In the interpretation of dreams Artemidorus was the most learned man that ever lived. He gave the best part of his life to collecting matter about dreams, and this he afterwards put together in five books. He might better have spent his time in bottling shadows of the moon.
It was however for the face of the man on the cover that I bought and have kept the book. The face is that of a man between thirty and thirty-five years of age. It is regular and handsome. The forehead leans slightly forward, and the lower part of the face is therefore a little foreshortened. It is looking straight out of the picture; the shadows fall on the left of the face, on the right as it fronts you. The nose is as long and broad-backed as the nose of the Antinous. The mouth is large and firm and well-shaping with lips neither thick nor thin. The interval between the nostrils and verge of the upper lip is short. The chin is gently pointed and prominent. The outline of the jaws square. The modelling of the left cheek is defectively emphasised at the line from above the hollow of the nostrils downward and backward. The brows are straight, the left one being slightly more arched than the right. The forehead is low, broad, compact, hard, with clear lines. The lower line of the temples projects beyond the perpendicular. The hair is thick and wavy and divided at the left side, depressed rather than divided, for the parting is visible no further up the head than a splay letter V.
The eyes are wide open, and notwithstanding the obtuse angle made by the facial line in the forward pose of the head, they are looking out level with their own height upon the horizon. There is no curiosity or speculation in the eyes. There is no wonder or doubt; no fear or joy. The gaze is heavy. There is a faint smile, the faintest smile the human face is capable of displaying, about the mouth. There is no light in the eyes. The expression of the whole face is infinitely removed from sinister. In it there is kindliness with a touch of wisdom and pity. It asks no question; desires to say no word. It is the face of one who beyond all doubt knows things we do not know, things which can scarcely be shaped into words, things we are in ignorance of. It is not the face of a charlatan, a seer, or a prophet.