offering to some god. A lovely stele from Rhodes gives us a family
group. The husband is on horseback and is bidding farewell to his wife,
who seems as if she would follow him but is being held back by a little
child. The pathos of parting from those we love is the central motive of
Greek funeral art. It is repeated in every possible form, and each mute
marble stone seems to murmur [Greek]. Roman art is different. It
introduces vigorous and realistic portraiture and deals with pure family
life far more frequently than Greek art does. They are very ugly, those
stern-looking Roman men and women whose portraits are exhibited on their
tombs, but they seem to have been loved and respected by their children
and their servants. Here is the monument of Aphrodisius and Atilia, a
Roman gentleman and his wife, who died in Britain many centuries ago, and
whose tombstone was found in the Thames; and close by it stands a stele
from Rome with the busts of an old married couple who are certainly
marvellously ill-favoured. The contrast between the abstract Greek
treatment of the idea of death and the Roman concrete realisation of the
individuals who have died is extremely curious.

Besides the tombstones, the new Sculpture Room contains some most
fascinating examples of Roman decorative art under the Emperors. The
most wonderful of all, and this alone is worth a trip to Bloomsbury, is a
bas-relief representing a marriage scene. Juno Pronuba is joining the
hands of a handsome young noble and a very stately lady. There is all
the grace of Perugino in this marble, all the grace of Raphael even. The
date of it is uncertain, but the particular cut of the bridegroom's beard
seems to point to the time of the Emperor Hadrian. It is clearly the
work of Greek artists and is one of the most beautiful bas-reliefs in the
whole Museum. There is something in it which reminds one of the music
and the sweetness of Propertian verse. Then we have delightful friezes
of children. One representing children playing on musical instruments