harmonised with the genius of Etruria as the confluence of sister streams. The religion of Hellas was the voluntary adoption of her children, stamped with the impress of Hellenic sensibility and imagination; lively, joyous, and elastic; inspiring, but not controlling, art and literature; independent of political systems, and equally susceptible of implicit faith and allegorical development: the Etruscan creed was imposed upon a subject people by the ascendency of a priestly caste, whose ritual influenced, but was not an emanation of, the national character: it was veiled in an impenetrable shroud of mystic and symbolical imagery: intolerant of every rival, it absorbed freedom, alike in all its germs and creations, whether intellectual, political, or artistic: it arrayed itself, like the Roman Catholic, in the robes of illusion, and was armed with all the prestige of ceremonial pomps and observances: it was an allpervading principle, the leaven of society, the very atmosphere

of existence.

The mystical features of the Etruscan system deserve illustration, not only because they have been exaggerated and distorted, but because they are prominent among the types of Orientalism. Among the more ordinary symbols are the Hippocampi and watersnakes, usually regarded as emblematic of the soul's passage from life to the shades of eternity—an interpretation sustained at once by the shrouded spirits and figures of boys riding on their backs, and by their amphibious character, evidently the type of a double state of existence. Dolphins, painted alternately red and black, figure among the sepulchral ornaments, and probably symbolise the maritime sceptre of Etruria; while the rolling border beneath them represents the waves, in which they are tossing and careering, as in the Virgilian picture of the shield of Eneas. But, of all Etruscan emblems, serpents are perhaps the most pregnant with a varied mystical significance. Now they are the types of health and renovation, of Apollo and Esculapius; now, the symbols of sanctity, distinguishing generally the sacred from the profane; now, the emblems of volcanic agencies and Typhonian powers; now, the instruments of terror, brandished in the hands of priests at the head of advancing hosts, and riveting the ascendency of the sacerdotal order by passively yielding to the potent fascination of soothsayers and charmers-not, however, that the veneration of the reptile was peculiar to Etruria or even to the East. But in the Etruscan symbolism of the soul, or spiritual essence, under the figure of a bird, we trace a very curious affinity to the Scriptural system of types. It is well known that the series of emblems so profusely employed by the Fathers in the exposition of Holy Writ, was handed down from

age to age by the traditions of the Schools of the Prophets;' and S. Augustine applies this instrument of interpretation to a difficulty in the Old Testament, doubtless with authority from ancient usage. In his version, the passage in Genesis xv., which describes Abraham, in offering a sacrifice of a heifer, a goat, a ram, a turtle-dove and a young pigeon, as leaving the birds alone undivided with his knife, is connected with a parallel in 1 Cor. iii., where S. Paul asserts that those who have built upon the foundation of Christ works of gold, silver, and precious stones, will not only be saved, but receive a reward; while those who have built upon the same foundation works of hay and stubble, shall themselves be saved, yet so as by fire,' while their works shall be consumed. The birds, he says, are emblematic of the first of the two classes mentioned by S. Paul; and, accordingly, Abraham does not divide them, because they represent the truly spiritual, between whom and their works there is no division.

Among other authentic emblems of Etruscan superstition are the hammer, the symbol of supernatural, generally of fiendish, power; the twisted wand, the attribute of benign divinity; the snake-bound brow, the herald of sovereignty; the fish, typifying ocean's depths; the rudder and the trident, the attributes of maritime supremacy; wings, distinguishing the spiritual from the human; and griffons, marking evil and destructive agencies.'

The deathbed scenes, favourite subjects in many of the tombs, often exhibit exquisite tenderness and pathos, and prove that the sombre religion of the country did not repress, even if it failed to stimulate, affectionate sensibility. In one of the sepulchral paintings of Volterra, a female is stretched upon her couch her father, husband, sisters or daughters, are weeping ' around her: her little ones stand at her bedside, unconscious

1 The following extract will show how loose a rein Professor Orioli, a distinguished member of the modern school of Italian antiquaries, has given to his fancy in mystic interpretation :-The Grotta de Pompeio at Tarquinii,' says he, 'manifestly figures the kingdom of Shades and the infernal world. The pillar in the centre is the chief of the five mountains which were supposed to support our globe. The surrounding frieze expresses this still better in the language of art; for its upper portion, with its waves and dolphins, indicates most clearly the sea which covers the infernal world and surrounds our globe; and the lower, with rose flowers, indicates the infernal world itself, which has its peculiar vegetation. The pillar itself, still better to set forth the hidden idea of the artist, bears the rose flowers, but no waves or dolphins, because the central mountain which it represents has vegetation, but is not covered by the sea. Nor are the mutules and triglyphs without meaning; for as in architecture they represent beams and rafters, so here they are hieroglyphical of the skeleton and framework of the infernal world and of its great mountain, which of rocks makes beams, but not less bold than that other, which of the waves of the sea makes a meander pattern.'-Ann. Inst. 1834, pp. 156-159.

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'how soon they are to be bereft of a mother's tenderness-a 'moment near at hand, as is intimated by the presence of a winged genius with a torch on the point of expiring. Again, on an urn, on the lid of which he reclines in effigy, a youth is represented on horseback about to start on that journey from 'which no traveller returns, when his little sister rushes in, and 'strives to stay his horse's steps-in vain, for the relentless messenger of Death seizes the bridle and hurries him away. 'Here, again, the man is already mounted, driven away by Charon with his hammer; while a female genius affectionately 'throws her arm round the neck of the disconsolate widow, and 'tries to assuage her grief.'—Vol. ii. p. 193.

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But, perhaps, the most honourable trait of Etruscan character, distinguished alike from Grecian and Oriental customs, is the national homage to the fair sex. The assertion of Nepos, that no Roman was ashamed to be seen with his lady by his side at table, is eminently true of Etruria, in whose sepulchral devices husband and wife are constantly seen reclining together in family and festal scenes. Indeed, it is highly probable that the Roman veneration for woman, which so prominently figures in the annals of the Eternal City-in the legend of Virginia, the chaste revenge of Lucretia, the heroism of Clolia-exhibiting the Roman matron as the

'Clarum ac venerabile nomen,

'Gentibus, ac nostræ multum quod profuit urbi'

was at least fostered by Etruscan influence. The Athenians considered the graces of art and literature thrown away upon their consorts, and reserved all feminine accomplishments to enhance the fascinations of their mistresses: whereas the Etruscan ladies received a refined education, and were sometimes initiated into the mysteries of divination; and the same courtesy and homage which attended them on earth followed them to the grave. Their sepulchral decorations and furniture are more sumptuous and elaborate than their lords'-a distinction which they well deserved, if we may judge of the elegance and modesty of their lives from the surviving scenes in which they are portrayed, and from the emblems in their hands, which are usually a pomegranate as the symbol of fertility, and a tablet or scroll, the type of education. The tyrant sex, on the other hand, are reclining in luxurious indolence, their brows wreathed with festive chaplets-a wine-jug in one hand and a goblet in the other. We have no desire to enlist in an indiscriminate defence of Etruscan manners against the charge of indelicacy; but such an accusation comes with peculiar ill grace from Greece, and we have every reason to believe that infringements of social decency were monopolised by the male sex.

Timæus might have glanced at home at the licensed nudity of Spartan and Thessalian girls, before he charged the Etruscan banqueters with being waited upon by naked handmaids. No countenance to the calumny has been elicited from any Etruscan monument, painting or relief, yet discovered: on the contrary, all surviving relics exhibit feminine forms draped in a style which might well have caused Grecian' modesty to blush; and Niebuhr agrees with modern Italian writers in a summary rejection of the libels retailed by Theopompus-that inveterate scandal-monger of antiquity!—of the shameless profligacy of Etruscan morals.

Adepts in luxury, and lovers of sumptuous life, for which the richly diversified produce of Tuscany, and their widely extended commerce, gave them ample opportunities, they were far superior to the Greeks in mere material civilization. The Etruscan cities presented a remarkable contrast to those of Hellas, in the health and cleanliness which resulted from their skill in sewerage, which has left its vestiges on many an Etruscan site, and reared an undying memorial in the Cloaca Maxima of Rome. The art of drainage, in its relation to agriculture, they practised with admirable skill. On the banks of the Po, in the neighbourhood of Hadria, they carried out those operations, whereby, in modern days, the Chiana has been converted from a barren pestilential swamp into a richly cultivated plain. The river, confined within dams, was continually raising its bed, which would have rendered it necessary to heighten the dyke, and have tasked the energies of man in an unequal struggle with the powers of nature, had not the Tuscans usefully employed the superfluous waters, by diverting them into the marshes, only to withdraw them when the fertilising deposit had once been secreted. The region alluded to would be thankful for such an operation now; and Etruscan skill would have saved Florence from the terrific inundations of the middle ages. Another method which enabled them to redeem land for the purposes of agriculture, was that of tunnelling the hills in which Tuscany abounds, and thus letting off the lakes which had formed in the craters of extinct volcanoes. These tunnels, says Niebuhr, are still at work among the mountains, though unknown to the ignorant peasantry, whose tarns they drain. This extraordinary people combined in a remarkable degree the two great elements of material prosperity, agriculture and trade; their skill in husbandry needs no other eulogy than Virgil's line

Sic fortis Etruria crevit

which extols it as the vital source of the splendour and the strength of Etruria.

In commerce they rivalled Tyrian enterprise, studding with their colonies the waters of the Tyrrhene Sea, and the shores of Spain, and competing even with Carthage for the 'far isle of the Blest.' Their knowledge of physic is celebrated by Eschylus. In the art of war Rome condescended to borrow from Etruria, and their astronomical science enabled them to approach more nearly than any nation of antiquity to the true division of time, when they fixed the tropical year at exactly 365 days, five hours and forty minutes. But, with all this, Tuscan civilization was the civilization of the mass; not, like the glorious culture of Greece, that which elicits and fosters the brightest sparks of personal energy and genius: it stereotyped, instead of inspiring society: it could never have been prolific of the noble literary fruits of Hellenic and Roman freedom-the impassioned eloquence of Demosthenes and Eschines, the splendid harmony of Cicero, the pictured page' of Livy, the deep meditations of Plato, the dignity and pathos of the Greek Tragedians; it could never have fought a Marathon, nor developed an intense national unity, nor achieved the imperial idea of widespread conquest and dominion. Doubtless, the peculiar influence of the government contributed largely to imbue the national civilization with its sombre hues and rigid lines. That government was an aristocracy; but it was a close, not an open aristocracy, resembling the oligarchy of mediaval Venice, and unlike the happily tempered constitution of old Rome and our own England, which continually derives fresh pith and vigour by keeping the avenues of honour open to plebeian merit. It possessed indeed many of the inherent virtues of aristocracythe permanence and stability it gives to government, the check upon licentious excesses which long habituation to power maintains over the ruling class; and that prevision for the future, which is natural to the holders of an hereditary stake in the land but it was eminently defective in the cardinal virtue of antagonism; it lacked the main-spring of political energy which the democratic element embodies. But this was not all, for the spiritual and temporal functions united in the same ruler. The Chief Pontiff was the Chief Magistrate, and the terrors of superstition supported the decrees of the Prince. Before the gate of that Paradise,' says Mr. Dennis, where the intellect revels unfettered amid speculations on its own 'nature, on its origin, existence, and final destiny, on its relation 'to the First Cause, to other minds, and to society in general'stood the Sacerdotal Lucumo, brandishing in one hand the

1 Probably Madeira, or one of the Canaries.

2 Apud Theophr. H. P. ix. 15.