotints
from the Cheylesmore collection; while at the time
of writing the walls are given up to examples of

346 The British Museum: Its Treasures
painting as practised in China and Japan from the
fourth to the nineteenth century.
Even if the exhibitions were changed with great
frequency, say every month, it would be many
years before the varied stores of the department
were exhausted. The title of the department indi-
cates that its treasures are of two kinds, that is,
prints, meaning thereby engravings, etchings, mez-
Zotints, aquatints, wood engravings, and litho-
graphs; and drawings, namely, original sketches as
they left the hands of their creators. The collec-
tion is of great range and variety, and has been in
constant growth since the foundation of the mu-
seum. It will be remembered that the treasures of
Sir Hans Sloane included many pictures, and that
among the bequests of the earliest benefactors were
the richly-stored portfolios of the Rev. C. M. Cra-
cherode. Subsequent purchases and gifts have been
too numerous for complete tabulation, but some
idea of the money expended in enriching the depart-
ment may be gathered from the fact that six hun-
dred pounds were paid for a single tiny drawing
by Raphael. The gifts of generous art-lovers have
been numerous and of great value, including Ellis
Ellis's unique extra-illustrated copy of the Letters
of Madame de Sévigné, extending to thirty-eight
volumes embellished with upwards of nine thou-
sand portraits, views, etc.; a complete set of the
catalogues of the Royal Academy from 1769 to 1838
The Arts of Life 347
in thirteen volumes; Pennant’s account of London
in fourteen fully illustrated volumes, etc.
None but those acquainted with the minute de-
tails of the history of art can appreciate to the full
the fine equipment of the department, but a few par-
ticulars as to the various schools represented may
be offered for their suggestive value. Of the Ital-
ian School, for example, there are original drawings
by upwards of three hundred artists, including such
sons of fame as Bellini, Perugino, Titian, Michel
Angelo, and Leonardo Da Vinci; of the German
school there are drawings by upwards of fifty art-
ists, with Dürer and Holbein among the number;
the Dutch and Flemish schools are represented by
drawings by upwards of two hundred and ninety
artists; the French by upwards of seventy and the
Spanish by upwards of forty. Needless to say, the
English school also has a strong showing. And
none of these figures take account of the prints by
artists belonging to the countries mentioned. In
fact nothing short of exhaustive catalogues, of which
more than fifty volumes have been prepared from
time to time, can give an adequate idea of the riches
of this one department of the museum.
Could the earliest benefactors of the British Mu-
seum visit its galleries to-day, how gratified they
would be to think of their own share in the creation
of that great institution. It might cause them a
momentary pang to discover that the collections in
348 The British Museum: Its Treasures
which they took so much pride and which they im-
agined so complete have been overshadowed by
accessions of which they knew nothing and never
dreamt, but as they wandered through the richly-
stocked and well-ordered rooms, and came to realize
the liberal manner in which this treasure house of
learning is administered for the instruction of all
without respect of position or means, that feeling
would give place to a sense of unqualified delight
that their labours have had issue in such a result.
So far as names and dates and incidents are con-
cerned, it is possible to place the history of the
museum on record; what is not possible is any
account, even the most tentative, of the far-reach-
ing influence its treasures have exerted in enriching
the minds of its countless visitors, and in clarifying
and widening the scope of human knowledge.
THE END.
INDEX
Acropolis, 183, 187.
Addison, Joseph, 163.
Admission regulations of the
British Museum, 57, 58, 59,
60, 61, 62, 63, 107, 121, 344,
345.
Aegina, Sculptures from, 179,
180 -
Aesthetics, Theory of, 327.
Africa, Ethnography of, 303, 306,
307.
Alexander the Great, 196, 235.
Alexandria, Assault of, 88.
Alexandrian MS., 49.
Amasis I, 230.
Amenemhat I, 227.
Amenemhat II, 228.
Amenhetep, King, 230.
Amenhetep III, 231, 232.
Amenhetep IV, 232, 233.
America, Ethnography of, 303,
307.
Ancestral worship, 319.
Anne, Queen, 25, 27.
Annual Register, The, 56, 64, 86.
Antiquarian Society, The, 14.
Apollo, Temple of, 191.
Archaic Room, 177, 178, 180.
Aristotle, 304.
Aristotle’s “Constitution of
Athens,” 151.
Arnold, Dr. Thomas, 210.
“Ars Moriendi, The,” 135, 136,
138.
Art, Ruskin’s A. B. C. of, 173,
181, 205.
Artemisia, 194, 195.
Arts of Life, The, 326-348.
Arundel, Earl of, see Thomas
Howard.
Arundel Manuscripts, 83, 84.
Asclepios, 191.
Ashburnham House, 4, 48, 52,
146.
Ashur, the god, 253, 266, 267.
Ashur-bani-pal, 245, 260, 261,
262, 263, 265, 266, 269.
Ashur-nasir-pal, 244, 252, 253,
254, 255.
Asia, Ethnography of, 303, 305.
Asiatic Room, 331.
Aspasia, 191.
Assyria, 243, 244.
Assyrians, Physique of, 252, 253.
Astrolabes, 337.
Athenè, 181, 184, 185, 186, 187.
Athens, 90, 91, 173, 174, 176.
Atkyns, Richard, 139.
Atreus, Treasury of, 178.
Augustus, Bust of, 199.
Aurelius, Marcus, Bust of, 200.
Austen, Jane, 164.
Autographs of famous men, 158,
165.
Babel, Tower of, 243.
Baber, Henry H., 96.
Babylon, 243.
Babylonia, 243, 244.
Babylonian and Assyrian Antiq-
uities, 240-271.
Bark-cloth, 312, 313.
Barnard, Frederick A., 79, 80.
Baston, Thomas, 30.
Beauty, Sense of, 326, 327.
Behistun, Rock of, 241.
Beloe, Rev. William, 77, 105.
Benin Bronzes, 323, 324, 325.
Bentley, Richard, 3, 4, 5, 49.
Beowulf, Manuscript of, 152.
Bible, Manuscripts of, 166, 167,
I69.
Bibles, Early printed, 136, 137,
141.
349
350
Index
Binding, Choice examples of, 142,
143, 169, 170.
Birch, Dr. Thomas, 35, 75.
Block-Books, 134, 135, 136.
Bodleian Library, 80.
Bodley, Thomas, 14, 15.
Boleyn, Anne, 157.
Bond, Edward A., 112, 113.
Books, First editions of famous,
141, 142.
Books, Manuscripts of famous,
165.
Borough, John, 18.
Boswell, James, 163.
Branchidae, Sculptures from, 179.
Breasted, James H., 211, 219, 220,
222, 226.
Bridgewater, Earl of, see Francis
Henry Egerton.
Bridgewater Treatises, The, 82.
Britain, Early, 298.
British and Romano-British An-
tiquities, 274.
British coins, 331.
Bronze Age, The, 277, 292, 293,
294, 295. -
Bronze Room, 204, 205.
Brooke, Stopford A., 152.
Browning, Robert, 164.
Bruce, Thomas, 89 (and see Earl
of Elgin).
Buckingham House, 55.
Buckingham Palace, 80. .
Budge, E. A. Wallis, 216, 218,
237. -
Burney, Dr. Charles, 78.
Burns, Robert, 143, 166, 335.
Byron, Lord, 163, 166, 172, 260.
Caesar, Julius, 198, 298.
Camden, William, 10, 11, 12, 13,
18.
Canoes of Savage races, 320.
Canopic jars, 236, 237.
Canova, Antonio, 92.
Carew, Richard, of Antony, 14,
15.
Carlyle, Thomas, 73, 124, 154.
Carving of Savage races, 321,
322.
Cary, H. F., 114, 115, 116.
Cave'dweilers, 275,383,384, 286,
287, 295.
Caxton, William, 139, 140,
Cellini, Benvenuto, 327.
Centaurs and Lapiths, 187, 192.
Charles I, 17, 51, 73, 74.
Charles II, 73, 142, 157, 159.
Chart of Marshall Islands, 320,
321.
Chatterton, Thomas, 163.
Chaucer, Geoffrey, 337.
Chronology, Biblical, 273.
Churchill, Sarah, 160.
Civilization, 299, 300, 301.
Claudius, Bust of, 199.
Clay tablets, Assyrian, 265, 266,
267, 268, 269, 270.
Cleopatra, 207, 208.
Cleopatra's Needles,
231.
Clocks, 337, 338.
Clothing of Savage races,
311, 312, 313.
“Clytiè,” 197.
Cobbett, William, 63.
Codex Alexandrinus, 73,
208.
Coinage, 328.
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor,
163, 166.
Communism, 316.
Cooking-pots, 309.
Costa, Solomon da, 75.
Coster, Lourens Janszoon, 137.
Costume, Assyrian, 253, 254, 255.
Cotton House, 5, 13, 17, 51.
Cottonian Library, 4, 5, 13, 17,
18, 19, 20, 21, 24, 36, 37, 48,
49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 146, 152,
155.
Cotton, Sir John, 20.
Cotton, Sir Robert, 5, 10, 11, 12,
13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21,
28 *.
207, 230,
310,
166,
115,
Cotton, Sir Thomas, 20, 51.
Courten, William, 38, 39, 40.
Covel, Dr. John, 30, 31.
Cowper, William, 163, 165.
Cowtan, Robert, v, vii, 129, 130.
Cracherode, Rev. Clayton M., 76,
77, 143, 346.
Craftsmanship versus art, 327,
344.
Creation, Assyrian legends of,
256, 268.
Creswell, Caves of, 286.
Cromwell, Oliver, 158, 159, 338.
Index 351
s
Crystal of Lothair, 338, 339.
Currency of Savage races, 316,
3.17.
Daniel, Pere, 156.
Darius the Great, 241.
Darwin, Charles, 6, 301, 302, 317.
Dawkins, Prof. Boyd, 275, 200.
Dead, Egyptian cult of, 218, 219,
220, 236, 237, 238.
Dee, Dr., 21, 336.
Deluge, Assyrian legends of the,
268.
Demeter of Cnidos, 181, 189.
Demotic writing, 213.
D’Ewes, Sir Symonds, 25.
Diana, Temple of, 196.
Dickens, Charles, 164.
“Dictionary of National Biogra-
phy,” vii.
Dighton, Robert, 77, 105.
Diodorus Siculus, 260, 263, 269.
Disraeli, Isaac, 66, 103, 156.
Domesday Book, 106.
Dryden, John, 162.
Edward V, 335.
Edwards, Edward, v, vi, 102.
Egerton, Francis Henry, 82, 83.
Egerton Manuscripts, 83.
Egerton, Sophia, 83.
Egypt, 207, 208, 215, 218.
Egypt, Kings of, 210.
Egyptian Antiquities, 87, 88,
207-239.
Egyptians, Origin of, 217.
Egyptology, 209, 210.
Elam, Conquest of, 265.
Elgin, Earl of (and see Thomas
Bruce), 89, 90, 91, 92.
Elgin Marbles, 89, 90, 91, 92,
182-191.
Elizabeth, Queen, 15, 142, 159,
335.
Elizabethan Englishmen, 9.
Elizabethan Literature, 175.
Ellis, Sir Henry, 94, 105, 106,
107, 108, 202.
Elstobb, Elizabeth, 26.
Embalming, 236, 237.
Emerson, Ralph W., 197.
Enamel, Objects in, 340.
England in the fifteenth century,
England, Manuscript chronicles
of, 152, 153, 154, 155.
Ephesus Room, 182, 195, 196.
Epicurus, 304, 310.
Esarhaddon, 244.
Essex House, 51.
Ethnographical Gallery, 299-325.
Eumenes II, 149.
Evans, Sir John, 293.
Evelyn, John, 40, 55.
Exodus, The, 207, 208.
Fasting and religion, 306.
“Fifteen Decisive Battles of the
World,” 174.
Fir-cone as a sacred emblem,
248, 249, 253.
Fire-making implements, 305.
Fish-hooks, 307, 308.
Flint implements, 274, 278, 279,
280, 281, 284, 285, 286, 288, 289,
290, 291.
Food vessels, 305, 306, 307.
Forshall, Josiah, 116.
Fraudulent weights and meas-
ures, 310.
Freind, Dr. Robert, 5, 52.
Gainsborough, Thomas, 77.
Games of Savage races, 314,
315.
Garnett, Richard, 117.
Garnett, Richard, (younger), 107,
111, 116, 117.
Garrick, David, 75, 98.
Geikie, Dr. James, 277.
George II, 53, 72, 73, 79. -
George III, 42, 64, 75, 79, 80, 82,
133, 338.
George IV, 81, 82.
Gibbon, Edward, 100, 101, 165,
200, 335.
Glass and Ceramic Gallery, 332,
333.
Gold Ornaments and Gems, Room
of, 202.
Gordon, Charles, 160.
Graeco-Roman Rooms, 197, 198.
Gray, Thomas, 65, 66, 70, 103,
165.
Greece, Modern world’s indebt-
edness to, 172, 173.
Greek Anthology, 193.
Greek coins, 329, 330,
352
Index
Greek and Latin
Hall of, 177, 200.
Greek Manuscripts, 151.
Greek and Roman Antiquities,
87, 17.1-206.
Greek and Roman Life, Room of,
205, 206.
Green, John R., 153.
Grenville Library, 121, 131, 132,
167, 169.
Grenville, Right Hon. Thomas,
84, 85, 108, 111, 131, 143.
Grey, Lady Jane, 158, 159, 165.
Gutenberg, Johann, 136, 138, 142.
inscriptions,
Hallam, Henry, 7, 137, 145, 146.
Hamilton, Sir William, 86, 87,
90.
Hampden, John, 159.
Hapi, God of the Nile, 216, 217.
Hargrave, Francis, 78.
Harleian Library, 20, 24, 25, 26,
32, 33, 34.
Harleian Manuscripts, 34, 35, 36,
37, 53, 54, 102.
Harley, Edward, (Earl of Ox-
ford), 3, 4, 5, 29, 30, 31, 32, 40,
48, 146.
Harley, Robert, (Earl of Ox-
ford), 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27,
28, 31, 34. -
Harley, Sir Robert, 22, 23.
Harpy Tomb, The, 179, 180, 181.
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 161.
Helios, Horses of, 185.
Henry VII, 71.
Henry VIII, 157, 335.
Henry, Prince of Wales, 71, 72,
165.
Herodotus, 208, 216, 222, 236, 247.
Hezekiah, 270, 271.
Hicks, Dr. George, 26, 27.
Hieratic writing, 213.
Hieroglyphics, 212, 213, 214.
Hill, Dr. John, 98, 99.
History, Archaeological, 276, 277.
History, Geological, 275, 276, 277.
History, Prehistoric, 275, 276.
History, Sources of, 153, 154,
155, 156.
Horace, 145, 199.
Houses of Savage races, 315, 316.
Howard, Thomas, 11, 83, 84.
Hume, David, 163.
Hunting weapons, 308, 309, 317,
321.
Hyksos Kings of Egypt, 229.
Ictnos, 184.
Illuminated books, 167, 168, 169.
Iron Age, The, 277, 296, 297.
Irving, Washington, 6, 67, 70,
126, 128, 161. -
Italy, Antiquities from, 86, 87.
Ivory, Carvings in, 340, 341.
James I, 16, 71, 165, 343.
Jefferies, Richard, 178.
Jenyns, Soame, 33.
Jerusalem, Siege of, 270.
Jewelry, 341, 342.
Jewish coins, 330, 331.
Johnson, Dr. Samuel, 22, 32, 79,
80, 101, 163.
Jones, Inigo, 52.
Jones, John Winter, 112. .
“Journal Britannique,” 100, 101.
Keats, John, 164, 188.
Kent’s Cavern, 282, 283, 284.
Kenyon, Frederic G., vii, 113,
114, 151. -
Kesserloch Cavern, 286.
Khafra, King, 223, 224, 225.
Khorsabad, 245, 246.
Khufu, King, 221, 222, 223, 224,
225
King's Library, 64, 79, 80, 81, 82,
121, 131, 133, 134, 135, 165.
King's Pamphlets, 73, 74, 75.
Knight, Gowin, 98, 99, 100, 101.
Lachish, Capture of, 259.
Laing, S., 279.
Lamb, Charles, 75, 116, 142, 143,
163.
Lansdowne Manuscripts, 77, 78.
Lansdowne, Marquis of, 77.
Layard, Austin Henry, 240, 242,
247, 250, 256, 257, 264, 267.
Lecky, W. E. H., 301.
Lee, Sidney, 8.
Library of the British Museum,
129. (See Reading-Room.)
Lindisfarne Gospels, 167.
“Lives of the Founders of the
British Museum,” vi.
Lumley, Lord, 72.
Index 353
Lysicrates, Monument of, 190.
Lyte Jewel, The, 342, 343.
Lyte, Thomas, 343.
Macaulay, Lord, 27, 28, 110, 133,
134, 166, 198.
Madden, Frederic, 116.
Maecenas, 22, 27, 199.
Magicians, Stories of Egyptian,
225, 226.
Magna Charta, 155.
Maine’s “Ancient Law,” 316.
Man, Prehistoric, 272-298.
Man, Savage, 300, 301, 302.
Manuscripts, Departments of,
144-170.
Manuscript Saloon, 147, 150, 157,
161.
Marathon, Battle of, 174, 175,
176.
Mary, Queen of Scots, 159.
Maty, Matthew, 100, 101, 102.
Mausolus, Prince of Caria, 194,
195. -
Mausoleum Room, 194.
Mazarine Bible, 137.
Mead, Richard, 3, 4.
Mediaeval Room, 334, 335, 336.
Memnon, Colossi of, 231.
“Memories of the British Mu-
seum,” vii, 129.
Menephthah, King, 234.
Menkure, King, 224.
Milton, John, 162, 165, 207.
“Mirabili Romae,” 136.
Monck, Christopher, 39.
Montagu House, 55, 56, 59, 64,
65, 66, 70, 71, 73, 88, 89, 116.
Montagu, Ralph, 55, 56.
Morgan, J. Pierpont, 296.
Morton, Charles, 102, 103, 104.
Muller, Max, 318.
Museums, what they postulate,
6; possible only in a high
state of civilization, 7; churches
as, 8. -
Musgrave, Sir William, 76.
Mycenae, Sculptures from, 178.
Napoleon, 88, 211.
Natural History Museum, 70,
113.
Nebuchadnezzar I, 270.
Nelson, Lord, 86, 160.
Neolithic Age, The, 277, 278, 285,
287, 288, 290, 291, 294.
Nereid Monument, The, 193, 194.
Nereid Room, 193, 194.
Nero, Bust of, 199.
Netsukës, Japanese, 332.
Newcastle, Life of the Duke of,
143.
Newsum, Bartholomew, 338.
Nile, The, 215, 216, 217.
Nimroud, 240, 242, 245, 250, 252,
256, 258.
Nineveh, 242, 261, 265, 270.
Nude in Greek sculpture, 189,
190.
Oceania, Ethnography of, 303,
305.
Officers of the British Museum,
95, 96, 97, 114.
Oldys, William, 3, 4.
Onslow, Arthur, 49, 50, 53.
Ornaments of Savage races, 314,
321.
Osborne, Thomas, 34, 35.
Oxford, Countess of, 35, 36, 54.
Oxford, Earls of, see Edward
and Robert Harley.
Palaeolithic Age, The, 277, 280,
281, 285, 287.
Panathenaic Procession, 187, 188,
189.
Panizzi, Anthony, 69, 85, 96, 108,
109, 110, 111, 112, 117, 132,
133.
Paper, Substitutes for, 148, 149,
150.
Papyrus, 148, 149.
Parchment, 149.
Parliamentary Inquiry of 1835,
62, 63, 95, 106.
Parthenon, The, 183, 184, 189,
190, 191.
Pater, Walter, 200.
Paul, The Apostle, 196.
Peirithoos, King, 187.
Pengelly, William, 282, 283.
Pentelic marble, 185.
Pergamum, 149. -
Pericles, 176, 183, 191.
Persephone, 181, 185.
Perthes, Boucher de, 278, 279,
280.
354
Index
Petrie, Flinders, 215, 225.
Pheidias, 184, 185, 187.
Phigaleian Room, 181, 192.
Philipps, Sir Erasmus, 41.
Planta, Joseph, 103, 104, 105.
Plutarch, 191, 196.
Poets’ Corner, 161.
Pope, Alexander, 3, 4.
Portland, Duke and Duchess of,
36, 54.
Portland Vase, The, 202.
Poseidon, 186.
Pottery and porcelain, 331, 333,
334.
Pottery of Savage races, 322.
Printed Books, Department of,
121-143.
Printing, Development of, 134,
135, 136.
Prints and Drawings, Depart-
ment of, 344, 345, 346, 347.
Prior, Matthew, 28.
Pynson, Richard, 140.
Pyramids, Egyptian, 219, 220,
222, 223, 224.
Rameses II, 233, 234.
Ramsay, Allan, 3.
Rawlinson, Henry C., 240, 241,
242.
Readers, Statistics of, 65, 66,
104, 131.
Reading-Room, The original, 65,
66, 67, 68.
Reading-Room, The Circular, 65,
68, 69, 70, 110, 111, 121, 122,
123, 124, 126, 128, 129.
Religion of Savage races, 318,
319, 320.
Renaissance, The, 8, 9, 10.
Rings, 341, 342.
River-Drift, 279, 280, 281.
Roman Gallery, 177, 198.
Rosetta Stone, The, 88, 211, 212,
214, 215, 235.
Rothschild, Baron
342, 343.
Royal Libraries, The, 71, 72, 73,
79, 80, 81, 82.
Rudolph II, 337, 338.
Ruskin, John, 167, 168, 171, 173,
176, 178, 183, 186, 189, 190,
201, 344.
Ferdinand,
Sargon, 244, 245, 246, 265.
Scott, Sir Walter, 98.
Sculptures, Assyrian, 245, 246,
248, 249, 250, 251, 252, 260,
261, 262.
Seeley, John R., 95.
Sekhet, fire-goddess, 231, 232.
Selden, John, 14.
Sennacherib, 244, 259, 270.
Sepulchral reliefs, 192.
Shakespeare, William, 162, 335.
Shalmaneser II, 244, 256, 257,
258, 264.
Shelley, Percy B., 164, 186, 335.
Sidmouth, Lord, 81.
Sidney, Sir Philip, 10.
Sloane Museum, 36, 38, 40, 41,
42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 54, 73,
103, 274, 346. *
Sloane, Sir Hans, 37, 38, 39, 40,
41, 42, 43, 47, 52, 55.
Smart, Christopher, 98.
Smith, George, vii.
Smith, Reginald A., 287.
Southey, Robert, 115, 117.
Speed, John, 14, 18.
Spenser, Edmund, 162.
Sphinx, The, 223.
Steele, Richard, 162.
Sun-Dials, 336.
Swift, Jonathan, 3, 162, 165.
Tangaroa, Image of, 319.
Tattooing, 311.
Tennyson, Lord, 164, 166.
Terracottas, Room of, 178, 201.
Thefts from the Reading-Room,
129, 130. .
Theseus, 185, 186, 209.
Theseus, Temple of, 190.
Thomason, George, 74, 75.
Thomason Tracts, 73.
Thompson, Edward Maunde, 113.
Thothmes III, 230, 231, 246.
“Three Fates,” The, 185, 186,
245. -
Tiberius, Bust of, 199.
Tiglath-Pileser I, 244.
Tiglath-Pileser III, 244, 256, 258.
Toilets, Assyrian, 246, 247, 248,
258.
Towneley, Charles, 89.
Towneley Marbles, 89.
Index
355
Trajan, Bust of, 199.
Tylor, Dr. E. B., 302, 317, 328.
Tyndale, William, 145.
Type, Movable, 135, 137, 138.
Usertsen I, 227.
Usertsen III, 228, 229.
Ussher, Dr., 18, 273, 274, 278,
279.
Vase Rooms, 203, 204.
Venetian Glass, 334.
Venice, Early books printed at,
139.
Verstegan, Richard, 14, 15.
Victoria, Queen, 157.
Waddeson Bequest Room, 342.
Walpole, Horace, 11, 42, 70, 84,
103, 163.
Wanley, Humfrey, 20, 24, 25, 26,
29, 31.
Ware, Sir John, 18.
Warfare of Savage races, 317.
Washington, George, 160.
Watt, Thomas, 69, 129.
Wax-tablet, 150.
Wedgwood, Josiah, 87.
Wellington, Duke of, 160.
West, James, 35, 36.
Westminster Abbey, 23.
Westminster School, 5, 10, 11,
52.
White, William, 70.
Wingless Victory,
191.
Wolsey, Cardinal, 157, 159.
Worde, Wynkyn de, 140.
Wren, Sir Christopher, 51.
Writing, The art of, 147, 148.
Young, Edward, 37, 38.
Temple of,
UNIVERSITY OF MICH IGAN
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