murrhins were of a compofition fomewhat fi❤ milar, i. e. of a very fine fpecies of porcelain almost as transparent as glafs; but the Egyptian artists, wanting the proper materials of which the latter were made, were obliged to be content with remaining fuccessful imitators only. The Egyptians would probably have made as fine porcelain had they poffeffed the fpecies of argillaceous earth necessary; but, as I have before remarked, it was principally in the more elegant kinds of highly finished ornamental glafs ware that they excelled; fuch were those three cups, of very curious glafs, named alla fontes, fent from Egypt by the Emperor Adrian to Rome, and which, ficut palumborum colla, like the NECKS OF PIGEONS, reflected, on whatever fide they were viewed, a rich variety of colours, in the manner of the precious ftone called obfidianum, fuppofed by fome commentators to be cat's eye, and by others the opal. The Greeks, of whom the Egyptians were the mafters in chemistry, foon learned of them the art of making these fictitious gems of all poffible colours, the ruby, the hyacinth, the emerald, and the sapphire; for, thus Pliny, speaking of the former, obferves: fit et tinctura, ex genere

genere obfidiani, ad efcaria vafa; et totum rubrum vitrum, atque non tranflucens, POMATINON appellatum. Fit et album, et MURRHINUM, aut byacinthos Sapphirofque imitatum, et omnibus aliis coloribus.*

It is time for us to return to the Indians, who are celebrated by the fame writer for their skill in fabricating artificial BERYLS; that is to say, in making coloured, but not white, glass. It is fcarcely poffible to conceive, after a ferious perusal of the previous extracts from MENU, but that the Indians were as ancient and as excellent chemifts as the Egyptians; and, fince all the precious ftones above enumerated were native to the foil of India, as shall be fhewn more at large hereafter, when we come to confider the antiquity of their engraving in gems, it is equally impoffible to conceive but that, as they were firft known, they were earliest imitated by the more ingenious race of Indians. The Indian fciences with their books are indeed buried in fuch profound obfcurity, that here alfo we can alone argue upon the ground of analogy and conjecture; but the arguments for their having manu

* Plinii Nat. Hift. lib. xxxvi. cap. 26.

factured

factured glass, in periods of great antiquity, amount to little lefs than certainty; for, I muft repeat it, if they could make artificial BERYLS, they wanted neither means, nor genius, nor commercial incitement, to fabricate other fimilar compofitions from filiceous substances; and, if they were fo early potters, it is scarcely poffible, but that they could also manufacture glafs veffels, though not, perhaps, of fuch fuperior fineness as those of Sidon and Diofpolis. The truth is, that, in all manufactures of pottery, owing to the intenseness of the fire made use of, some portion of the matter is neceffarily vitrified, and the glafs and pottery manufacture must have gone on together from remotest antiquity.

It is very probable, also, that the Indians understood the method of working in Mosaic; for, Philoftratus tells us, Apollonius faw in India a moft glorious temple of the Sun, the walls of which were of red marble, refembling fire, interspersed with streaks of gold, while the floor exhibited to the view an infinite variety of pearls and precious stones, artfully difpofed in a kind of chequer-work, to VOL. VII.

C c

imitate

imitate the rays of that luminary,* and which reflected back a luftre that rivalled his genuine beams. These were probably artificial ftones of the kind under difcuffion, and this fpecies of Mofaic work feems to have been not uncommon in the Eaft; for, we read in Efther of a beautiful pavement of this variegated kind in the palace of Susa, when, at the great banquet given by the Babylonian fovereign Ahafuerus, all the riches of his treafury were difplayed to the view of the people. The paffage impreffes the mind with the most exalted idea of the magnificence in which those fovereigns lived, and is highly worthy of infertion in a work that enters so much at large into the fplendid antiquities of Afia.

And, when thefe days were expired, the king made a feaft unto all the people, that were prefent in Shushan the palace, both unto great and Small, feven days, in the court of the garden of the king's palace;

Where were white, green, and blue, bangings, faftened with cords of fine linen and purple to filver rings, and pillars of marble: the beds

* Vita Apollonii, lib. ii. cap. 11.

were

were of gold and filver, upon a pavement of RED, and BLUE, and WHITE, and BLACK, marble.

And they gave them drink in veffels of gold, (the vessels being diverfe one from another,) and royal wine in abundance, according to the ftate of the king.*

The Egyptians too were no ftrangers to this kind of elegant work in Mofaic; for, Lucan, defcribing the luxurious palace of Cleopatra, acquaints us,

totaque effufus in aulâ

Calcabatur ONYX.

Which can fcarcely have reference to any thing except the teffellated pavement, of various coloured ftones, in which the ONYX abounded.

On the whole, as the tribe of CUMBHACARA, or the potter, is enumerated among thofe earliest formed, and as mention is fo frequently made in the Inftitutes of facrificial vafes, there can be no doubt of very fine porcelain having been anciently made in India; and that glass, both white and coloured, could not be unknown to a race fo

*Efther, cap. i. v. 5, 6, 7.

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far