28. Hecuba.
"Nous avons le personnage même d'Hécube dans la Pleureuse du Capitole. Cette prétendué pleureuse est une Hécube furieuse et une Hécube en scène, car elle porte le costume, elle a le geste et la vivacité du théâtre, je dirais volontiers de la pantomime.... Son regard est tourné vers le ciel, sa bouche lance des imprécations; on voit qu'elle pourra faire entendre ces hurlements, ces aboiements de la douleur effrénée que l'antiquité voulut exprimer en supposant que la malheureuse Hécube avait été métamorphosée en chienne, une chienne à laquelle on a arraché ses petits."—Ampère, Hist. Rom. iii. 468.
31. Colossal bust of Antoninus Pius.
The Hall of the Faun derives its name from the famous Faun of rosso-antico, holding a bunch of grapes to his mouth, found in Hadrian's Villa. It stands on an altar dedicated to Serapis. Against the right wall is a magnificent sarcophagus, whose reliefs (much studied by Flaxman) represent the battle of Theseus and the Amazons. The opposite sarcophagus has a relief of Diana and Endymion. We should also notice—
15. A boy with a mask.
21. A boy with a goose (found near the Lateran).
Let into the wall is a black tablet—the Lex Regia, or Senatus-Consultum, conferring imperial powers upon Vespasian, being the very table upon which Rienzi declaimed in favour of the rights of the people.
The Hall of the Dying Gladiator contains the three gems of the collection—"the Gladiator," "the Antinous of the Capitol," and the "Faun of Praxiteles." Besides these, we should notice—2. Apollo with the lyre, and 9. a bust of M. Junius Brutus, the assassin of Julius Cæsar.
In the centre of the room is the grand statue of the wounded Gaul, generally known as the Dying Gladiator.