Hamilton, William; Kirk, Thomas: Outlines from the figures and compositions upon the Greek, Roman and Etruscan vases of the late Sir William Hamilton: with engraved borders (London, 1814)

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ciples of Zeno adopted the same opinion. Hesiod
believed, that those, who lived in the golden
age, were become good genii, and still inhabited
the earth, though invisible. These mystical ideas,
which appear to be founded upon the immortality
of the soul, passed from Phoenicia into Greece
and Italy. There they remained, and both in-
creased the superstition of the people, and mul-
tiplied almost to infinity the histories of appari-
tions and ghosts, both of the dead and of the gods,
which by means of the marvellous, laid a strong
hold of, and greatly interested, credulous minds,

It is perhaps an apparition of this sort,
which the present plate exhibits, Some persons
have thought, that they discovered here Chry-
sosthemis and Clytemnestra offering presents to
the tomb of Agamemnon, which is represented
by the column, upon which one of the females
supports herself. The genius would be that of
Agamemnon, who appears to the alarmed Cly-
temnestra, as is represented both by Sophocles
and Eschylus in the dream they suppose that
princess to have had. Whether this be the true
explanation or not, it is evident, that the design
itself is full of grace and expression, and we can
no where find a grander or more noble figure