But an infinite pathos and strange
terror are given to this beautiful group by some faint bas-reliefs on the
pedestal, indicating that the happy mother is Eve, and Cain and Abel the
two innocent babes.
Then we went to the Alhambra, which looks like an enchanted palace. If
it had been a sunny day, I should have enjoyed it more; but it was
miserable to shiver and shake in the Court of the Lions, and in those
chambers which were contrived as places of refuge from a fervid
temperature. Furthermore, it is not quite agreeable to see such clever
specimens of stage decoration; they are so very good that it gets to be
past a joke, without becoming actual earnest. I had not a similar
feeling in respect to the reproduction of mediaeval statues, arches,
doorways, all brilliantly colored as in the days of their first glory;
yet I do not know but that the first is as little objectionable as the
last. Certainly, in both cases, scenes and objects of a past age are
here more vividly presented to the dullest mind than without such
material facilities they could possibly be brought before the most
powerful imagination. Truly, the Crystal Palace, in all its departments,
offers wonderful means of education. I marvel what will come of it.
Among the things that I admired most was Benvenuto Cellini's statue of
Perseus holding the head of Medusa, and standing over her headless and
still writhing body, out of which, at the severed neck, gushed a vast
exuberance of snakes.
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