The Venetian paper of about 1470, used, for example, in the printed books of Nicolas Jenson and other printers in Venice, is a substance of very great beauty and durability, inferior only in appearance to the very best sort of vellum. It is very strong, of a fine creamy tint, and sized[250] with great skill, so as to have a beautiful glossy texture. For the illuminator's purpose it appears to have been almost as good as vellum. It even receives the raised mordant for burnished gold of the highest beauty and brilliance. The very small quantity of good paper that is now manufactured, mainly for artistic purposes, is made by hand in exactly the same way that was employed in the fourteenth or fifteenth century. Most paper is now made by machinery, and as a rule contains more esparto grass than pure linen fibre. THE METALS AND PIGMENTS USED IN ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPTS[251]. _Fluid and leaf gold._ _Gold and silver or tin._ The splendour of illuminated manuscripts of almost all classes, except manuscripts of the Irish school such as the _Book of Kells_, is largely due to the very skilful use of gold and silver. These metals were applied by the illuminator in two ways, _first_, as a fluid pigment, and _secondly_ in the form of leaf. The fluid method appears to have been the older. It is easier to apply, but is not comparable in splendour of effect to the highly burnished leaf gold, which was used with such perfection of skill by the illuminators of the fourteenth century. _Method of grinding._ _Fluid gold_ was made by laboriously grinding the pure metal on a porphyry slab into the finest possible powder. This powdered gold, mixed with water and a little size, was applied with a brush like any other pigment; see Theophilus, I. 30 to 33[252]. When dry, it could be to some extent polished by burnishing, but as it was laid directly on to the comparatively uneven and yielding surface of the vellum it never received a very high polish. As a rule therefore fluid gold was left unburnished, and its surface remained dull or _mat_ in appearance. _Dull and burnished gold._ For this reason it was not unfrequently used in conjunction with burnished leaf gold, a fine decorative effect being produced by the contrast of the _mat_ and polished surfaces. Thus, for example, in fourteenth and fifteenth century manuscripts a delicate diaper of scroll pattern is sometimes painted with a fine brush over a ground of burnished gold leaf. In the fifteenth century, during the decadence of the illuminator's art, the use of fluid gold, which had previously greatly diminished, was much revived, especially for the background of the realistic borders in Flemish manuscripts[253], for touching in the high lights of miniatures, and for many other purposes. When used to cover large surfaces, it is always unsatisfactory in effect and has little decorative value. _Cistercian severity._