The daily gazette., 1876-12-12
From the New York Herald.
The Tomb Of Aga
mPInnOn

| The startling discoveries on the site of the
ancient Mycene by DIR. Henri Schliemann,
| which the Herald had the honor of exclu-
sively announcing yesterday, will deserve
and obtain the deepest attention of scholars
| and Hellenists all over the world. They
take us back to one of those dim periods
sailed prehistoric" over which "A wave of
physical oblivion had swept, and of which
1 only u shadowy story remained. The body
| of things In these ages died and was buried
and the spirit lived only on the air of the
breath, or f,oated, clothed In spectral from,
before the eye OF the poet "in fine frenzy
| rolling" To bring these ages before us In
| something palpable-that can be looked at,
touched and weighed-is ''materialization''
| on the most exalted scale. what would
Byron, who poured out his enthusiasm
| upon q mound in the Trojan plain that he
believed to have been the grave of Hector.
have given to lay his hand upon the tomb
reared above the dust of A gamemnon the
mighty liking of mem" The immortal in
tcrcst centred in the great epic of Homer
secures for this discovery of the cnthusias-
tic German doctor a spell-bound audience
larger than that listening to the disintcrred
story Of any of the other great archGologi-
cal discoveries ofmodern times. II possibly
outdates them all in antiquity. If the
chrOnologies are sustained IL touches An
epoch co"Val with the earliest discovered
records of Assyria-the reign of Tiglath
Pileser |. IL brings to light IA civilization
four centuries older than the foundation of
Rome, two centuries before the birth of
Homer. four hundred years before the vic
tory of Cornbus in the Olympic games at
Ellis, six centuries before "A stone was laid
there of the temple of Jupiter, about which
the German savans are laboring by the
banks of the Alpheus, five hundred years
before the Temple OF Diana at Ephesus
was begun; yea, a century before Saul was
King of Israel. When we look upon the
marvels Of Grecian art, the exquisite perfec-
tion oi the workmanship, the complex lines
ofthought centred in the details of the oldest
Greek monuments previously brought to
light, we feel instinctively that they are the
products of century after century of grow
ing civilization. A feeling of artistic do
spair takes possession of the beholder that
the Oldest seems the most perfect until the
belief begins to grow that Grecian art and
p'tllN anu IlllIbsoIhy must nave sprung
into the world full grown and fully armed
as the tabled Minerva sprung in the divine
pangS of Jupiter from his brain. An that
we knew or apparently could know, rcduc-
| ci itsclfof this fancy SO re1ugnant to the
experience of mans toilsome progress in
the world around us. From the excaya-
tions of Myccnr come apparently the cor
rohnrttion of what we think in all logic
should have been Traditions that had
been embalmei in the brightest song we
have seen waved away by impcrious the
oristS aS absolute myths The patient Ger
man. with his spale. digs the grave of
theorists IA! the same time that he brings
the heroes to the light of day. We shall
await with the greatest iupaticnca the
details Of the discovcries-an impatieurc
which all The learned. all the lovers of an
cient Greece will share. The enthusiasm
with which tho scholarly Emperor of
Brazil is reported lately to have spoken of
DIR. Schliemann's discoveries after IA visit
| to Mycene is now explained. Even an
Emperor might feel proud to stand beside
| he.simple savant when before them was the
| tomb of A AgameInnon.