=39. The Profusion of Statues and Art Objects.=--So much for the wall decorations, and we must turn to the statues. The mansion seems to swarm with slaves, yet they are hardly more numerous than the sculptures in bronze and marble. Many of these are good copies of the best masterpieces of Greece. The splendid athlete in the atrium is from an original by Praxiteles; the Penelope in the peristylium follows precisely the noble work of Scopas. Many others are simply graceful and ornamental but less pretentious works by lesser geniuses, often adapted in detail by the clever copyists. [Illustration: PORTRAIT BUST--POMPEY THE GREAT.] The whole quantity of art objects in such a house is enormous. The legs and arms of the chairs and every knob and handle upon the furniture are chased or carved with an amazing skill. The veriest knick-nacks and articles for everyday life have been transformed into things of beauty. In the triclinium is a long series of statuettes presenting the myths of Bacchus--the god himself, the drunken Silenus, the satyrs, bacchants, and all the other revelers. It would be easy, indeed, to reconstruct a good part of the standard Græco-Roman mythology from the statues, statuettes, and reliefs, no less than from the frescos scattered about the mansion and garden. =40. Family Portrait Busts.=--However, there is one lengthy array of sculptures in the atrium that does not bear the hand of Greece. These are the portrait busts of the Junii Calvi. There they stand, a full score of them; all the more distinguished members of the great house since sculpture became a facile art in Rome. [Illustration: TYPICAL ROMAN PORTRAIT--MARC ANTONY.] It is an array of cold, hard, yet withal terribly efficient faces. Slightly battered is the broad homely countenance of that tough old Calvus who was Scipio’s legate at Zama. Here also is the sharp shrewd face of his great-grandson who was prætor under Sulla; here the more refined and intellectual lines of the grandson of the last named worthy who won Octavius’s thanks at Actium for gallantry with his bireme, and afterward was a famous governor of Syria; here the high forehead of that courageous Stoic, the present master’s grandfather, who bade Nero do his worst, and who calmly “opened his veins” when the centurion arrived with the tyrant’s order to commit suicide. There are also displayed the busts of several distinguished women of the family including that Junia who was the bosom friend of the Empress Livia.