Again, it is the most useful edifice--the palace or house--whereon attention is concentrated--the temple and the tomb, the interest attaching to which is ideal and spiritual, are secondary, and appear (so far as they appear at all) simply as appendages of the palace.

In the sculpture it is the actual the historically true--which the artist strives to represent.

Unless in the case of a few mythic figures connected with the religion of the country, there is nothing in the Assyrian bas-reliefs which is not imitated from nature.

The imitation is always laborious, and often most accurate and exact.

The laws of representation, as we understand them, are sometimes departed from, but it is always to impress the spectator with ideas in accordance with truth.