ornamented with gold; they have a kind of frieze ornamented with trellis-work, so as apparently to detach the support from the supported roof. In the houses of the higher classes the walls are decorated with damask, and in those of the commoners with paper-hangings, which latter we have adopted. Drapery is also freely used, hanging down and serving to divide the interior spaces of the houses. Doors and windows are still formed of curtains, as in the primitive times of civilisation in Assyria, India, and Babylon. We are all acquainted with the excellence of Chinese silk-weaving, interspersed with golden threads, as also with the brightness and originality of some of their patterns, whenever they keep to an imitation of nature in their floral forms. They are generally, however, too realistic, the material not unfrequently appearing like a botanist’s herbarium, or like a collection of butterflies or stuffed birds. Their embroidery is not less old than their silk-weaving. As early as 2205 B.C. in their statistical records (numbering about 4,768 volumes) gold, silver, copper, ivory, precious stones--_five sorts of pigments_ of mineral extraction--silk, hemp, cotton, weavings of these materials, and the feathers of all sorts of birds are mentioned. The woven stuffs are of one colour. Silk is either red, black, white, or yellowish, weaving in colours not being known. The frequent mention made of birds’ feathers may serve as a proof that they were used for embroidery, which in primitive times was more an ‘opus plumarium’ than embroidery proper, which is the forerunner of the art of painting. Feather crowns, kilts, and dresses are still in use amongst the savages of our own times. The colours are given by nature, and suit the grotesque taste of the undisciplined mind by their bright variegations and incongruities. The oldest Chinese embroidery in colours was perfectly plastic. The plants, flowers, animals, and even figures, formed a polychromatic relief on the flat surface of the stuff. This style is still fashionable in China, though, instead of feathers, artificially coloured threads are used, always so as to make the objects appear raised from the surface. Even at present life-size figures in relief, or whole scenes, are executed with the needle in brightly-coloured silk threads. We are here involuntarily reminded of the reliefs of Nineveh, and we may assume that they are nothing but a transformation of embroidery into stone or alabaster. The dresses, furniture, saddles, tea-pots, shoes and boots, jackets, covers, weapons, doors, and windows of the Chinese are all ornamented with patterns which have had their origin in this kind of relief-embroidery, traces of which are found even in their lacquered and keramic products.