"Nous savons que l'Apollon Citharede de Scopas etait dans le temple d'Apollon Palatin, eleve par Auguste; les medailles, Properce et Tibulle, nous apprennent que le dieu s'y voyait revetu d'une longue robe.

'Ima videbatur talis illudere palla.'

_Tib._ iii. 4, 35.

'Pythius in longa carmina veste sonat.'

_Prop._ ii. 31, 16.

"Nous ne pouvons donc hesiter a admettre que l'Apollon de la salle des Muses au Vatican a eu pour premier original l'Apollon de Scopas.

"Nous savons aussi qu'un Apollon de Philiscus et un Apollon de Timarchide (celui-ci tenant la lyre), sculpteurs grecs moins anciens que Scopas, etaient dans un autre temple d'Apollon, pres du portique d'Octavie, en compagnie des Muses, comme l'Apollon Citharede du Vatican a ete trouve avec celles qui l'entourent aujourd'hui dans la salle des Muses. Il est donc vraisemblable que cet Apollon est d'apres Philiscus ou Timarchide, qui eux-memes avaient sans doute copie l'Apollon _a la lyre_ de Scopas et l'avaient place au milieu des Muses.

"Apollon est la, ainsi que plus anciennement il avait ete represente sur le coffre de Cypselus, avec cette inscription qui conviendrait a la statue du Vatican: 'Alentour est le chur gracieux des Muses, auquel il preside;' et, comme dit Pindare, 'au milieu du beau chur des Muses, Apollon frappe du plectrum d'or la lyre aux sept voix."--_Ampere, Hist. Rom._ iii. 292.

Here we reach the _Sala Rotonda_, built by Pius VI., paved with a mosaic found in 1780 in the baths of Otricoli, and containing in its centre a grand porphyry vase from the baths of Titus. On either side of the entrance are colossal heads of Tragedy and Comedy, from Hadrian's Villa.

Beginning from the right are:

539. *Bust of Jupiter from Otricoli--the finest extant.

540. Antinous, from Hadrian's Villa. All the drapery (probably once of bronze) is a restoration.

"Antinous was drowned in the Nile, A.D. 131. Some accounts assert that he drowned himself in obedience to an oracle, which demanded for the life of the emperor Hadrian the sacrifice of the object dearest to him. However this may be, Hadrian lamented his death with extravagant weakness, proclaimed his divinity to the jeering Egyptians, and consecrated a temple in his honour. He gave the name of Besantinopolis to a city in which he was worshipped in conjunction with an obscure divinity named Besa."--_Merivale_, lxvi.

541. Faustina the elder, wife of Antoninus Pius.

542. Augustus, veiled.

543. *Hadrian, found in his mausoleum.

544. *Colossal Hercules, in gilt bronze, found (1864) near the Theatre of Pompey. The feet and ankles are restorations by Tenerani.

546. *Bust of Antinous.

547. Sea-god, from Pozzuoli.

548. *Nerva.

"Among the treasures of antiquity preserved in modern Rome, none surpasses,--none perhaps equals,--in force and dignity, the sitting statue of Nerva, which draws all eyes in the rotunda of the Vatican, embodying the highest ideal of the Roman magnate, the finished warrior, statesman, and gentleman of an age of varied training and wide practical experience."--_Merivale_, ch. xliii.

549. Jupiter Serapis.

550. *The Barberini Juno.

551. Claudius.

552. Juno Sospita, from Lanuvium. This is the only statue in the Vatican of which we can be certain that it was a worshipped idol; the sandals of the Tyrrhenian Juno turn up at the end,--no other Juno wears these sandals.

553. Plotina, wife of Trajan.

554. Julia Domna, wife of Septimius Severus.

556. Pertinax.

The _Sala a Croce Greca_ contains:

_On the right._--The porphyry sarcophagus of Sta. Constantia, daughter of Constantine the Great, adorned with sculptures of a vintage, brought hither most inappropriately, from her church near St'Agnese.

_On the left._--The porphyry sarcophagus of Sta. Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, carried off from her tomb (now called Torre Pignatarra) by Anastasius IV., and placed in the Lateran, whence it was brought hither by Pius VI. The restoration of its reliefs, representing battle scenes of the time of Constantine, cost 20,000.

At the end of the hall on the right is a recumbent river-god, said to have been restored by Michael Angelo. The stairs, adorned with twenty ancient columns from Palestrina, lead to:

The _Sala della Biga_, so called from a white marble chariot, drawn by two horses. Only the body of the chariot (which long served as an episcopal throne in the church of S. Marco) and part of the horse on the right, are ancient; the remainder is restoration. Among the sculptures here, are:

608. Bearded Bacchus.

609. An interesting sarcophagus representing a chariot-race. The chariots are driven by Amorini, who are not attending to what they are about, and drive over one another. The eggs and dolphins on the winning-posts indicated the number of times they had gone round; each time they passed another egg and dolphin were put up.

610. Bacchus, as a woman.

611. Alcibiades?

612. Veiled priest, from the Giustiniani collection.

614. Apollo Citharaedus.

615. Discobolus, copy of a bronze statue by Naubides.

616. *Phocion, very remarkable and beautiful from the extreme simplicity of the drapery.

618. Discobolus, copy of the bronze statue of Myron--inferior to that at the Palazzo Massimo.

"Il n'y a pas une statue dont l'original soit connu avec plus de certitude que le Discobole. Cet original fut l'athlete lancant le disque de Myron.

"C'est bien la statue se contournant avec effort dont parle Quintilien; en effet, la statue, penchee en avant et dans l'attitude du jet, porte le corps sur une jambe, tandis que l'autre est trainante derriere lui. Ce n'est pas la main, c'est la personne tout entiere qui va lancer le disque."--_Ampere, Hist. Rom._ iii.

270.

619. Charioteer.

Proceeding in a straight line from the top of the stairs, we enter:

The _Galleria dei Candelabri_, 300 feet long, filled with small pieces of sculpture. Among these we may notice in the centre, on the right, Bacchus and Silenus, found near the Sancta-Sanctorum, also:

194. Boy with a goose.

224. Nemesis.

'Une petite statue da Vatican rappelle une curieuse anecdote dont le heros est Agoracrite. Alcamene et lui avaient fait chacun une statue de Venus. Celle d'Alcamene fut jugee la meilleure par les Atheniens. Agoracrite, indigne de ce qui lui semblait une injustice, transforma la sienne en Nemesis, deesse vengeresse de l'equite violee, et le rendit aux habitants du bourg de Rhamnus, a condition qu'elle ne serait jamais exposee a Athenes. Ceci montre combien sa Venus avait garde la severite du type primitif. Ce n'est pas de la Venus du Capitole ou de la Venus de Medicis, qu'on aurait pu faire une Nemesis. Nemesis avait pour embleme la coudee, signe de la _mesure_ que Nemesis ne permet point de depasser, et l'avant-bras etait la figure de la _coudee_, par suite, de la mesure. C'est pourquoi quand on representait Nemesis on placait toujours l'avant-bras de maniere d'attirer sur lui l'attention.