Pliny employs the term “fundere,” to cast, and not “exprimere,” nor “emendare.” In the passage about Lysistratus, then, “forma” would seem to mean a model, or core, like the shoemaker’s last, on which the wax was spread for the purpose of emending or improving something. What is that something which Pliny tells us he improved by this means? What can it be except the “imaginem,” the likeness? There is no other word to which “emendare” can refer. If, then, we understand the passage as meaning that Lysistratus modeled a likeness in gypsum, and then improved it or finished it in wax which he spread over the gypsum, the statement is quite intelligible, and not a word is warped from its correct significance. If we adopt the other interpretation, however, we must understand “imaginem gypso expressit” to mean that he made a mould in gypsum, contrary to the direct force of the words; and with wax poured into that mould (making “formam” equivalent to “imaginem,” and referring to it) he emended or improved—something. What? Why, the mould,—which is absurd. Again, we cannot begin by making “imaginem” mean the cast, before the “formam” or mould is made; not only because the practical process is thus reversed, but because then we should have a cast in plaster made by pouring wax into the mould, which is even more absurd. Taking “forma” to have in this sentence any of its meanings except “mould,” we have no difficulty in understanding it; taking it as “mould,” we are forced to change the primary significance of “imaginem” and “expressit,” and are involved in very serious questions. In addition to these considerations, it must not be forgotten that this cast of gypsum, according to Mr. Perkins’s interpretation of the sentence, was made not of the face alone (“vultus”) which is by no means an easy process, but of the whole figure (“facie”), which is a very hazardous one, and to which, with all the knowledge and experience of the present day in casting, few people would be willing to submit. A passage of Alcimus Avitus, in his poem “De Origine Mundi” (lib. 1, 6, 75), throws a clear light on the process which seems here to be described as the invention of Lysistratus:— “Hæc ait, et fragilem dignatus tangere terram Temperat humentem conspersa pulvere limum Molliturque novum dives sapientia corpus Non aliter quam opifex diuturno exercitus usu. _Flectere laxatas per cuncta sequacia ceras Et vultus complere rudes aut corpora gypso Fingere_ vel segni speciem componere massa Sic Pater Omnipotens.” Here we have the body modeled (“fingere” is to model) in gypsum, and the ductile “cera” spread over all the undulations, and the rude face finished, just as Pliny describes it.