When we separated for the night, grandmother took a hand of each of them in one of hers, and said, "Good-night, my children; be true to yourselves and to each other!" and it was in this way I noticed a ring, like the love-token in the picture, on my grandmother's wedding-finger.
A CHAPTER ON NECKLACES, OLD AND NEW.
BY MRS. WHITE.
It is curious to trace the first appearance of necklaces amongst the Egyptians, in the same form as they exist at the present day upon the necks of the Patagonians, and the natives of the islands of the Pacific; for the ancient dwellers by the Nile wore necklaces of the seeds of leguminous plants, berries, and feathers (especially those of the poule de Numidie), precisely the same substances which are used in this ornament by the above people, except that the emu supplies the feathers, and that shells are occasionally mingled with the bright-colored berries. But shells were also used in necklaces by the Egyptians, as our readers may perceive in the table-cases of the Egyptian gallery in the British Museum.
Here, we may trace the next appearance of this trinket, when art began to be applied in its composition, and spherical beads of various substances were used; as well as its progression from a simple ornament to its superstitious use as an amulet.
In one of these cases some very interesting specimens of our subject may be seen, tracing, as plainly as more important things might do, the gradual advance of art; there is one of round blue beads capped with silver, another representing deities and symbols, and a third with pendants in the form of the lock of horns, fishes, and cowries, which are well deserving of attention.
The two latter were of course worn as amulets, and, being impressed with sacred images, were supposed to ward off danger and infection, to render the wearer courageous or agreeable, or invest him with the various qualities which their symbolism, or the substances of which they were composed, represented in the mythic language of the East.
Perhaps it might have been with such intentions that we find the necklace so favorite an adornment with the warriors of antiquity. The Medes, Persians, Indians, and Etruscans wore them in the valuable shape of strings of pearls, sometimes enriched with jewels; while the chiefs and great men amongst the northern nations were distinguished by necklaces and collars of gold, called torques, so that, when conquered, the necklaces of both oriental and Celtic nations must have made an important part of the spoils. Hence, probably, the adoption of the monile by the Romans as a reward for military valor, and hence also the surname of Torquatus Manlius, who was so called from his having torn the golden torque from the neck of an enemy on the field of battle.
Necklaces were worn by both Greek and Roman women, but only within doors, and on occasions of domestic festivity, as at weddings and dances; they were especially used as bridal presents, and the learned in mythology will remember that it was upon the occasion of Hermione's marriage that Vulcan, to revenge her mother's infidelity, bestowed upon her the fatal necklace which worked such wondrous evils on her race. Here we perceive that the Eastern superstitions connected with this ornament had accompanied the fashion of wearing it into Greece: the rich and beautiful necklace of Hermione was a talisman—not to counteract evil, but to produce it; so that by-and-by we find this very necklace, which Ovid tells us was of gold, and to the description of which Nomus devotes fifty lines of his Dionysica, bribing Eriphyle, the wife of Amphiaraus, to betray her husband.