Next to these in repute comes Calamis.[1132] Antipater[1133] too, it has been said, laid, rather than engraved,[1134] a Sleeping Satyr upon a drinking-bowl.[1135] Next to these come Stratonicus[1136] of Cyzicus, and Tauriscus:[1137] Ariston[1138] also, and Eunicus,[1139] of Mytilene are highly praised; Hecatæus[1140] also, and, about the age of Pompeius Magnus, Pasiteles,[1141] Posidonius[1142] of Ephesus, Hedystratides[1143] who engraved battle-scenes and armed warriors, and Zopyrus,[1144] who represented the Court of the Areopagus and the trial of Orestes,[1145] upon two cups valued at twelve thousand sesterces. There was Pytheas[1146] also, a work of whose sold at the rate of ten thousand denarii for two ounces: it was a drinking-bowl, the figures on which represented Ulysses and Diomedes stealing the Palladium.[1147] The same artist engraved also, upon some small drinking-vessels, kitchen scenes,[1148] known as “magiriscia;”[1149] of such remarkably fine workmanship and so liable to injury, that it was quite impossible to take copies[1150] of them. Teucer too, the inlayer,[1151] enjoyed a great reputation. All at once, however, this art became so lost in point of excellence, that at the present day ancient specimens are the only ones at all valued; and only those pieces of plate are held in esteem the designs on which are so much worn that the figures cannot be distinguished. Silver becomes tainted by the contact of mineral waters, and of the salt exhalations from them, as in the interior of Spain, for instance. CHAP. 56.—SIL: THE PERSONS WHO FIRST USED IT IN PAINTING, AND THE METHOD THEY ADOPTED. In the mines of gold and silver there are some other pigments also found, sil[1152] and cæruleum. Sil is, properly speaking, a sort of slime.[1153] The best kind is that known as Attic sil; the price of which is two denarii per pound. The next best kind is the marbled[1154] sil, the price of which is half that of the Attic kind. A third sort is the compressed sil, known to some persons as Scyric sil, it coming from the Isle of Scyros. Then, too, there is the sil of Achaia, which painters make use of for shadow-painting, and the price of which is two sesterces per pound. At a price of two asses less per pound, is sold the clear[1155] sil, which comes from Gaul. This last kind, as well as the Attic sil, is used for painting strong lights: but the marbled sil only is employed for colouring compartitions,[1156] the marble in it offering a resistance to the natural acridity of the lime. This last kind is extracted also from some mountains twenty miles distant from the City. When thus extracted, it is submitted to the action of fire; in which form it is adulterated by some, and sold for compressed sil. That it has been burnt, however, and adulterated, may be very easily detected by its acridity, and the fact that it very soon crumbles into dust.