in each compartment, and all modeled in the plaster with remarkable vivacity and spirit: not one of them was cast. So in the houses at Pompeii, not a vestige of a figure or ornament cast in plaster has ever been found, nor a mould in plaster; and when one considers that, being completely protected, they would naturally have survived as well as other far more fragile and destructible objects which have been preserved, the evidence is almost absolute that they never could have existed there. If so, it is in the highest degree probable that they existed nowhere. It would seem plain, then, that even the first, simplest, and most natural processes of casting in gypsum were unknown to the ancients, for no other process is so easy and simple as to fill a flat mould with plaster and then remove it, provided there are no under-cuttings. In doing this, however, there is a slight practical difficulty if the mould is in one piece, as the least under-cutting would render it impossible to remove the cast without injury or breakage. Indeed, though there were no under-cutting, it would at least be very difficult to remove the plaster from a mould in one piece. Clay would be removed with far greater ease because of its pliancy, and any cracks or imperfections could be at once remedied; add to this that baked clay is one of the most enduring of materials, and we have the probable reasons why the ancients used it instead of gypsum. But whatever may have been their reasons, it is per

fectly clear that they did use clay; and we have no evidence that they ever used plaster.

This use of gypsum to take impressions from flat moulds is suggested by Theophrastus, it would seem, in his treatise on mineralogy,1 in which he says that plaster "seems better than other materials to receive impressions." The term ȧrópaypa means nothing more than an impression, such as one makes in wax from a seal ring, and such as is common still in plaster; it is to this use that he seems to refer. He does not say, however, that gypsum was really put to this use; and if it were, it would advance us little in our inquiry, since any material which is soft will receive an impression, whether it be bread, pitch, clay, wax, or any similar substance.

But the step from this simple process of stamping in a shallow mould to casting from life or from the round is enormous. The difficulties are

multiplied a hundred-fold. It is no longer a simple operation, but a nice and complicated one. The part to be cast must first be oiled or soaped, then covered with plaster of about the consistency of rich cream, then divided into sections while the material is still tender, so as to enable the mould to be withdrawn part by part without breakage, then allowed to set, then removed, oiled or soaped on the interior surface, the parts all properly replaced, fluid plaster poured into the mould, — and finally, after the cast is set, the mould must

1 Διαφέρην δὲ δοκεῖ καὶ πρὸς τὰ ἀπομάγματα πολὺ τῶν ἀλλῶν.

be carefully removed by a hammer and chisel. This is an elaborate process as applied to an arm or a hand, but when applied to a living face it is not only difficult but disagreeable, and unless due care be used it may be dangerous; and after all a cast from the face is hard, forced, and unnatural in its character and impression, however skillfully it may be done, and can only serve the sculptor as the basis of his work. Yet if the common interpretation of the passage in Pliny be accurate, this is the process which was invented and practiced by Lysistratus, and by means of which he made portraits. Credat Judæus! With all our knowledge and practice, we do not find this to answer in our own time.

But to cast from a statue in clay is still more difficult and complicated; there the extremest care and nicety are required in making the proper divisions, in extracting the clay and irons, recommitting the sections, and breaking off the outer shell of the mould. In fact, the modern process is so complicated that no one can see it without wondering how it ever came to be so thought out and perfected, or without being convinced that it must have been slowly arrived at by many steps and many failures.

That statues were modeled in plaster by the ancients there is no doubt. Pausanias mentions several; and Spartianus 2 also speaks of "Three

1

1 Lib. ix. ch. 23; Lib. i. ch. 40; Lib. viii. ch. 22.

2 Spartian, Sev. Hadrian., 22.

Victories" in plaster, with palms in their hands, erected at one of the games, and says that on one of the days of the Circensian games when according to common custom they were erected, the central one on which the name of Severus was inscribed, and which bore a globe, was thrown down by a gust of wind from the podium, and that another bearing the name of Geta on it also fell and was shattered to pieces.

Firmicus also relates that after Zagreus, son of Jupiter, was slain by the Titans, his body was cut to pieces and thrown into a cauldron, from which Minerva rescued the heart and carried it to Jupiter. He then gave it to Semele, who resuscitated Zagreus, and Jupiter afterwards preserved his likeness in plaster, -"Ex gypso plastico opere perfecit."

66

Mr. Perkins cites all these instances, and says: They authorize us to believe that the Greeks and Romans practiced casting in plaster." But in saying this he altogether overlooks the very plain distinction between the two entirely different operations of casting and modeling. We know that they modeled in plaster; the only question is whether they cast in that material. The term for casting, as we have stated, was "fundere," and is always used when real casting in brass or other metal is spoken of; but nowhere is the term " fundere" applied to any work in gypsum. "Ars

1 De Errore Profanarum Religionum. Vid. Lobeck aglaopham,

p. 571.

fundendi æro is constantly spoken of, "ars fundendi gypso never. Besides, the very phrase "ex gypso plastico opere perfecit " is at variance with casting. The words "plastico " and "opere mean modeling, and nothing else.

But throughout this paper by Mr. Perkins these two completely distinct processes are constantly confounded with each other. It suffices for him to find a statement in an ancient writer that anything is made in plaster, or even an allusion to a plaster statue, and at once he jumps to the conclusion that the statue was necessarily cast, and not shapen or modeled.

"It remains for us now," he says, "to establish by undeniable proof how little foundation there is for the opinion of those who pretend that the ancients did not make use of plaster for casting, supporting their opinion on the complete absence of statues and statuettes in plaster, or fragments of any kind found in excavations, when nevertheless thousands of objects of the frailest kind are found, such as stuccoes, vases, terra cotta, glass, wax heads, etc. If it be true that the inclemencies of weather and atmospheric agents could cause the disappearance of plaster saturated with humidity, or placed in conditions favorable to its destruction, it does not necessarily follow that these conditions always reproduce themselves. It suffices, to convince one's self of this, to glance at the plates 67, 76, 85, in the magnificent work published at St. Petersburg on the antiquities of the Cimmerian