ning
the same ingredients fused in the same manner. And besides the many
glass ornaments known to be of an earlier period is a bead, found at
Thebes, bearing the name of a Pharaoh who lived about 1450 B.C., the
specific gravity of which, 25 deg. 23', is precisely the same as of crown
glass, now manufactured in England.

Glass bottles are even met with on monuments of the 4th dynasty,
dating long before the Osirtasens, or more than 4,000 years ago; the
transparent substance shows the red wine they contained; and this kind
of bottle is represented in the same manner among the offerings to the
gods, and at the fetes of individuals, wherever wine was introduced,
from the earliest to the latest times. Bottles, and other objects of
glass, are commonly found in the tombs; and though they have no kings'
names or dates inscribed upon them (glass being seldom used for such a
purpose), no doubt exists of their great antiquity; and we may
consider it a fortunate chance that has preserved _one_ bead with the
name of a sovereign of the 18th dynasty. Nor is it necessary to point
out how illogical is the inference that, because other kinds of glass
have not been found bearing a king's name, they were not made in
Egypt, at, or even before, the same early period.

Pliny ascribes the discovery of glass to some Phoenician sailors
accidently lighting a fire on the sea-shore; but if an effect of
chance, the secret is more likely to have been arrived at in Egypt,
where natron (or subcarbonate of soda) abounded, than by the sea side;
and if the Phoenicians really were the first to discover it on the
_Syrian_ coast, this would prove their migration from the Persian Gulf
to have happened at a very remote period. Glass was certainly one of
the great exports of the Phoenicians; who traded in beads, bottles,
and other objects of that material, as well as various manufactures,
made either in their own or in other countries: but Egypt was always
famed for its manufacture; a peculiar kind of earth was found near
Alexandria, without which, Strabo says, "it was impossible to make
certain kinds of glass of many colors, and of a brilliant quality,"
and some vases, presented by an Egyptian priest to the Emperor
Hadrian, were considered so curious and valuable that they were only
used on grand occasions.

Glass bottles, of various colors, were eagerly bought from Egypt, and
exported into other countries; and the manufacture as well as the
patterns of ma