Alternating with Mr. Reid’s ceiling paintings, is a series of rectangular panels, in which are depicted, in low tones of color and in a style somewhat suggestive of a classic bas-relief, a number of ancient out-door athletic contests. Beginning at the west end of the vault, the first of these represents a group of young men throwing the discus. Then come Wrestling and Running. In the fourth panel, the athletes are being rubbed down by attendants, to clear them of the sweat and heat of the conflict; and in the fifth, the successful contestants are kneeling to receive the crown of victory at the hands of a woman seated on a dais. The last picture represents the return home, a tripping company of youths and maidens crowned with garlands.
The visitor will remember what was said concerning the special enrichment of the penetrations in the side corridors for the sake of compensating in a way for the absence of such decorations as Mr. Shirlaw’s in the pendentives. In the present instance, this enrichment takes the form of dragons and swans, which serve as “supporters” of the panels containing the printers’ marks.
In the pendentives, tablets for inscriptions alternate with medallions containing trophies of various trades and sciences. The list of the latter, beginning at the left over the north wall, is as follows: Geometry, represented by a compass, a protractor, and a scroll, cone, and cylinder; Meteorology, the barometer, thermometer, and anemometer; Forestry, a growing tree, and an axe and pruning-knife; Navigation, the chronometer, log, rope, rudder, and compass; Mechanics, the lever, wedge, and pulley-block; and Transportation, with a piston, propeller, driving-wheel, and locomotive head-light.
The inscriptions are from Adelaide A. Procter’s poem, Unexpressed, and are as follows:—
Dwells within the soul of every Artist
More than all his effort can express.
No great Thinker ever lived and taught you
All the wonder that his soul received.
No true painter ever set on canvas