Be the explanation what it may, the fact is indisputable that archaeology is patronised by those who know not its real meaning. A man has no more right to think of the people of old as dust and dead bones than he has to think of his contemporaries as lumps of meat. The true archaeologist does not take pleasure in skeletons as skeletons, for his whole effort is to cover them decently with flesh and skin once more, and to put some thoughts back into the empty skulls. He sets himself to hide again the things which he would not intentionally lay bare. Nor does he delight in ruined buildings: rather he deplores that they are ruined. Coleridge wrote like the true archaeologist when he composed that most magical poem "Khubla Khan"-- "In Xanadu did Khubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea." And those who would have the pleasure-domes of the gorgeous Past reconstructed for them must turn to the archaeologist; those who would see the damsel with the dulcimer in the gardens of Xanadu must ask of him the secret, and of none other. It is true that, before he can refashion the dome or the damsel, he will have to grub his way through old refuse heaps till he shall lay bare the ruins of the walls and expose the bones of the lady. But this is the "dirty work"; and the mistake which is made lies here: that this preliminary dirty work is confused with the final clean result. An artist will sometimes build up his picture of Venus from a skeleton bought from an old Jew round the corner; and the smooth white paper which he uses will have been made from putrid rags and bones. Amongst painters themselves these facts are not hidden, but by the public they are most carefully obscured. In the case of archaeology, however, the tedious details of construction are so placed in the foreground that the final picture is hardly noticed at all. As well might one go to Rheims to see men fly, and be shown nothing else but screws and nuts, steel rods and cog-wheels. Originally the fault, perhaps, lay with the archaeologist; now it lies both with him and with the public. The public has learnt to ask to be shown the works, and the archaeologist is often so proud of them that he forgets to mention the purpose of the machine. A Roman statue of bronze, let us suppose, is discovered in the Thames valley. It is so corroded and eaten away that only an expert could recognise that it represents a reclining goddess. In this condition it is placed in the museum, and a photograph of it is published in 'The Graphic.' Those who come to look at it in its glass case think it is a bunch of grapes, or possibly a monkey: those who see its photograph say that it is more probably an irregular catapult-stone or a fish in convulsions.