4th Room.-Roman bronzes, Roman and Greek glass, and personal ornaments.

5th Room.. Roman sarcophagus found at Husillos; a well (Puteal) with figures representing the Birth of Minerva, Greek, or copy from the Greek; 12 mosaics for hanging against a wall, brought by Charles III. from Herculaneum, representing the games

5th Room.-Dresden and Sèvres porcelain from the china closets at the Palace, and a very beautiful set of Wedgwood jasper ware, which formed part of the cargo of a ship that was seized during the Peninsular War. Bronzes of the 16th centy.

6th Room.-A very fine gun of the 17th centy., inlaid with garnets and cloisonné enamel; an ivory cross which deserves special mention and attention, with inscription "Ferdinandus Rex Sancia Regina," and is one of the most interesting ivories which exist of the 11th centy.; Visigothic and Arabic ornaments from Guarrazar and Andalucia; a crosier given by the Anti-Pope Luna to his sister, the abbess of a convent in Aragon; several ivory diptychs and caskets of interest.

The visitor must here cross the garden to go to the building where the Roman antiquities and medals are arranged.

1st Room.-Chiefly contains inscriptions. Obs. one with Iberic characters.

2nd Room.-The celebrated bronze tablets found at Osuna, and bought by the Government, must be observed. They contain part of the 61 chapters, and the whole of the following until the 82 inclusive, of the colonial laws

given by Julius Cæsar to the colony which he founded under the name of Genetiva Julia.

6th Room.-The visitor must espe

contained in this room. (See Introd. Spanish Sculpture.) They appear to belong to the first centuries of the Christian era. The attributes and emblems of draperies of these statues must be noticed, and inscriptions in Greek and Iberian characters in an undeciphered language. Some of these figures carry in their hands cups with fire, or signs which appear to refer to a solar deity. The student may look at a remarkable sun-dial with Greck inscriptions.*

7th Room.-Roman terra-cottas. Here the visitor may go upstairs to see the Coins and Medals. They are admirably arranged in historic series. Notice the early Iberian coins. The Greek coins are very fine, and the series of medals of Spanish, French, and Italian kings, and distinguished persons, is of the highest interest.

From here the visitor may go through the garden to a small building where the Pre-historic Collections are kept; chiefly remarkable for the quantity of stone-implements found in Spain, and end by going to the Salon Ethnografico, formerly the greenhouse belonging to this small palace. objects it contains which are most worthy of attention are:-a Mexican papyrus, anterior to the Conquest;

The

Private Armouries.-Those belonging to the Duke of Medinaceli and the Duke de Osuna deserve a visit. The view of the Guadarrama from the Vistillas near the Duke's palace ought to be seen.

The Artillery Museum is on the Plaza del Buen Retiro, close to the entrance into the Retiro Gardens (travellers with passports admitted every day). This Museum is chiefly interesting to military men; but the ordinary traveller will be interested in the fine embroidered tent which belonged to Charles V. It is of Oriental work, and was probably taken in the African war. (It was certainly not made by the ladies of Granada, as the custodian would have one believe.) Obs. an interesting model of the town of Madrid in 1830; also a gilt-brass model made for Charles IV.: the chairs and table used by Maroto and Espartero to sign the peace of Vergara.

The Naval Museum, in the Plazuela de los Ministerios, is open to the public (with esquela) on Tuesdays and Fridays from 10 A.M. to 3 P.M., except when it rains. Obs. the shipbuilding models of the day when Spain was a first-class naval power; and also the chart of America made by the pilot Juan de la Cosa for the use of Columbus in his second voyage of discovery in 1493.

of Spanish and South American minerals, marbles, &c. Obs. a loadstone (piedra iman) weighing 6 lbs. and supporting 60 lbs. of metal. The zoological collection contains many rare animals and fossil remains. Obs. a gigantic specimen of the *Megatherium Americanum, found in the year 1789 near the river Lujan, about 40 m. from Buenos Ayres in the river Plate; near it is a smaller specimen of the same extinct animal, which was found near Madrid, 20 ft. below the earth. Obs. also 2 stuffed bulls, called Señorito and Caramelo, and the skeleton of a French soldier.

§ 13. ROYAL PICTURE GALLERY.

The Museo, or Royal Picture Gallery, may be justly considered one of the richest galleries in the world, although containing many splendid gems, rather than a series of pictures illustrative of the history and schools of painting. It is open on Sundays, without charge, from 10 to 3 in winter, and 8 to 1 in summer; on Mondays from 1 to 4, and on other days from 9 to 4. It is closed on rainy Sundays and on holidays. A small fee of 2 reals (50 cents.) is paid on entrance, which goes to the support of the Asylum for the Poor at the Pardo.

A Catalogue in two volumes (the first containing the Italian and Spanish schools), and an abridgment of it in one volume, have been published by Don Pedro Madrazo. It is a creditable production, and contains much useful information as to the pictures and their authors. Many additions have been of late years made to the collection. Some interesting specimens of the early Flemish and Spanish painters have been brought from the Ministry of 'Fomento,' or public works.

entrance on the Prado side, and the unsightly mounds of earth have been removed from the back, thereby adding greatly to the general effect of the building. "The Museum, if not quite successful in design, has so many good points about it as to be well worthy of study; and, with a little more taste in the arrangement of details, might have been a really fine building.* It was built by Juan de Villanueva for his patron Charles III., who intended it for an Academy of Natural History: left unfinished, at the death of its founder, it was slowly continued by his successor, Charles IV., until the French invasion, when it was partly destroyed. And so it remained until after the marriage of Ferdinand VII. with his second wife, La Portuguesa, when one Monte Alegre, who had been a Spanish consul in France, persuaded him to refurnish the palace with French papers, chandeliers, and ormolu clocks; whereupon the pictures were taken down and stowed away in garrets and corridors exposed to wind and weather, until two noblemen of the court of Ferdinand, viz. the Duque de Gor and the Marques de Santa Cruz, the latter of whom was Mayordomo Mayor (or Lord High Steward), persuaded the queen to remove them to the then unused building on the Prado. In November, 1819, three saloons were got ready, and 311 pictures exhibited to the public; the extraordinary quality of which, especially of Velasquez, instantly attracted the admiring eye of foreigners, who appreciate the merits of the old masters of Spain much better than the natives. Ferdinand VII., seeing that renown was to be obtained, now came forward, and the Museo was slowly advanced, one more saloon being opened in 1821: thus cheaply did he earn the title of an Augustus; but such things occur elsewhere. The Gallery not having been built for pictures, the lighting is bad, and they cannot be seen to advantage on a dull day.

No collection of pictures was ever

*Ferguson's 'Mo lern Architecture,' p. 157.

begun or continued under greater advantages. Charles V. and Philip II., both real patrons of art, were the leading sovereigns of Europe at the bright period of the Renaissance, when fine art was an every-day necessity, and pervaded every.relation of life. Again, Philip IV. ruled at Naples and in the Low Countries at the second restoration of art, which he truly loved for itself. These three monarchs, like Alexander the Great, took a pleasure in raising their painters to personal intimacy; and nowhere have artists been more highly honoured than were Velasquez and Rubens in the palace of Madrid. At a later period, Philip V., grandson of Louis XIV., added many pictures by the principal French artists of their Augustan age. While the Spanish kings patronised art at home, their viceroys in Italy and the Low Countries collected and sent home the finest specimens of the great artists who flourished from Raphael down to the Carraccis and Claude: these glorious gems until the French invasion were preserved pure as when they issued from the studios of their immortal authors.

The Museo is deficient in examples of the early Italian schools, and of some of the great Italian painters of the 15th and 16th centuries, but is especially rich in the works of Raphael, Titian, Tintoretto, Paul Veronese, Rubens, and Vandyke. The Spanish masters, with the exception of Velasquez, Murillo, and Ribera, are scantily represented. It contains (including some which are attributed, on insufficient grounds, to these painters) 46 pictures by Murillo, 62 by Velasquez, 14 by Zurbaran, 55 by Luca Giordano, 58 by Ribera, 21 by Vandyke, 10 by Raphael, 5 by Guido, 10 by Claude, 35 by the Bassanos, 54 by the Breughels, 8 by Alonso Cano, 12 by the Poussins, 33 by Tintoretto, 43 by Titian, 21 by Paul Veronese, 53 by the Teniers, 62 by Rubens, 13 by Antonio Moro, &c. &c. The Gallery possesses almost the entire work of Velasquez; and it is only here that the masterpieces of this great painter can be really studied and understood,

A. Rotunda. B. Spanish School. C. Italian School. D. Vestibule, Modern Spanish School. E, F. Long centre Gallery, Spanish and Italian Schools. G. Hall of Isabel II. H. French Schools. I, J. Flemish and Dutch, both divided into 5 compartments, a, b, c, d, e. K. Portraits of the Spanish Bourbons.

L. Contemporary Spanish School. M. Original Drawings. N. Greek Vases, &c. O. Sculpture. P. Sculpture Q. Sculpture. R. Hall of Alfonso XII.