A brief recountal of the most important of the stories of this kind, must be prefaced by the paradoxical statement that the Magic Mirror need not by any means be a mirror. People are also reported to have seen future and distant things in shining metal surfaces, in rock-crystals, and in glasses filled with water. The Old Testament mentions a divination made by the radiance of _gems_—where it speaks of Urim and Thummim, the breast-ornament of six bright and six dark stones which the high priest donned to receive revelations from Jehovah. In a like manner, too, in _dactylomancy_ (divination by rings) the abnormal condition is said to have been induced by fixedly gazing at the stones of finger-rings. Likewise in the Bible we find an instance of divination by means of polished metal cups; for according to the Septuagint, the cup that Joseph caused to be placed in the sack of Benjamin, was the cup from which he was wont to divine. Instead of cups, use was also made of metal balls, arrows, swords, knives, and metal mirrors. Even Jacob Böhme practised the art of clairvoyance by the help of the "lovely jovial lustre" of a tin cup, "with the result that he was now introduced into the innermost depths or centre of recondite nature, and was enabled to look into the hearts and innermost character of all creatures." When gold and silver leaves marked with mysterious characters were thrown into a basin filled with water, and it was sought by gazing at the surface thus furnished, to arouse the "higher powers," the art was called _lecanomancy_. If the surface of the water alone was gazed at, it was called _hydromancy_; a method which communicated oracles by means of the images that appeared in the water. The only distinction between hydromancy and _gastromancy_ was, that in the latter case the water was poured into distended vessels. Cardanus has minutely described some gastromantic experiments that came under his observation. A bottle filled with holy water was placed in the sun upon a white-covered table; over the mouth of the bottle two olive leaves were laid crosswise; three lighted wax candles were then placed about the leaves and fumigated with incense, during which performance a prayer to Saint Helena was uttered. Very soon the mantic adepts standing in the background saw forms in the water; once a man with a bald head, slightly inclined forward; a second time a man dressed in scarlet. Cardanus himself could see nothing more than a disturbance in the water, as if produced by the motes of a sunbeam, and a peculiar generation of bubbles. The same principle lies at the foundation of _onychomancy_, where the thumb-nail of some suitable person, or the palm of the hand was anointed with oil and soot, and the images appeared in the shining surface illuminated either by the rays of the sun or by a candle.[26] Ink was often poured into the palm of the bent hand and divination made from the reflecting surface of the ink.