So early as the publication of the “Antiquities of Athens,” by Stuart and Revett, the traces of ornaments on the mouldings of the Greek temples were known and published by them, some of the painted ornaments, however, which they found, being engraved in their work as if in relief; but artists were for long after unwilling to accept these fragments as evidence that an entire system of ornamentation prevailed on the Greek buildings. The late Jules Goury and Professor Semper, from whom will be found a paper on Polychromy in the Appendix, were amongst the earliest to direct attention to this subject; but the most diligent labourer in the field is M. Hittorff, of Paris, who has devoted many years to the production of a magnificent work, in which will be found all the facts that are known, and a history of the long discussion which this subject has provoked. Mr. Penrose also, in his work on the “Principles of Athenian Architecture,” has recorded all that he himself saw, but is reluctant to believe that any ornaments existed where traces of ornament can no longer be found. He feels that there is “some slight ground of evidence that a peculiar yellow tinge upon some parts of the columns, especially of the west front of the Parthenon, is not simply the yellow said to result from the oxidation of iron contained in Pentelic marble, but has been applied externally as a tint, though perhaps so delicately as merely to reduce the high light of the marble without obscuring its crystalline character.” He considers it “unreasonable to suppose that the ancients entirely concealed, or even materially altered in appearance, the general surface of the white marble, which they made a great point of obtaining whenever possible; but that no one who has witnessed the painfully dazzling effect of fresh Pentelic marble under the Athenian sun will deny the artistic value of toning down the almost pure white of its polished surface, and the more so when considerable portions of the architecture were painted in the most positive colours. We need not suppose,” he says further, “this tone to have produced more than the difference between fresh white marble and ivory.” An examination of the facts recorded by these various authorities will convince any one that the question is now narrowed to one of degree only— “To _what extent_ were white marble temples painted and ornamented?” I would maintain that they were _entirely_ so; that neither the colour of the marble nor even its surface was preserved; and that, preparatory to the ornamenting and colouring of the surface, the whole was covered with a thin coating of stucco, something in the nature of a gilder’s ground, to stop the absorption of the colours by the marble. The Egyptians covered their buildings and statues in a similar way, no matter what the material; the Greek temples, which were built of lime-stone, were so undoubtedly; the ancient Greek terra-cottas almost without exception have traces of this ground.