is a fine bold head of Mæcenas, of which statesman - though several supposed portraits have been occasionally announced-it is believed by Visconti that there are but two authentic, of which he gives the outlines, accompanied with a recognised bust of the same great man, in the title-page of an interesting monograph published on the subject. Our own stone is larger than either of the others; all are remarkable for their likeness one to another, and for their common likeness to the bust. The face is that of a man of fifty; the features are large and expressive, but somewhat coarse; the head bald in front, but the parietal and occipital portions tolerably supplied with hair; the ears are large; the eyes have beetling brows; the nose is aquiline, almost to psittacine; there is a singular depression in the middle of the forehead, which forms quite a notch; while near the crown, whereabouts phrenologists place the organ of veneration, the head is somewhat flattened. The cornelian on which this head is cut is a brown transparent stone, and we believe the C. Fuscus of Cronstadt. 2nd, A pleasing little figure of Jupiter, standing very stately, with a glowing thunderbolt in his hand ready to throw. 3rd, A spirited nag's head and crest, recalling those noblest specimens of horseflesh in the Metopes from the Parthenon. 4th, A figure in the Etruscan or old Greek style, bearing a branch in the right and an amphora diota in his left, with the letters σTOLX. 5th, A beautiful fragment of a profile of Medusa (Moestuosa), with drooping eye, in fine Greek style, which we picked out from a drawer of rubbish at an orefice's at Rimini. 6th, A full-faced Medusa, with the features goaded into fierceness by the hissing monsters which wriggle amidst the coils of her hair. 7th, A puttino's two-third face in relief, on a cornelian as bright as a garnet. 8th, A Hercules reposing from his labours, not after the manner of ordinary mortals, but standing in the attitude of Curl and his associates for the second prize offered by the Goddess of Dulness to her favourites in the Dunciad, q. v. 9th, A beautiful female face, a fragment, indebted to a jeweller at Rome for

a gold skull-cap. 10th, A figure bearing an amphora in the early Greek or Etruscan style; the margin of this stone is crimped. 11th, A warrior with two heads; that on his shoulders is looking intently at another in his hand; a headless man in mail lies at his feet, on whose chest the standing figure plants a firm heel. 12th, Ă fine portrait of an Indian Bacchus, who, though venerable from his beard, looks fuddled in spite of the care with which he has elaborately interwoven his temples with an ivy wreath by way of antidote, but evidently it is put on too late. 13th, A fine head of Seneca. 14th, Another fragment; a hero in full armour, in front of a tower, dragging a helmet, the figure to which it belongs being unfortunately lost to the spectator by a flaw in the stone. 15th, Represents a shepherd sitting on the ground, and pulling a goat by the beard. 16th, Another representation of Bacchus (Orthos) supporting Silenus, who is anything but orthos, with one arm round the waist of his tipsy friend; who, thus urged on, by a gentle vis a tergo points his toe, and tries to put the best leg foremost. Bacchus, proud of his own superior sobriety, is looking round and pointing his finger at the expense of his companion, whose drooping head falls vinously supine over his protecting shoulder.

One famous cornelian deserves mention, as having given occasion to as much discussion and as great diversity of opinion as any object of virtù; this was the signet ring of the great Michael Angelo-the only point which seems certainly made out about it; and it has, ever since he possessed it, been familiarly named 'Michael Angelo's cornelian.' That it must have been an antique, as well as a first-rate gem, was assumed by many connoisseurs; for so great a judge would not, said they, have put anything mediocre or modern on his finger. The first question agitated was, what might be the subject of the gem; on which there was a great latitude of interpretation amongst adepts, for the encouragement of tyros. Mentour considered it to represent the birth of Bacchus; Tournemine that it was Alexander under the guise of Bacchus, and that the subject was

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allusive to the conquest of India; Baudelot announced it as the Athenian feast, Prianepsies, established by Theseus; Mariette simply a vintage, of which the artist ingeniously announces his name by the device of a little fisherman in the corner as Allion, a well-known Greek engraver. To this Mr. Murr very properly demurs; and denying the stone to be an antique at all, gives the following much more probable account of the angler in the exergue, 'who stands,' not for Allion('What,' he asks, could Mr. Mariette be dreaming of?') but logogriphically for Maria de Pescia, a celebrated engraver, contemporary with and a great friend of Michael Angelo, who wore it out of affection for the artificer. Raspe's observations on the authorship of this much litigated intaglio are judicious; and such as, could the pygmean piscator open his mouth and speak, he would no doubt affirm to be correct:

The great number of figures, and the whole composition of the subject, might (says this author), have suggested very grave and natural doubts of its antiquity; but such has been the blindness and folly of the antiquarians, that no one has hitherto suspected it; and Mariette, though he justly looks upon the little fisherman as significative of some name, blunders egregiously in supposing that it can be that of the Greek engraver Allion. It is true, indeed, that alieus signifies a fisherman, but, with a little knowledge of Greek, Mr. Mariette ought to have known that there is a vast difference between the words Allion and Alieus, while a very slight attention to the composition of the work would certainly have shown him that it was as far from the style of the ancients as the age of Maria de Pescia is remote from that of Allion.

Agreeable as cornelians of the 'old rock are to the eye, when the stone is oriental, the sex masculine, its size, shape, and thickness convenient, and the engraving good, yet all cut corniole' are certainly not ornamental. Thirty years ago, in England, there was a great rage for them, and they were worn by both sexes; then many a little flirt of fifteen wore a cloudy cornelian heart round her neck, of the size and consistence of her own, and told you plainly what you might expect if you attempted to make love to her; which, alas! one did occasionally, in spite of the timely warning; but it was most conspicuously

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exhibited, setting off thousands of obese paunches, dangling in red bunches, like radishes, three inches below an obsolete side-pocket, called a fob; and jingling at the end of a short, strong-scented bit of brass chain, supposed to be gold; each large, ugly seal-stone was set in a great clumsy bezil, and engraved with some harsh nondescript animal familiar only to heralds, or with the Harry, united to the equally interestsprawling initials of John, Tom, and ing surnames of Smith, Brown, and Walker. That age has passed away, and though the children on our eastern coasts pick up thousands of these pebbles, yet no lapidary cares now to buy them; and, save for shirt-studs and shirt-pins, their occupation is entirely gone. Visitors at different watering-places collect, but to lay them aside; there is, however, one purpose to which they may be put with advantage, and that is, to strew at the bottom of salt-water vivaria, when, being naturally hydrophanous, the water brings out their beauty, and the various hues of colour greatly embellish the live stock and weeds with which they are enclosed.

FELDSPATHS.

Next to the quartzes, of which we have been speaking, occur the feldspaths, whose characteristic is to have a laminated texture. This formation renders them resplendent and iridescent, even without the aid of the politor. They are found in masses, mixed with other substances. The word feldspath,' says Corsi, means the splendour of the fields.' Is it not rather a corrup tion of the German felz spath, the shining rock or stone? Little or

no use was made of these stones for intaglios or cameos, on account of their schistose texture, which, in spite of considerable hardness, rendered them liable to crepitate at every stroke of the engraving tools. Corsi has identified one or two with ancient stones, which we mention on that account, and also because, though rarely, some of them have been engraved. The stone called lunar,' from its reflecting a silvery light like the moon, is manifestly that which Pliny calls lapis astoros, and describes as a pale stone found in India, which shines after the manner of a full moon. Mineralogists call this stone adalaria, because it was first found by

Professor Pini on the St. Gothard, which belongs to the range of Alps anciently called Adula. It is much like crystal, tinctured of a delicate yellow by the moon, when looked at vertically, but scanned horizontally, it shows like mother-of-pearl, reflecting, when turned about, the colours red, green, and violet. The finest specimens, according to Haüy, come from Ceylon. The gorgeous stone called of Labrador, generally found under water, and which, having no colour of its own, makes (when the sun or any artificial light strikes it at an obtuse angle with the eye) a kaleidoscope of a hundred brilliant hues, is with no less certainty the lapis mithrax of Pliny, which was brought from Persia and the mountains of the Red Sea, but comes now from a variety of different sites, whereof the most famous is the island of St. Paul, on the coast of Labrador, though it occurs also in Russia and in Italy, in the neighbourhood of Vicenza. The beautiful modern stone called amazon, after the river Amazon, in America, had its representative in the smaragdus calcedonius of Pliny, as that author's description, with Corsi's comments and exposition of the passage, must convince every one who will carefully con it over. In spite of this, however, as no specimen had been found near Rome, the evidence was incomplete, till the late excellent and accomplished nobleman, the Marquis of Northampton, first disinterred it in that neighbourhood in 1826, and removed the only plausible objection that could be made to the conclusion arrived at by that eminent Italian lithologist, from whom we have had occasion so largely to quote. The following is his notice of this important discovery:

Nell' anno 1826 stando egli in Tivoli tentò uno scavamento nel luogo ove si crede che fosse la villa di M. Vopisco ivi trovò molti pezzi de Amazzone simile a quella di America; sembra che fossero frammenti di una quelche base o di statua o di colonna perche alcuni di essi sono formati en angolo retto, ma ciò che merita maggior osservazione si è che tutt'i frammenti sono piu o meno scolpiti è rappresentano geroglifici egiziani.

Though the above feldspaths were

not, as far as know, cut into rings, there was one, the last we shall mention, our cat's eye-called by the ancients Belus' eye, because the Assyrians consecrated it to this particular divinity. Pliny describes two species, the commoner sort, vitreous in appearance, and of the size of an acorn; the second scintillating with a golden light, and having a dark pupil in the centre of a white cornea; which last kind is so rare, that according to Teifascites, all other precious stones cost less than this, and Ismael Salamet paid, we read, for one set in a ring, sette cento danari elefantini, and sold it afterwards to the Prince of Yemen for just double that price. This, when it is found at all, is generally in Ceylon. In Pliny's day, Roman specimens came from Arbela, a city of Persia.

MOLOCHITES-MALACHITE.

There can be no doubt that the ancient molochites and our mala

chite are the same substance. The Latin name is derived from a word signifying the mallow,'-a plant to the green colour of which this beautiful substance generally assi milates itself-though there are malachites found of all shades of green. This interesting production is a stalagmite formed from the droppings of water highly charged with copper in solution, and of so heavy a specific gravity, from the quantity of metal it contains, that we may, in fact, regard it rather as a metal than as a stone. Its appearance is well known to most persons; when cut in slates, the colouring matter is seen to form beautiful concentric circles of different shades of green, sometimes bearing a resemblance to the turquoise, sometimes to the lapis lazzuli; white veins occasionally traverse it. The Russians, who obtain it from Siberia, possess the finest specimens known. The sumptuous verdant doors, whose beautiful and polished surface deservedly attracted so much attention in the Exhibition of 1851, were perhaps as fine as

can

be seen anywhere, even in Russia, whence they came. The ancients procured their molochites from Arabia and China; it was always a substance held in high esteem, from the facility with which

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it could be worked ( Tenerissima al taglio,' as Corsi observes), and from its admitting of being cut in relief by the simplest tools. There is no doubt it was so treated by the ancients; but the great frangibility of the material has prevented any specimens coming down to us in the form of cameos.

CALAMITA-THE MAGNET.

unex

The magnet, which was formerly considered a mineral substance, and continuing in our own day to be best known as the lode-stone, is, in fact, a protoxide of iron to which molecules of stony matter may adhere accidentally. This was often engraved. There is a curious specimen of a small one in the Collegio Romano encircled with hieroglyphics and presenting an hausted and still energetic action at its opposite poles. The Greek names for the magnet-for, like the diamond, it seems, at different periods, to have possessed two -were Ηρακλεια λιθος, the Heraclean stone, thus named after the city of Heraclea, in Lydia, as Hesychius distinctly informs us, Κέκληται δὲ ὄντος ἀπὸ τῆς Ηρακλείας τῆς ἐν Λυδία πόλεως ; and Μαγνητις λιθος; by which the more ancient Greeks understood a taley stone of the ollaris kind; the later, the lodestone, which was named like its taley predecessor, from Magnesia, in Lydia, whence it was brought. Magnets are now known to occur everywhere in the neighbourhood of iron mines, and consequently we have them in England. Not long since,' says the accomplished translator and commentator of Theophrastus, I found a fragment of one of these stones which would take up a small needle within half-a-mile of London.' An amusing mistake; but no doubt a transposition of words, occasioned by magnetism after the types were set. The original sentence must have run thus:-'I found a fragment of stone within two miles of London, that could take up a small needle, &c.' Theophrastus was of opinion that magnets were rare, and found in very few places.

OBSIDIAN.

The mines of Ethiopia, and the island of Lipari, produced a substance closely resembling stone, but

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in reality a volcanic product, described by the ancients under the name of obsidian from one Obsidius, says Pliny, who first turned it to account, or because, says St. Isidore, it reflects images. Whatever be its etymology, says Corsi, there can be no doubt of the high estimation in which it was held, since the jurisconsulte Pomponius writes, that it was reputed almost as a gem; and, indeed, Pliny treats of it in his chapter expressly devoted to precious stones. Teifascites describing it under the Arabian name of Sabag, says it is subject to liquefaction, intensely black, but so brilliant and resplendent as to make a perfect mirror. His commentator, Ranieri, adds, that it is a volcanic glass, very brilliant and hard. In consequence of its reflecting properties the Corinthians frequently made it into lookingglasses, and sometimes the walls of their apartments were ornamented, like our own, with sheets of it for mirrors. In spite of its reputation, we cannot say that it equals our own plate-glass, with a good amalgam of quicksilver at the back. No Belinda who had ever seen herself in an obsidian speculum, however fine, would consent to exchange the Psyche in front of which Betty arranges her coiffure, for the finest slab ever possessed by a Roman humbugged by Warren into beAugusta; nor any gentleman not lieving that

Blacking when brought to a wonderful pass, Displays a man's face in his boot as in glass,

would ever think of invoking the aid of obsidian to help him to shave. This volcanic glass must have occurred in very large masses, since we read in Pliny that his predecessors had beheld with astonishment four elephants carved in obsidian (he does not specify the size), which were introduced into Rome in the time of Augustus, and also of a Greek statue of Menelaus, fetched by Tiberius from Greece, wrought in the same material. We have never met with any specimens of engraved obsidian; the principal (if not only purpose to which it was put by the ancients) being for the mirrors we have mentioned above.

C. D. B.

is a fact established on the

indisputable authority of the returns of the Board of Trade, that ever since 1850, the British shipping round the Cape of Good Hope has shown an annual increase of at least one hundred thousand tons. The road round the Cape of course is the road to India, Australia, and China, and to other colonies and independent countries, which have not, up to the present time, become either familiar or important enough to the British public to bear us out in the task of enumerat

ing them. They may be accurately laid down in maps, with their sea-boards, mountains, and rivers marked most distinctly; and a good deal concerning them may be known to Fellows of the Royal Geographical Society. But they belong to the pioneers of science rather than to the sphere of hardy, plodding, practical life. Some time ago, the newspapers announced the probable arrival, one day or other, of an elephant of a peculiar colour, and other presents rich and rare, sent by the King of Siam to her Majesty. Who, until this announcement excited the hope of admiring this elephant in the Zoological Gardens, knew of or cared for Siam? That kingdom has faded from the minds of Europeans, ever since its Twins became matter for history and the fireside tales of old men.

And as it is with Siam, so it is with many other mighty kingdoms and island-covered seas in the Eastern World. We know of their existence. We know that there are mountains in the moon. The strangest portions of Les Mariages du Père Olifus are not the fables of that persevering mermaid who hunts her faithless husband from Monnikendam to Cochin China; but the accounts of the manners and customs, the produce and trade of Madagascar, Ceylon, Negombo, Goa, Calicut, Manilla, and Bidondo, and the other coast-towns and islands visited by Olifus in quest of a wife. The Far East-in contradistinction

to the Near East-for the integrity of which we went to war with Russia-contains a population of six hundred millions of people, or perhaps more; and of these, one hundred millions at most can be said to be in correspondence with the manufacturing and raw produceconsuming countries of Europe and America, and even of their corre-spondence the greater portion is of very recent date. The rise and progress of the East India Company, from the first establishment of their factory to the present day, is too well known to claim more than a passing allusion. Our Indian empire over one hundred millions of subjects, and fifty millions of tributaries and allies, more or less ripe for annexation, is the great civilizing fact of the last hundred years. Within the last thirty years, the three hundred and fifty millions of people inhabiting China have been put in communication with us, and we are now witnessing what may be called the small beginnings of trade with the Chinese Empire. Australia, with its rapidly-increasing European population, has risen, so to speak, under our very eyes. Japan has just been opened, but its exploration has not even commenced. In short, the whole of the Far East is, as it were, just opening to us. The idea has been abandoned, that the Eastern trade must be limited to gold, ivory, spices, and dyeing stuffs, silk, tea, coffee, rice, and tobacco. Cotton is expected from India, and Australian wool has wrought the almost utter confusion of the sheep of Germany and Spain. Some time ago, Dr. Forbes Royle published a very valu able book on the fibrous plants of India. Indian railways have already commenced bringing many portions of the interior within the sphere of our commercial activity. Indian railways will no doubt supply us with new sorts of produce for new kinds of manufactures, while the staple produce of our manufacturing districts will, from year to year, make