o, a kind of
tuberosity, which is cut into layers like those of the citrus and the
maple. In all the other trees, the tuberosities are of no value
whatever. It is the central part of trees that is most variegated, and
the nearer we approach to the root the smaller are the spots and the
more wavy. It was in this appearance that originated that requirement of
luxury which displays itself in covering one tree with another, and
bestowing upon the more common woods a bark of higher price. In order to
make a single tree sell many times over laminae of veneer have been
devised; but that was not thought sufficient--the horns of animals must
next be stained of different colours, and their teeth cut into sections,
in order to decorate wood with ivory, and, at a later period, to veneer
it all over. Then, after all this, man must go and seek his materials in
the sea as well! For this purpose he has learned to cut tortoise shell
into sections; and of late, in the reign of Nero, there was a monstrous
invention devised of destroying its natural appearance by paint, and
making it sell at a still higher price by a successful imitation of
wood.

"It is in this way that the value of our couches is so greatly enhanced;
it is in this way, too, that they bid the rich lustre of the terebinth
to be outdone, a mock citrus to be made that shall be more valuable than
the real one, and the grain of the maple to be feigned. At one time
luxury was not content with wood; at the present day it sets us on
buying tortoise shells in the guise of wood."--Pliny's Natural History,
Bohn's Translation.

ITALY IN MEDIAEVAL AND RENAISSANCE TIMES

The mediaeval craft seems, however, to have been derived from the East,
though Theophilus mentions the Germans as clever practitioners in
woodwork. A minnesinger's harp of the 14th century, figured by Hefner
Alteneck, appears to bear out his remark, though later in date, with its
powdering of geometrical inlays and curiously-designed sprigs, which
might almost have been produced by the latest art craze, which apes
archaic simplicity. It belonged to the knightly poet Oswald von
Wolkenstein, who died in 1445; the colours used are two browns, black,
white, and green. The oriental inlays of ivory upon wood, elaborate and
beautiful geometrical designs, are still produced in India in much the
same fashion as in the middle ages, for the possibilities of geometric
design were exhausted by the Arabs in Egypt and the