The Egyptians appear to have been familiar with the manufacture of gold. The gold-leaf still found in and about mummy-cases, some thousands of years old, proves not only that they had an abundant supply of the precious metal, but were acquainted with the art of gilding. Their making of golden ornaments and golden vases, of large size and beautiful workmanship, might be inferred from various incidental notices in ancient writers; but, it is placed beyond all doubt by the representations of Rosellini. Among these are numerous vases of a golden color, many of them showing not only manual dexterity, but also considerable taste. A picture in the tomb of Rameses IV. contains a golden vase of great beauty, supported by two Philistines. There is no mention of silver in Scripture till the time of Abraham. It then appears in the form of money, estimated by weight: “Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant.” Jeremiah paid for the field of Hanameel in the same way. The shekel and the talent indeed do not appear to have been originally fixed and stamped pieces of money, but merely weights used in traffic. So general did this become, that the Jews usually had scales attached to their girdles for weighing the gold and silver they received in payment, while the Canaanites carried them in their hands. Silver was so abundant in the days of Solomon that it was “nothing accounted of;” for “the king made silver to be as stones in Jerusalem.” The mention of brass which occurs in ancient writers must often be understood as meaning copper, either in its pure state or alloyed with tin, rather than the metallic compound with which we are familiar. It is stated that the chief sources of the wealth of the Pharaohs were the mines of the neighboring countries of Nubia and Ethiopia, which were abundantly productive of copper. The mirrors which were in possession of the Israelitish women when they left Egypt are said to have been of brass, for the laver and the foot of it were made of that metal. Such were all the mirrors made in ancient times. Many metallic mirrors may be observed in our collections of Egyptian antiquities. They are nearly round, but varied in form, according to the taste of the artisan, and are inserted in handles of wood, stone, or metal. Their substance is chiefly copper, but mixed with other metals, most carefully wrought and highly polished. In the Egyptian Museum at Paris, there are several mirrors of a metal which looks like brass.