[77] Note in this tapestry, in more than one feast scene, the swaggering action with which the guests raise the drinking-horns, either to drink from the larger end or to let the liquid pass into the mouth from the pointed extremity.
[78] In the sacristy of the church at Mittelzell, where I recently had an opportunity of examining it. This is an irregular oblong slab, about twenty inches in length, weighing about thirty pounds. One surface is nearly even, as if the molten glass had been poured out upon a table.
[79] The Slavonic tribes before their conversion do not appear to have had any knowledge of glass; it is not found in any of their tombs to the east of the Elbe.
[80] Apart from a few examples of enamelled glass of Saracenic origin preserved in church treasuries; these probably came in somewhat later.
[81] There are, beside these, five other glasses that may be connected with this saint, but these are of a different character. Hedwig was the wife of a Silesian prince who lived in the early part of the thirteenth century. On the occasion of a misunderstanding with her husband, arising from the lady’s refusal to drink anything but water at her meals, the difficulty was surmounted by a miracle. St. Hedwig was canonised in 1257, and was soon recognised as the landes patronin both of Silesia and Poland.
[82] For example, on Gallic and British coins derived from Greek types, or again on some English porcelain where an Oriental design has been unintelligently copied.
[83] Les Origines de l’Alchimie, 1885; La Chimie des Anciens et du Moyen Age, 1889; La Chimie au Moyen Age, 1893.
[84] This I shall refer to later on as the pseudo-Heraclius; it contains several sections treating on the manufacture of glass, and forms a valuable commentary on the decidedly earlier treatise of Theophilus.
[85] Compare with this account the furnace now used in Northern India described in [Chapter XXI.]
[86] At South Kensington, in the Indian section, may be seen some native distilling apparatus of glass, which follows very closely in the line of these old Syrian drawings.