It is rather saddening to think of the long periods which must elapse in the history of ivory carving, from this time when drapery was still a thing of beauty, showing the form it seemed to hide, on through phases in which the garments were laid on in a series of flat lumps, or covered with a multitude of meaningless lines, until, finally, it emerges in Gothic art, no longer diaphanous and clinging, it is true, but drapery, real drapery, hanging in long swaying folds and falling round the feet in delicate little heaps in a manner whose perfection was the sole prerogative of the French craftsmen. Between the Nicomachus diptych and the famous Diptychon Quirinalis of Brescia (No. 59), there is a great abyss. On one leaf of the latter are carved Hippolytus and Phædra, a poor copy of some Greek model; on the other Diana and Endymion. Meyer thinks it probable that in the representation of the chaste Diana, coyly saluting her lover under the chin, we may find the portrait of a Roman lady. Certainly the attitude of the lady’s left hand, firmly placed on her hip, could have been copied from no Greek original, and further, these two figures have curtains behind them and embroidery on the shoulders of their tunics, after the popular fashion of the fifth and sixth centuries. It is interesting to note the architectural background, an arch supported by two pilasters, which is very similar to that on the St. Gregory diptych, except that here the string-course which supports the scallop shell has not been cut away as in that at Monza. Liverpool Museum has a fine pair of tablets representing Æsculapius and Hygeia (No. 61); which undoubtedly refer to recovery from an illness. The figure of Æsculapius appears to be taken from the Farnese Hercules. Another small ivory of this subject is in a private collection in Zurich; the figures vary considerably, but are evidently of the same period—mid sixth century. There is one more diptych in that wonderful collection in the Treasury of the Basilica at Monza; representing an elderly bald-headed man, whose heavy torso and fat puffy face are well characterized, though the pose is rather awkwardly rendered. He appears to be a poet, for writing tablets and a _volumen_ lie at his feet, and on the adjoining leaf we see a Muse playing on the lyre. But from her matronly figure and his uncompromising ugliness, we appear to be dealing with another of those portrait diptychs, like the one at Brescia, in which the noble Roman had his portrait taken in fancy dress.