suit ἄχθος οὖν ἀεὶ πέλοι, aut, ἄχθος αἰὲν οὖν πέλοι. Melius fortasse,

Χώρα δ' ἄχθος αἰανὸν πέλοι.

Usus est voce noster in Persis. ver. 943. et Εumen. 669. καὶ τάδ ̓ αἰανῶς μένοι.

Ver. 1005. Τέρειν ̓ ὀπώρα δ ̓ εὐφύλακτος οὐδαμῶς.

θῆρες δὲ κηραίνουσι καὶ βροτοί τί μιν,

Καὶ κνώδαλα πτεροῦντα καὶ πεδοστιβή.

Cum memorentur κνώδαλα in versu sequente, certè vox Θῆρες supervacanea videtur. Legendum sine dubio ex emendatione Jacobi apud Stanleium Oɛoí. In ultimo autem versiculo allusio fit ad transformationes Divorum, propter amorem mulierum, in Tauros, Cycnos, et cet.

Ver. 1008. Καρπώματα στάζοντα κηρύσσει Κύπρις•

Καλωρα κωλύουσαν ὡς μένειν ἐρῶ.

Ne minimum quidem sensum ex his verbis elicuerunt Viri Docti. Sed levissima mutatione omnia plana fient. Lego, Καρπώματα στάζοντα κηρύσσει Κύπρις Χάλωρα κωλύουσαν ὡς, μένειν ἐρεῖς ; "Venus prædicat fructus maturos esse;

Et tu dices eam manere, ut rapinas (i. e. raptores) arceat ?" Filias cavere jubet Danaus ne Veneris præsidio nimium credant; quippe quæ infida sit Dea, et triumphis de innocentibus puellis reportatis quàm maximè gaudeat.

Ver. 1051. Φυγάδας δ' ἐπιπνοίας, κακά τ ̓ ἄλγη,

Πολέμους θ' αἱματόεντας

Προφοβοῦμαι.

Meliorem sensum efficies legendo φυγάδων δ ̓ ἐπιπνοίας, "fugientium persecutiones." Qualiter apud Ovidium Metamorph. lib. 1.

Imminet et crinem sparsum cervicibus afflat." Ceterùm puellarum indignatio præcipuè ex eo oritur, quòd vi et armis grassari voluerint consobrini sui, et omnia pro imperio agere; quos contrà decuisset amatoriis donis et omni verborum lenocinio Virginum benevolentiam aucupari. Innuere videntur, se, si modeste expetita essent, succumbere potuisse. CANTABRIGIENSIS.

162

ON THE EMERALD.

(ORIENTAL.)

SIR,

TO THE EDITOR OF THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL.

In the first Numbers of your Journal I find two letters on the subject of the Emerald, upon which I shall beg leave to make the following observations.

The candid writer of the first letter seems to incline to the opinion, that the Emerald was unknown to the ancient inhabitants of Asia, although the authority of Teifashi, which he quotes in regard to the discovery of this stone, in the excavated ruins of Alexandria, both establishes its high claims to antiquity, and leads to the obvious conclusion, that it must have been well known to the ancient Asiatics; Alexandria having been for about three centuries, under the Ptolemies, the chief seat of the commerce of the ancient world.

But Orielensis, the writer of the second, goes much farther, for he denies to the whole ancient world the knowledge of this precious stone, and he seems to have advanced this opinion in direct opposition to every ancient authority.

Now, if Orielensis will have the patience to turn over the pages of his Pliny once more, from the beginning to the end of the 37th book, he must allow, I think, that this writer possessed some practical knowledge of the subject which he has handled, and that the Scythian Smaragdus, which he so highly extols, and in some respects so minutely describes, could be no other than our modern Emerald.

Pliny, indeed, may have extended the generic term of Smaragdus too far, by comprehending under it many inferior sorts of stones, which are intitled to this distinction, merely by a few characters which they possess in common with their

prototype; but is it fair to infer from this circumstance, that our modern Emerald could have been neither of the many species enumerated? whereas the three first have in reality very strong claims to that distinction.

The next argument of Orielensis, which is founded upon the superior hardness of the ancient Smaragdi, seems to have arisen from a too literal interpretation of his author, for if nequeant vulnerari mean a hardness so great as to resist the diamond, this seems to be in direct opposition to what Pliny says on the uses of the diamond, expetuntur à scalptoribus ferroque includuntur, nullam non duritiam ex facili cavantes, and is equally inconsistent with the expression scalpi vetitis, which implies the possibility of engraving the Smaragdus.

Orielensis refers us for another proof, to the great size of some Smaragdi mentioned by ancient authors, all of which may have been Pseudo-smaragdi, as Pliny suspects that to be, which was preserved in the temple of Hercules, at Tyrus, and which the famous Genoese cup, which was brought from Cæsarea, in Syria, in the 12th century, is now generally conceived to be.

I proceed to the negative inference which Orielensis draws from a fact he assumes, that no specimen of Emerald, whether engraved, or otherwise, is to be found in any collection of ancient gems. And first I shall observe, that whether Pliny means by his scalpi vetitis that Emeralds in general were forbidden to be engraved, or the concave Emerald only, as Salmasius conjectures; the assertion applies only to his own. time, for he admits that they were engraved at one period, i. e. Ismeniæ ætate, and mentions the engraved Amymone of that person; moreover, every reader will here recollect the Ring of Polycrates, which Herodotus, who is the first narrator of the story, calls a Smaragdus, and which Pausanias, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, and Suidas, call by the same name. It is true, Pliny informs us that this ring was preserved in his time in the Temple of Concord, at Rome, and that it was a Sardonyx; but, unfortunately for Pliny's assertion, he adds, " Polycratis gemma illabata intactaque est ;" upon which his editor, Brotier, very properly remarks," ergo quæ Romæ ostendebatur non fuit Polycratis gemma; eȧ enim signabat Polycrates, teste Herodoto.”

To return to the negative argument, which is founded on the above gratuitous supposition. The assertion of Pliny, in regard to the disuse of the Smaragdus for engraving, being admitted, it follows, that we can hardly expect to meet with an engraved specimen of it in any collection of ancient gems, and this is all the inference we are warranted in drawing from the passage. Morcover, I may be allowed to observe, that the exquisite beauty of this stone, and the superior fitness of all stones of the Agate and Onyx kind, for the purpose of Intaglio engraving, lead to the conclusion that it was seldom applied to that

use.

And yet, what will Orielensis say, if I produce an instance of the discovery of an engraved Emerald of undoubted antiquity? This instance is given in a note to Brotier's Pliny, which I will transcribe for his information. Scalpi vetitis) Inde in Dactyliothecis antiquarum gemmarum rarissimi sunt Smaragdi. At cùm his legibus non teneantur principes, in sepulcro Mariæ, filiæ Stilichonis, uxoris Honorii, quod effossum est in Vaticano D. Petri templo anno 1593. inter ceteras gemmas pluresque Smaragdos unus erat, in quo incisum Honorii caput."

To this curious discovery I shall add (what will render the evidence for the antiquity of the Emerald sufficiently clear and decisive) the existence of some rings and necklaces of Emerald of undoubted antiquity, preserved in the Museum at Portici, and in the collection of the late Mr. Townley.

Of the first, I find the following particulars recorded

the MSS. notes which I wrote many years ago after visiting the Museum at Portici.

"Five golden rings, inclosing as many small Emeralds, in their natural pebble-like form, retaining some faint marks of their crystallization. I am further confirmed in my opinion of their being genuine by two golden necklaces in the next frame, in one of which these Emeralds alternate with every fifth link, and in the other with every third. They are strung by a hole which runs through the axis of the prism. These retain nearly perfect their original hexagonal prismatic form, and exactly resemble some detached beads of an antique Emerald necklace which I collected at Rome."

In Mr. Townley's collection of gems, there is an antique necklace, which is composed of twenty-one hexagonal prismatic beads of Emeralds and Plasma, of which number about one third at the two extremities are of Plasma. They are very irregular both as to their size and shape, which appears to have resulted from the accidental forms of the original pieces. The angles are worn rather smooth, none of the Emeralds are clear, but all have the same tone of color, which is a light green. One of them presents a traversing ray of light which is obser vable in several of the pieces of antique Emerald in my possession, which I have before noticed.

The stone called by the antiquaries at Rome Plasma, or Plasma di Smeraldo, which has here been substituted for the Emerald, seems to have been a favorite material with the ancient sculptors in Intaglio, and I suspect that most of the very large specimens of Emerald mentioned by Pliny were of this substance; a statue of Osiris, ten inches high, in the Albani collection at Rome, being composed of it.

I have now proved, that the Smaragdus of the ancients is no other than our Emerald, which is well known to be the Zumrut of the Arabian and Persian writers, which will assist us in tracing its history through the middle ages. But in order to prosecute this inquiry, I must again recur to the age of Pliny, who informs us, that the Egyptian Smaragdus bore the second rank in the estimation of the ancients, and that it was found near Coptos in the Thebaid.

Strabo, speaking of the country between Coptos and the Arabian gulf, observes, " on this isthmus are found Smaragdi and other precious stones, which the Arabians extract from mines of an extraordinary depth."

Another ancient authority for the existence of these mines is cited by Beckmann, in his learned notes to Marbodus.

"De loco, ubi eruti sunt, conferantur Strabo, et imprimis quem alii non laudârunt, Photius in bibl. p. 194. ubi ex Olympiodori historiâ refertur, juxta Talmin, Ægypti urbem in extrémis finibus fuisse Smaragdi fodinas, σμαράγδου μέταλλα, unde Egypti regibus magnus fuisse proventus. Hinc in tabulis geographicis nomen montis Smaragdi." Again, "Nostrâ memoriâ ista loca prorsus ignorantur, quæ tamen ante pauca secula