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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1870 edition. Excerpt:... apartments, there was a recess of the form described, and among the dlbris occurred the rings that had been employed in the suspension of the curtain drawn across the front. These recesses appear to have continued in use after the Roman occupation, and were perhaps represented by the oriel windows of the middle ages. They are introduced into many parts of Ham House, near Richmond in Surrey, which was built in the year 1610, but considerably altered in the reign of Charles II. In this house some of these recesses are arranged for one person, others for two, and have fittings, if not curtains, of the middle of the seventeenth century. In England, in a villa discovered at Leicester, Mr. Thomas Wright, F.S.A. informs us that a short pillar was found lying upon the tessellated floor of the semicircular division, which seemed to have served as an altar, or to have supported a small statue; and it has been conjectured that this recess served as the sacrarium, a place of domestic worship where the image of the patron god of the family was placed. The elaborate design of the decorative portion of our pavement is best understood by the beautiful illustration which is given. It shows at a glance the amount of skill and labour which has been bestowed upon the work, the taste and genius displayed in its conception, and the spirited and artistic way in which it has been carried out. For boldness of design, harmony in colour, and the effect of gradations of light and shade in the tints selected, this pavement, with the exception, perhaps, of that from Leadenhall Street, surpasses anything of the kind previously found in the metropolis. It is of a better class of work than those discovered in Threadneedle Street, Lothbury, or at the Excise...