the original purchaser sold it shortly after to the Duc de Richelieu for one thousand crowns.

SAVING TIME.

POPE CLEMENT VII. at the siege of Rome, in the year 1530, seems to have had a happy notion of saving time; for, being asked by Benvenuto Cellini for absolution, on account of certain homicides which he believed himself to have committed "in the service of the church," he added an absolution (in prospectu) for all homicides, thereafter, which he, "the said Benvenuto, in the same service," might find it desirable to commit. The same Pontiff (or Pope Paul, his immediate successor) entertained an admirable sense too of the deference due to talent. Being teased about another murder which Cellini had performed-this was not "in the service of the church," but a casual stabbing of a waiter, or tavern-keeper, or some such person-the relative of the deceased in urging punishment, made some mention about "the laws;" upon which the successor of St. Peter (goldsmiths like Benvenuto being easier hanged than replaced) took the high tone at once, and told the complainant"Sir, I must inform you, that men who are masters in their profession, should not be subject to the laws." Murders, therefore, continued to be committed, and the apostolic plate to be engravedboth by Signor Cellini," on the shortest notice."

THE BATHS OF DIOCLESIAN.

THE baths of Dioclesian are said to have had accommodations for eighteen hundred bathers. The names of the different bathing apartments were the cold bath (frigidarium), the hot (calidarium), the tepid (tepidarium), the stove (hypocastum), the sweating room (sudatorium), the undressing room (apodyterium), and the perfuming room (unctuarium). Whatever pains Palladio, Serlio, and other authors took in their designs for the restoration of the baths of the Romans, they do not appear to have been very successful, for the designs of the same building, by different artists, differ considerably. According to Alberti, in the eighth book of his Architecture, the extent of an ancient Roman bathing establishment was at least a hundred thousand square feet. Now if we consider the great extent of their ruins, the great number of their apartments, courts, and halls which were inclosed and served for recreations and exercise, Alberti does not err on the side of excess. They were generally of a square or oblong form, and surrounded with walls; this space had three enclosures, each of which surrounded the building, as it were, one placed within the other. The first, or that which surrounded the exterior, contained the halls in which the philosophers gave their instructions, and those which were used by the athlete. The second division contained open places, planted

with trees, for the exercise of the youths. In the third division, situated in the middle of the building, were the baths, surrounded with porticos and open courts. Sometimes the entire building was enclosed by a park, like that of Alexander Severus, which contributed greatly to the embellishment of the whole

structure.

UNIQUE PICTURES.

THE following choice specimens of ancient and modern art, the undoubted property of a distinguished wit, collected with recent labour, and at great expense; among which are many genuine and original productions, it is said will be shortly brought to the hammer :

Two Cats fighting, by Claude (claw'd).

The interior of Covent Garden Theatre during

the Riot, by Opie (O. P.)

The rescued Flower, by Salvator Rosa.
The extracted Tooth, by Stump.

The Veto, by A. Pope.

The Kitten in a Cage, by Poussin (Puss in.)
Recubans sub tegmine fagi, by Beechey.
The Salutation, by Metzu (Met, you.)
The Siege of Troy, by Teniers (Ten years.)
Death of William Rufus, by Arrowsmith.
The Ghost and Don Giovanni, by Bone.
View of Billingsgate, by Rouw.

The Hay-stack in Danger, by Raeburn. The Carpenter's Shop, a Cabinet picture, by Turner.

The Polar Expedition, with a portrait of Captain Ross, by Landseer.

OF THE EGYPTIAN LABYRINTH.

From Elmes's Lectures on Architecture.

Of the early private domestic architecture of the Egyptians, we have not many or sure grounds; but their immense palace or congeries of palaces, called the Labyrinth, which the Greeks imitated in their no less celebrated Labyrinth at Crete, by Dedalus, proves them to have advanced in the palatial style of domestic architecture to as great perfection o splendour as they had in the sacred styles.

It has been doubted whether any ruins of this wonderful structure have ever been discovered; but Captain Wilford, an enterprising searcher into antiquities, asserts in a very able paper in the Asiatic Researches, that its ruins are still to be seen near the Lake Moris, at a place which the Arabs have named the Kasi, or Palace of Karan, whom they suppose to have been the richest of mortals. We must, however, rely upon the credit of ancient authors for an account of it; and the authority of Herodotus is undoubtedly the best we can refer to on this head. There is great diversity of opinion upon the exact period to which this much boasted

edifice should be assigned. Herodotus (lib. ii. n. 148) attributes its construction to the twelve kings who reigned in Egypt at the same time, about six hundred and eighty years before the Christian era. Pomponius Mela agrees in most points with Herodotus; and from these two authors we may gather a tolerably clear idea of this great example of the palatial domestic architecture of Egypt.

Herodotus, who had visited and examined this edifice with great attention, affirms that it surpassed every thing that he had conceived of it. Within one and the same circuit of walls, it contained twelve magnificent palaces, regularly disposed, and communicating with each other. Each of these palaces contained three thousand halls, twelve of which were of a particular form and beauty. Half of these halls or chambers were interspersed with terraces, and were arranged round the twelve principal halls, communicating with each other, but by so many turns and windings, that, without an experienced guide, it was impossible to escape wandering; the other half were underground, cut out of the rock, and were said to have been used for the sepulchre of their kings. Herodotus assures us, that he visited all the apartments above ground; but those which were subterraneous, they would not, from motives of superstition, permit him to enter. Captain Wilford thinks that the various apartments under ground had been used for depo