THE STORY OF THE PORTLAND VASE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2200, 30 April 1896, Page 49

THE STORY OF THE PORTLAND VASE.

The Portland vase is at present deposited in the gold-ornament room (it is entirely of glass) in the British Museum ; of course it has a glass case, and it rests upon a nice pad of crimson plush. As usual, the official information deals almost exclusively with the apocryphal subjects depicted on the vase — «« Peleus and Thetis on Mount Pelion," and the like recondite allusions. The Portland vase is 9|m high and 21|in in oiroumference. The material is a kind ot glass— an imitation of onyx — the ground being a rich, transparent, dark-amethyst oolour, with snowy figures in bas-relief of truly exquisite workmanship. It was found in a marble sarcophagus inside a sepulchral chamber under the Monte del Grano, two miles and a-half from Rome, on the road to Frasoati. It was deposited there a.d. 235, and the vase is sapposed to be the urn that contained the ashes of the Romaa Emperor Aloxander Severus and his mother, Julia Matnmsa. It was unearthed by order of Pope Barberirii (Urban VIII), and it was for more than two centuries the principal ornament of the Barberini Falaoe.

In 1786 the then Dufre of Portland purohased the vase at a sale for 1029g5 ; and he deposited it in the British Museum in 1810, when it was carefully placed under a glass case on an octagonal table in the middle of an ante-room near the Hamiltonian collection. At a quarter to 4 on February 7, 1845, a number of visitors were going round the Hamiltonian room and its ante-chamber in much the same limp, aimless way that peopleperform their museum peregrinations to this day, when they heard a fearful orash. Now, when we ooneider that even a subdued chuckle is somehow vastly Increased in volume amid the sombre galleries at Bloomsbury, we realise in some slight degree the appalling effect of that crash. The moment the attendants hastened to the spot they beheld the priceless Portland vase scattered in a hundred fragments over the floor. The doors were immediately closed; and Mr Hawkins, the superintendent, at once questioned the horrified persons in the apartments, none of whom attempted to escape, lest the odium of the fell deed should descend upon him. All g*ve satisfactory replies, until the delinquent himself was taxed, when he at once cried— •• Alone I did it 1 "

He was immediately given into custody, and on being brought before Mr Jardine, at Bow street police station, he, too, fell from his high estate by allegirg " delirium arising from -habitual intemperance " — clearly a euphemism for a state of uproarious drunkenness." The culprit waa William Loyd, a theatrical scene-painter of Dublin, but tkca living in a coffee-house in Long Acre. Of course the outrage was amere bid for evanescent notoriety, ah act of Timdalism ad captandum viilgus, with not even the redeeming feature of .baying been committed in order to draw attention to the perennial wrongs of Ireland. All this waa bad enough, but even worse remained behind; for, amazing as it may seem; tbe law was powerless in the matter. The Wilful Damage Aot directed the payment of £5, or two months' imprisonment, for deliberate damage done to property under the value of £5; from which it is evident that those who piloted the aot through Parliament bad an idea that no human being would venture to damage property above that value. Be this as it may, the magistrate was driven to the evasion of directing Loyd to pay £s— the nominal value of the glass case under which the vase stood. All the miscreant possessed, however, was 9d ; consequently he was haled off forthwith to Tothlll Fields Prison, where bis trucalent disposition manifested itself from time to time in violent assaults on the turnkeys. This extraordinary story has a ourious sequel. On February 13 a letter was received by Mr Jardine at Bow street enclosing £5, which the anonymous donor requested might go in payment of Loyd's fine. Subsequently the governor of the gaol received the authority of the magistrate to set the prisoner at liberty. One result of this remarkable affair was that the Government passed \ a special Aot to protect works of art from the recurrence of outrages of this kind. In one oorner of the room in which the Portland vase is at present exhibited hangs a curious water-colour drawing, in a plain oak frame, of the shattered fragments just as they lay on the floor immediately after the outrage. Perhaps I should have mentioned that tbe missile Loyd used was a curious little piece of sculpture that was exhibited close by the vase itself. A drawing of the pieces bears the following inscription in faded ink at the top left-hand corner: — "Destroyed Fab. 7th, 18i5; restored Sept. 10th, 1845.— John D^ubleday." Below Is written : •• Drawn from the fragments by T. Hosmer Shepherd, 1845."— Strand Magazine.