_Zoölogy_ is represented with a lion seated beside her, her hands
clasping his mane. She is the huntress and student of wild life, and
her body is powerfully developed, like an Amazon’s. She is clad in
the pelt of an animal, the head forming her cap, and in buskins of
skin. She stands on a rocky piece of ground, like a desert. The chief
colors employed in the pendentive are the typical animal colors,
browns and yellows.
_Physics_ stands on an electric globe, from which emanate rays of
light. She carries a torch in her left hand, and she holds up an end
of her drapery in her right in such a way that it seems to start from
the flame and flow in sympathy with it over her whole body, so that
it conveys the idea of the unceasing motion of fire. The same colors
as those used in the pendentive of _Geology_, purple and orange, are
used here also, but in this case standing, of course, for the colors
of flame.
[Illustration: MATHEMATICS. BY WALTER SHIRLAW]
_Mathematics_, the exact science, is represented as almost entirely
nude,--like “the Naked Truth” of Mr. Walker’s tympanum on the floor
below. Her right foot is on a stone block inscribed with the conic
sections, and on a shield which she holds are various geometrical
figures. Her scanty drapery is appropriately disposed in the severest
lines.
_Geology_, a sculpturesque figure, stands squarely and firmly upon
a mountain top, beyond which is seen the setting sun. A fold of her
drapery forms a receptacle for the specimens she has gathered. In her
left hand is a globe, and in her right a fossil shell. Her hair is
confined by a head-dress of bars of silver and gold. The embroidered
pattern of her garment has a suggestion of fossil forms and of the
little lizards which are found among the rocks.
_Archæology_ is clad in the Roman costume, and wears the helmet of
Minerva; the helmet is wreathed with olive, the emblem of peace,
which was sacred to Minerva, and is here used with special reference
to the peaceful character of the science, which can pursue its labors
only in an orderly society. The figure stands on a block of stone,
the surface of which is carved to represent a scroll, the ancient
form of book. A vase, copied from the manufacture of the Zuñi Indians
of New Mexico, stands beside her. In her right hand she holds a large
book, the pages of which she examines with the aid of a magnifying
glass in order to spell out its half obliterated text. Around her
neck is coiled a chameleon, whose changing hues are intended to
symbolize the varying nature of the theories she propounds.
The countenance of _Botany_ is expressive of a joyous sympathy with
nature. She stands on the pad of a water-lily, engaged in analyzing
its flower, the long stem of which coils gracefully about her body to
the water. Her drapery flows and breaks as a half-opened flower might
arrange itself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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