Another essential part of the order, too often overlooked, is the colour, which was as integral a part of it as its form. Till very lately, it was denied that Greek temples were, or could be, painted: the unmistakable remains of colour, however, that have been discovered in almost all temples, and the greater knowledge of the value and use of it which now prevails, have altered public opinion very much on the matter, and most people now admit that some colour was used, though few are agreed as to the extent to which it was carried. It cannot now be questioned that colour was used everywhere internally, and on every object. Externally too it is generally admitted that the sculpture was painted and relieved by strongly coloured backgrounds; the lacunaria, or recesses of the roof, were also certainly painted; and all the architectural mouldings, which at a later period were carved in relief, have been found to retain traces of their painted ornaments. It is disputed whether the echinus or carved moulding of the capital was so ornamented. There seems little doubt but that it was; and that the walls of the cells were also coloured throughout and covered with paintings illustrative of the legends and attributes of the divinity to whom the temple was dedicated or of the purposes for which it was erected. The plane face of the architrave was probably left white, or merely ornamented with metal shields or inscriptions, and the shafts of the columns appear also to have been left plain, or merely slightly stained to tone down the crudeness of the white marble. Generally speaking, all those parts which from their form or position were in any degree protected from the rain or atmospheric influences seem to have been coloured; those particularly exposed, to have been left plain. To whatever extent, however, painting may have been carried, these coloured ornaments were as essential a part of the Doric order as the carved ornaments were of the Corinthian, and made it, when perfect, a richer and more ornamental, as it was a more solid and stable, order than the latter. The colour nowhere interfered with the beauty of its forms, but gave it that richness and amount of ornamentation which is indispensable in all except the most colossal buildings, and a most valuable adjunct even to them. IONIC ORDER.