Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 2.djvu/314

 282 A History of Art in Chald.v.a and Assyria. This is not the only difference between the two methods and the two interpretations. The Egyptian artist can seize the character of a movement with much justice and vivacity, but he endeavours to ennoble it by giving it a general and typical value. This he does, for example, in the gesture of the king who brandishes his mace or sword over the head of his conquered enemv while he holds him by the hair with his other hand. 1 He thinks more about elegance in arranging the posture of his figures ; look, for instance, at the men and women carrying offerings, at the dancers and musicians who abound in the reliefs and pictures. His favourite attitude, however, is one expressive of force in repose. We cannot deny that in his figures in the round the Mesopotamian sculptor showed the same predilection, but his choice was suggested, or rather imposed, by the resistance of the materials he employed and the necessity of avoiding certain executive difficulties over which he could not triumph. We can hardly see how he could have given his figures more animation or have better expressed the freedom of their limbs and the swing of their bodies ; the stones he used were either too hard or too soft, and he was without the needful skill in the management of his tools. It is in the reliefs, where he is more at his ease, that he allows us to see whither his natural inclinations would lead him. They contain hardly any seated figures. Man is there always on his feet and in action. Movement, to interest the Mesopotamian artist, need not be the expression of an idea, or the cause of graceful lines. It pleases him for its own sake by its freedom and unexpectedness, I am almost tempted to say, by its violence. This feeling is visible chiefly in the battle pictures and hunting scenes. In these, no doubt, the drawing of limbs, &c, often leaves much to be desired. The hand has been unable to render all that the eye has seen. The unveiled human body has not been displayed often enough to the sculptor for him to know thoroughly the construction of its frame-work and the mode of attachment of its limbs. On the other hand, when animals have to be treated, with what singular power and complete success the same artist has often represented the tension of the contracting muscles, the speed of the horse as he stretches himself in the gallop, the spring of the lion as he throws himself upon the spear (see Fig. 161), and, finally, the trembling of the flesh in the last ] Art in Ancient Egypt, vol. i. fig. 85.