Lucian speaks of a fortune-teller who ordered those who came to consult him, to write down on a bit of paper the questions they wished to ask, to fold it up, and seal it with clay, or any other substance of a like kind. Such earth appears to have been employed in sealing, by the Byzantyne emperors; for we are told that, at the second Nicene Council, image worship was defended by one saying, “No one believed that those who received written orders from the Emperor, and venerated the seal, worshipped on that account the sealing-earth, the paper, or the lead.” Cicero relates that Verres, having seen in the hands of his servants a letter written to his son from Agrimentum, and observing on it an impression in sealing-earth, he was so pleased with it that he caused the seal-ring with which it was made to be taken from the possessor. Also, the same orator, in his defence of Flaccus, produced an attestation sent from Asia, and proved its authenticity by its being sealed with Asiatic sealing-earth; with which, he told the judges, all public and private letters in Asia were sealed: and he showed on the other hand, that the testimony brought by the accuser was false, because it was sealed with _wax_, and for that reason could not have come from Asia. The scholiast Servius relates, that a sybil received a promise from Apollo, that she should live as long as she did not see the earth of the island of the Erythræa, where she resided; that she therefore quitted the place, and retired to Cumae, where she became old and decrepid; but that having received a letter sealed with Erythræn earth, when she saw the seal, she instantly expired. No one, however, will suppose that this earth was used without preparation, as was that to which is given the name of _creta_ chalk; for, if it was of a natural kind, it must have been of that kind called _potter’s clay_, as that clay is susceptible of receiving an impression, and of retaining it subsequent to hardening by drying. It is believed that the Romans, under the indefinite term _creta_, often understood to be a kind of potter’s earth, which can be proved by many passages in their numerous writers. Columella speaks of a species of chalk of which wine-jars and dishes were made, of which kind it is conjectured Virgil speaks when he calls it adhesive. The ancient writers on agriculture give precisely the same name to marl, which was employed to manure land: now, both chalk and marl, in their natural state, are extremely inapplicable to the purpose for which we are led to believe the _terra sigillaris_ was used; therefore, admitting the Roman _creta_ was composed of them, those substances must naturally have undergone some laborious process, in order to render them proper for the purpose to which they were applied.