If these observations on the Ionic capital seem to detain us too long, we cannot help it: they are nothing less than indispensable for a proper understanding of its nature, and the peculiarity of circumstances attending it. What remains to be observed is, that owing to its complexity, that capital admits of very great diversity of character and decoration. It is sometimes without, and sometimes has a necking to it, which may either be plain or decorated, as may best accord with the particular expression, either as to richness or quiet simplicity, which is aimed at as the characteristic of the entire design. The capital may be modified almost infinitely in its proportions; first, as regards its general proportion to the column; secondly, as regards the size of the volutes compared with the width of the face. In the best Greek examples the volutes are much bolder and larger than in those of the Roman and Italian, in some of which they are so greatly reduced in size, and become consequently so far apart from each other, as to be insignificant in themselves, and give the whole capital an expression of meagreness and meanness. The _spirals_ forming the volute supply another source of variety, since they may be either single or manifold. In what is called the Ilissus Ionic capital there is only a single spiral, or _hem_, whose revolutions form the volute, which mode, indeed, prevails in all the Roman and modern Ionics; but in the capitals of the Temple of Erechtheus at Athens, there are, besides that principal spiral, other intermediate ones which follow the course of its revolutions. Again, the _cathetus_, or eye of the volute, where the spiral or spirals terminate, admits of being made smaller or larger. It is, besides, sometimes flat, sometimes convex, and occasionally carved as a _rosette_. All these variations are independent of the general composition of the capital, and though not all equally good, they both suggest and authorize other modifications of the Ionic type, and fresh combinations. [Illustration]