Page:Greek Buildings Represented by Fragments in the British Museum (1908).djvu/215

 THESEUM, ERECHTHEUM, AND OTHER WORKS. I99 the relief of the sphynx ; the wings were patterned with feathers, the hair yellow, the background blue—" intensely bright blue." On February 2, 1844, was discovered the pedimental slab, now in the Museum, with a harpy above an Ionic column ; it was " richly coloured." The slabs with cocks and hens were found at the same time. We have had evidence enough that painted decoration on external marble work was regarded as a necessary completion from the earliest days of Greek art to the latest. Mycen^. In the Lycian Room of the Museum has lately been erected a reconstruction of the greater part of the pillared gate of the " Treasury of Athens " at Mycenae. It is made up of parts brought to this country by collectors at various times. Some belong to the Elgin Collection, others transferred from the Institute of Architects belonged to Donaldson, and the most important fragments of the pillars recently obtained were brought from Greece nearly a century ago by the Marquis of Fig. 203. — Mycenas, part of Frieze. Sligo. One of the fragments (Fig. 203) I had the fortune to find standing unrecognised in the porch of a collector's house in London. On my calling Dr Murray's attention to it, he obtained it as a gift from the proprietor. The gateway, and the fragments which were found round about it, have often been described and figured by Dodwell, Gell, Donaldson, and others, and several restorations have been put forward, the latest and best being that of Mr Phene Spiers, now placed with the fragments in the Museum. In one respect,