[258] Sandyx is a colour procured by calcining common ruddle and sandarach together. Sandarach is a red substance found near, and in silver mines. An island in the Red Sea produced a great deal. Sandarach is also gum from the juniper, but Pliny means the mineral.--Book xxxv. ch. 6. Virgil, however, must mean the juniper when he says, that browsing upon sandarach rendered the fleeces of the sheep red. [259] The early establishment of the manufacture of glass and the beautifully coloured Venetian beads in Murano, where a remnant of the art still exists, I think warrants my supposition. The Queen of Cyprus’s gift of ultramarine to the church of Assisi, may be taken as a proof, that so late as 1300 the island had not lost its colour manufactures. [260] This was later by four years than his examination of the colours found in the baths of Titus, the paper upon which in the Philosophical Transactions I have quoted. [261] The word vernix (varnish) was entirely unknown to the ancients. Lyttleton, in his Latin Dictionary, says it is derived from the fact, that in the spring, _ver_, the juniper, begins to yield its resin; and that juniper, or gum sandarach, was the first substance from which true varnish was prepared. He ought to have added in Europe: for certainly true varnish was used in China long before the period at which he places the first use of the word vernix, and, as will appear by the text, I have no doubt that the thing, if not the name, was known by our ancients in Europe also. [262] Supposed the Penæa sarcocolla; the gum is in the form of small whitish grains, of a bitter sweetish taste; it is almost entirely soluble in water. [263] Supposed to be produced by a species of ferula. It is soluble in water and in vinegar. [264] The resin of the juniper. [265] Pliny, b. xxxv. ch. 15. [266] Pliny’s account of ampelitis appears to agree with that given by Field, in his Book on Colours, of some specimens of native asphaltum, brought to him direct from Persia. It did not dissolve with oil or turpentine, but ground well with drying oil, and made a fine colour. For ampelitis, see Pliny, b. xxxv. c. 16. [267] A boat, or ship-builder, when he _pays_ the bottoms of his vessels with boiling pitch, is really painting in the encaustic manner. [268] B. xxxii. ch. 7. The word here translated _waxed cloths_, is literally _candles_; but, as candles were made of wax, I adhere to Holland’s expression, as giving Pliny’s meaning. [269] B. xxi. ch. 14. The wax so coloured was the finest white punic wax; we must not forget that waxen images were among those exhibited in funeral processions. [270] In his quotations from Vitruvius and Pliny he unaccountably translates _red wax_ for _Punic wax_. Now Pliny says expressly that Punic wax was the whitest of all, and particularly describes the manner of bleaching it.