Shells have at least as good a claim for being admitted among our decorations, as the heads of sheep and oxen. You know that the ancients placed those heads, stript of the skin, on the frizes, especially of the Doric order, between the Triglyphs, or on the Metopes. We even meet with them on the Corinthian frise of an old temple of Vesta, at Tivoli[69]; on tombs, as on one of the Metellus-family near Rome, and another of Munatius Plancus near Gaeta[70]; on vases, as on a pair in the royal cabinet at Dresden. Some modern artists, finding them perhaps unbecoming, changed them into thunderbolts, like Vignola, or to roses, like Palladio and Scamozzi[71]. We conclude from all this, that learning never had, nor indeed ought to have, any share in an art so nearly related to what we call _Lusus Naturæ_. Thus the ancients thought: for, pray, what could be meant by a lizard on Mentor’s cup?[72] The _Picti squallentia terga lacerti_ Virg. G. IV. make, to be sure, a lovely image amidst the flowers of a Rachel Ruysch, but a very poor figure on a cup. Of what mysterious meaning are birds picking grapes from vines, on an urn?[73] Images, perhaps, as void of sense, and as arbitrary, as the fable of Ganymede embroidered on the mantle, which Æneas presented to Cloanthus, as a reward of his victory in the naval games[74]. To conclude: is there any thing contradictory between trophies and the hunting-house of a Prince? Surely the author, though so zealous a champion for the Greek taste, cannot pretend to propose to us that of King Philip and the Macedonians, who, by the account of Pausanias[75], did not erect their own trophies. Diana perhaps, amidst her nymphs and hunting-equipages, _Qualis in Eurotæ ripis, aut per juga Cynthi,_ _Exercet Diana choros, quam mille secutæ,_ _Hinc atque hinc glomerantur, Oreades_— Virg. might better suit the place; but we know that the antient Romans hung up the arms of their defeated enemies over the out-sides of their doors, to be everlasting monitors of bravery to every succeeding owner of the house. Can trophies, having the same design, ever be misplaced on any building of the Great? I wish for a speedy answer to this letter. You cannot be angry at seeing it published. The tribe of authors now imitate the conduct of the stage, where the lover, with his soliloquy, entertains the pit. For the same reason I shall receive, with all my heart, an answer, _Quam legeret tereretque viritim publicus usus:_ Hor. for _Hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim._ Id. AN ACCOUNT OF A MUMMY, IN The Royal Cabinet of Antiquities at DRESDEN.