of Electra’s robe there is visible degeneration. Here, as in the Tellus Group, the contour of the bosom is made to support the falling drapery, an unnatural and very unpleasing effect. The architecture of the period is distinguished by similar characteristics. It is distinctly Græco-Roman with much of the subtle harmony of fine Greek work lost. The temples are, on the whole, the least interesting part of the work, for they are pale copies of Greek architecture not always very artistically adapted. A good many of the ruined monuments of Rome to which the pious traveller now directs his footsteps date from the Augustan period. Many of the temples of the Republic were now rebuilt on the old plan with more sumptuous materials, as, for example, the round shrine of Mater Matuta,[57] commonly called the Temple of Hercules. Technical innovations include the debasement of the Doric column by omitting those subtle flutings which gave it all the grace whereby its strength was saved from clumsiness, and by erecting it upon a pedestal. But the Romans preferred the more exuberant Corinthian order with its florid capital of acanthus foliage, a type which the Greeks had used very sparingly and seldom externally. Again, the Romans had discovered improved methods of construction which enabled them to use a wider span in roofing, but they made no artistic advantage out of this fact. On the contrary, by dispensing with the _peristyle_ or surrounding colonnade they rendered the exterior of their temples much less interesting. The principal surviving relics of Augustan temples are eight columns of the Temple of Saturn[58] which still stand in the Forum at Rome. The celebrated Pantheon[59] is now recognised to be a work of Hadrian’s time though its plan probably repeats that of the temple erected on the site by Agrippa. But the clearest picture of the ecclesiastical architecture of the day is to be seen on the reliefs of the Altar of Peace, which reproduce the appearance of actual temples with almost photographic exactitude. The finest extant example is undoubtedly the temple at Nismes, known as the Maison Carrée,[60] a graceful erection of this period which exhibits the Corinthian style without undue extravagance.