The next development of Greek ingenuity in the construction of flutes came in a remarkable guise, showing a contrast as great as our ships in mail and armour present to ships that carried our flag a century ago. Suddenly as it seems, with no transition stages, the Greek inventor brought forth his new flute of ivory encased in bronze. Evidently, it was an age of luxury. The Greeks valued in every respect each art that was known to them; they lavished wealth upon artists, and paid honours to orators and singers and players, no less than to sculptors and painters. No price was too great to pay for their beloved flutes. The flute of Ismenias, a celebrated Theban musician, cost at Corinth three talents—a sum equivalent to £581 5s. of our money. No intimation has ever been left to us of the basis upon which such valuation was made, whether an adventitious worth was given by encrustations of jewels and setting of gold, or whether some famous maker acquired a repute so that, like Stradivarius, every instrument from his hand was sought for by those able to appreciate artistic excellence; we cannot even guess, for in acoustic conditions there is no parity of relation between fiddles and flutes; and for all that we know, the great price quoted may have been reached in fighting for a rarity, the instinct for which is perennial in the human race. So delightful a thing is it to possess that which others covet; so exalting the exultation in having that which others have not; verily, it is the taproot of all civilisation. Without it civilisation had never been. The particular flutes now under examination must have been costly, but only moderately so. The Greeks were adepts in metal work of all kind, and in these flutes their skill in the art is manifest; battered as they are and grey green with age, they bear the record of the master hand. The interior tube is of ivory, and the outer or encasing cylinder is of bronze. At the upper end there is a raised piece of metal, in the curve of which there is a figure of a reclining Mænad, still beautiful in figure, and in flowing lines of drapery. The flutes are the counterparts of each other, differing only in length, and slightly varying in the distance of the finger holes. The lengths are respectively eleven and a half inches and ten and a quarter inches; but the last named pipe has the end fractured, and, therefore, may have been as long as the first, or longer. The measurements may not be exact, but are approximately as stated; at all events, sufficiently so for the needs of our present purpose. It should be understood that the fragments are pieced together, and with even the most careful handling one would fear disaster.