The best of this type of work was executed in the fourteenth century. Objects made of ivory alone are very rare in Saracenic art. The illustration given of an ivory ink-horn is unique in this material, but ink-horns of the same shape are common that have been made in copper and brass. Figure and animal carvings of Saracenic or Moorish design have been made in Spain, and in some other countries under the rule of the Saracens, but are not found in the Egyptian Saracenic. China has always been prolific in the production of ivory carvings. There are numerous statuettes of Confucius, Cheoü-lao, the god of old age, of the Buddhist female divinity Kouan-in, and of other divinities. Necklaces, pierced plaques for waist-belt decoration, and the _su-chus_ or rosaries, all are carved with a certain archaic quality and quaintness, but of a minute and unsurpassed dexterity of workmanship. The Chinese ivory fans of pierced work are beautiful and as delicate as lace-work. Examples of these are very common. [Illustration: Fig. 126.—Ivory Ink-Horn; Saracenic. (S.K.M.)] The pen-cases called _pitongs_ are beautiful objects, carved with dragons, flowers, and quaint figures in toy-like houses and gardens. The “puzzle balls” are amongst the most wonderful of the Chinese carvings in ivory, where quite a number of loose balls of lessening sizes are contained within each other, and are all carved out of a solid ball of ivory. The outer surfaces of each ball are also carved with elaborate ornamentation. The method of cutting out these balls consists in boring a number of holes at regulated distances on the surface to a measured depth of the thickness of each outer shell, and then to cut around the circumference of each hole with a steel tool made with a bent end to suit the concentric curve of the sphere, and turned until each shell is freed from its next smaller ball. The Chinese puzzle balls are not very perfect examples of accurate turning, as the ornamentation conceals the rough workmanship in a great degree, but still they are marvels of skill and patience.