. The New England magazine . startling; they seemed things to hauntones dreams, and fit companions for themummied faces of the Pharaohs that Ihad lately seen at Boulak. Dr. Schlie-mann told me subsequently, that a plastercast was probably first taken of the deadmans face, and then the portrait wastaken on gold from the plaster. Thelikeness is evidently not perfect, but thegeneral impression is lifelike. It may bethat these are the features of great Aga-memnon, like to JoveIn eye and forehead, with the loins of Mars,And ample chest like him who rules the sea. Mark the straight Grecian nose, and
. The New England magazine . startling; they seemed things to hauntones dreams, and fit companions for themummied faces of the Pharaohs that Ihad lately seen at Boulak. Dr. Schlie-mann told me subsequently, that a plastercast was probably first taken of the deadmans face, and then the portrait wastaken on gold from the plaster. Thelikeness is evidently not perfect, but thegeneral impression is lifelike. It may bethat these are the features of great Aga-memnon, like to JoveIn eye and forehead, with the loins of Mars,And ample chest like him who rules the sea. Mark the straight Grecian nose, andthin lips, and—do you see it? — thethe upward curve of the mustache ! It does. not appear whether this was due topomade or curling tongs, but the mostunheroic product of our modern civiliza-tion, known as the dude, will recognizehere a bond uniting him to the heroic age. As we pass from case to case amongstthese messengers from the hoary past, wenotice that they bring tidings from an agebefore that of iron. We have here terra-cotta, alabaster, bronze, copper, silver,gold, precious stones, iridescent glass, —but no iron. It was also an age beforewriting. \\t find no sentence, word, orletter. Cadmus had not yet landed inGreece; but the abounding skill andbeauty show that wisdom is older thanthe alphabet. It was not yet an age oftemples, only of altars, and so it corre-sponds to the period of Abraham, not ofSolomon. It was an age of wealth. Mr. Glad-stone terms the value of the articles inthe museum extraordinary. The goldalone weighs about one hundred poundstroy, and so is worth nearly twenty-fivethousand dollars, which would be theequivalent in purchasing power
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