[936] “Du moment qu’il avait exécuté une composition dans la manière antique et qu’il y avait mis toute la splendeur de sa palette, il ne se demandait pas si le dessin de ses personnages était correct ou non, s’ils se trainaient bien sur leur jambes, s’ils étaient réellement assis sur une chaise ou un fauteuil, ou simplement appuyés contre ces meubles”; Kondakoff, op. cit., i, 108. Of existing MSS. with coloured miniatures, only some six or eight date back to these early centuries. Labarte’s Hist. des arts indust., Paris, 1892, with coloured facsimiles is the most satisfying work in which to study mediaeval art objectively. At South Kensington a variety of specimens are to be found, including ivories, enamels, paper casts of mosaics, reproductions of frescoes, etc., many of which go as far back as the sixth century.
[937] Oribasius, physician to Julian, seems to be the genuine father of bookmaking, the real prototype of the “scissors and paste” author, but he foreran the swarming of the brood by a couple of centuries.
[938] Gregory Nys., De Vit. S. Macrinae (in Migne, iii, 960). Whence it appears that it was unusual for them to be taught to apply themselves to the distaff or the needle. Maidenhood was mostly passed in luxury and adornment; Chrysostom, Qual. Duc. Sint Uxores, 9 (in Migne, iii, 239); in Epist. ad Ephes., iv, Hom. xiii, 3 (in Migne, xi, 97); cf. Jerome, Epist., 128, 130. The latter sets forth his ideas as to the training of a girl at some length. As soon as she has imbibed the first rudiments she is to begin psalm-singing and reading of prophets, apostles, etc. Later she should proceed to the study of the fathers, especially Cyprian, Athanasius, and Hilarius. She should spend much time in church with her parents, and must be guarded circumspectly from the attentions of the curled youth (cincinatti, calamistrati). She rises betimes to sing hymns, and employs herself generally in weaving plain textures. Silks and jewellery are to be rigorously eschewed; and the saint cannot reconcile himself to the idea of an adult virgin making use of the bath, as she should blush to see herself naked; Epist., 107. His remarks, of course, apply directly to life at Rome.
[939] From Jerome’s letter just quoted it appears that it was usual for girls to play on the lyre, pipe, and organ.
[940] See her life by Gregorovius, 1892. Her cento of Homeric verses applied to Christ is extant. To her inspiration most probably is due the foundation of the Auditorium at CP., and the prominence given to philosophy. Pulcheria was occupied in building churches and in disinterring the relics of martyrs.
[941] She is best known from the epistles of Synesius. Nothing of hers is extant. Murdered 415, wife or maid uncertain; see Suidas, sb. nom. She was scraped to pieces with shells, a mode of official torture peculiar to the Thebais, which may have been inflicted often on Christian ladies during Pagan persecutions. In other districts an iron scraper was used; Eusebius, Hist. Eccles., viii, 9; 3, etc.
[942] I need not refer more particularly to the phenomena of radio-activity and cathode rays, information concerning which has been exploited by every popular periodical. The atoms (electrons) which become visible in the low-pressure tube have been calculated to be of but 1∕800 the magnitude of the hydrogen atom, and many physicists are inclined to regard them as the first state of matter on its way to resolution into the formless protyle or ether.
[943] A great part of modern books on chemistry is now devoted to synthesis. Not only have such well-known organic substances as indigo, vanilla, citric acid, etc., been prepared artificially, but also those new articles of commerce, the aniline dyes, saccharine, etc. Numbers of new drugs for therapeutic experiment are synthetized annually in the great German laboratories of Bayer, Merck, etc.
[944] Especially suggestive are the ingenious experiments with ferments, which tend to show that the anabolic and katabolic activities of living matter may soon be imitated in the laboratory; see Buchner, Bericht d. deutsch. chem. Gesel., xxx, xxxi, xxxii; also recent physiological treatises in which are contained the speculations of Pflüger and others as to the “biogens” of protoplasm, etc. Most important of all is Loeb’s discovery of the possibility of chemical fertilization; see Boveri, Das Problem der Befruchtung, Jena, 1902.
[945] Archytas, with his flying wooden dove, was the most noted mechanician in this line; A. Gellius, x, 12, etc.