Picture Gallery. In this room the center part of the ceiling is supported by small columns, which divide the lights, and which are imitated from tose that are seen at Athens, in the upper division of the octagon building, vulgarly called the temple of the Winds. Rhese columns rest on massy beams, similar to those in marble, which lie across the peristyle of the temple of Theseus, also at Athens. The larger columns which support the entablature offer the profiles of those of the Propylaea.
Along each side of this rooms extends a cornice, from which are suspended curtains, destined occasionally to protect from the sum the several compartments of pictures, hung against the walls; and these curtains are here represented as actually let down over the pictures.
At the farther end of this gallery stands an organ, the Ionic order of whole columns, entablature, and pediment, has been copied from the exquisitely beautiful specimen displayed in the temple of Erectheus, in the Acropolis of Athens. The car of the god of music, of Apollo, glides over the center of the pediment. The tripods, sacred to this deity, surmount the angles. Laurel wreaths and other emblems, belonging to the son of Latona, appear embroidered on the drapery, which, in the form of an ancient peplum or veil, descends over the pipes o fthe instrument, and gives it the appearance of a sanctuary.
Large tables, destined for portfolios of drawings and books of prints, occupy the middle of the gallery, and a few antique implements and remains are placed along its sides.
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