All this is very different from the “Roman style” of books and the commentaries on Vitruvius. We may see in such provincial Roman works an early stage of Romanesque art and even the beginnings of Gothic. Again, the fragment of a column at the British Museum, carved over with a lattice pattern having foliage in the interspaces, is particularly interesting as an example of an “all-over” diaper pattern, and a prototype of Romanesque carved shafts. At Trèves there are many examples of much more elaborate diaper patterns of the same type. Such continuous surface decorations speak rather of what was to be in the romance ages than of the past of classical art. Even the series of acanthus leaves arranged like tiles on the “roof” of the sarcophagus found at Haydon Square shows adaptive invention and pleasure (that is what it comes to) in the doing (Fig. 50). If ever we awake to make use of our inheritance and set about civilising London, we might yet gain something of value from the Roman sculptures which have been discussed. A replica of the splendid head of Hadrian might be joined on to a bronze cast from one of the figures of the emperor in the British Museum and re-erected, resurrected, as a visible symbol of the Roman age in Britain and London. Set on a tall pedestal, it would make a noble monument. Copies of the Ludgate Hill Soldier and of the “Signifer” at the Guildhall, we might place against each side, and the reclining River God—the Thames—in front, with an enlargement of the Genius Loci at the London Museum above it. Such a monument would be something to tell the children about, and it might even move the business men to occasional thoughts outside the fluctuations of stock. [Illustration: FIG. 87. ] _Symbolism._—Romano-British sculpture was certainly not over-refined; indeed, much of it was just the opposite. But ideas were embodied, and many of the things had simple and poetic meanings. The power of making impersonations is specially to be noted, whereby an image stood for a thing as definitely as its name—Sun, Moon and Planets, Seasons, Winds and Waters, Countries, Cities and localities, events and wishes. Fragments of a set of reliefs of seasons found at Bath, represented by nude boys carrying flowers, a reaping-hook, etc.; the winged heads of Winds; and the rising and setting Sun of the Mithraic panel at the London Museum talk a universal language.