Sculpture of course began in Greece, as elsewhere, with idols. It is the custom of all barbarous nations to colour their idols. The Egyptians, as we know beyond all doubt, not only coloured, but dressed theirs. So did the Greeks. It may be a question, whether the Greeks borrowed their art from the Egyptians, improving it, as they did everything else. Let scholars decide that question. This, however, is certain, that in either case the Egyptian practice would obtain— 1st. If the Greeks borrowed from the Egyptians, they would borrow the painting and dressing. 2nd. If they did not borrow—if their art was indigenous—then it would come under the universal law of barbarian art; and painting would, at any rate in the earlier epochs, have been employed. (We know that both painting and dressing were employed in all epochs.) This being so, and the custom being universal, unless the change from painted to unpainted statues had been very gradual, insensibly so, the man who first produced a marble statue without any addition would have been celebrated as an innovator. No such celebrity is known. Ancient literature abounds with references and allusions to the practices of painting and dressing statues. Space prevents their being copiously cited here. Moreover, many of them are too vague for _direct_ evidence. Of those which are _unequivocal_ a few will be given. _Dressing Statues._—Pausanias describes a nympheum, where the women assembled to worship, containing figures of Bacchus, Ceres, and Proserpine, the heads of which alone were visible, the rest of the body being hidden by draperies. And this explains a passage in Tertullian (“De Jejun.,” 16), where he compares the goddesses to rich ladies having their attendants specially devoted to dress them—_suas habebant ornatrices_. For it must be borne in mind that the Greek idols, like the saints in Catholic cathedrals, were kept dressed and ornamented with religious care. Hence Homer frequently alludes to the offerings of garments made to propitiate a goddess; thus, to cite but one, Hector tells Hecuba to choose the most splendid _peplos_ to offer to Minerva for her aid and favour. Dionysius, the Tyrant of Syracuse, according to a well known anecdote, stripped the Jupiter of his golden cloak, mockingly declaring that it was too heavy for summer, and too cold for winter. “The golden cloak of the Sicilian Jupiter seems scarcely to illustrate the subject of dressing statues—as it was probably not drapery, not cloth enriched with gold—but solid, like the golden Ægis of the Minerva of Phidias, which could be removed and replaced.”—W. W. LLOYD.