Page:Travels & discoveries in the Levant (1865) Vol. 1.djvu/383

Rh Two other smaller bronze handles were found with these remains; and it was evident that the whole had belonged to a large hydria of the same metal, the body of which had decayed, all but the mouth, which on account of its greater solidity had not been decomposed.

The bronze group had been placed at the lower insertion of the principal handle. It is in embossed or repoussé work, and had been anciently gilt. Wlien I found it, minute portions of gilding were still adhering to the hair of the female figure; and the earth of the grave, on being sifted, yielded many particles of gold leaf. The composition of this relief is exceedingly beautiful, the execution rather inferior to the design; and we miss in it the refinement and delicacy of modelling which distingiushes the bronzes of Siris in the British Museum beyond all other works of the same kind. However, bronzes in embossed work of a good period are so exceedingly rare that the group of Boreas and Oreithyia may fairly rank among the most precious objects of this class which have been discovered. Sifting the earth, I found a number of small pearls and other fragments of a necklace. The presence of these remains shows that the grave was that of a female; and the subject of the bronze group was probably selected to commemorate allusively the untimely fate of the person in whose grave it was found; just as in ancient sarcophagi we often find repeated the Death of Meleager, the Rape of Proserpine, and other kindred subjects, suitable for the commemoration of the death of the young. On my making this remarkable discovery, the