ES OF LIFE.
1, 2, 3, 5. Assyrian. 4. Sicilian Silk. (Birdwood's "Indian Arts,"
pp. 331, 335, 336, 337.)]

Aristophanes, in "The Frogs," laughs at the Persian carpet
patterns--their unnatural birds and beasts and flowers--whilst he
claims for his own frogs, that they at least have the merit of being
natural.[109] This little touch of art throws a gleam of inner
light on the struggle towards originality and truth which
characterized the Greek principles of beauty and fitness in literature
and art, in direct contrast to that which was always turning back to
those fossil forms which were only respectable on account of their age
and their mystery, but of which the tradition and intention were
already lost.

Roman patterns were merely Greek adaptations with an Etruscan flavour,
which was a survival of the earliest Italian art. Perhaps the
indigenous element had been already modified by Phoenician
influence.

In taking stock of Oriental symbolical patterns, we find that one of
those of the widest ancestry and longest continuity is the "Sacred
Hom."[110] (Pl. 20-24.) This is to be found in Babylonian,
Persian,[111] Indian, Greek, and Roman art; and consequently it
prevails in all European decoration (except the Gothic), where it was
reduced to unrecognizable forms.

Sir George Birdwood says the Hom or Homa was the Sanskrit Soma, used
as an intoxicating drink by the early Brahmins, and was extracted from
the plant of that name, an almost leafless succulent Asclepiad. It
appears to have changed its conventional form as other plants by
fermentation came to the front, containing what appeared to be the
"spirit of life"--the _aqua vitae_.

The palm, with its wonderful fruit, which is convertible into
intoxicating drinks, and afterwards the vine itself, were each of them
moulded into analogous conventional fruit forms, which keep as much as
possible within the limits of the original cone shape. (Pl. 21.)

[Illustration: Pl. 21.
1. Tree of Life and Lions. Gate of Mycenae. 2. Persian or Sicilian
Silk. Tree of Life and Leopards.]

[Illustration: Pl. 22.
1. Split Lotus Fruit on Chinese Bowl. 2. Split Lotus resembling
Tree of Life. Frieze by Benozzo Gozzoli, Ricardi Palace,
Florence. 3. Petal of Flower on Glass Bowl from Southern
Italy. British Museum.]

There is a palm-tree which absolutely carries a cone in the heart of
its crown of fronds.[112] This may have helped to