are not
Byzantine in their decorations. One of them was originally a vase,
and, indeed, is still, for the long gold neck has no connection
with the inside; the handle is also of gold, both these adjuncts
seem to have been regarded as simply ornament. The other cruet is
carved elaborately with leopards, the first and taller one showing
monsters and foliate forms. Around the neck of the lower of these
rock crystal cruets is an inscription, praying for God's blessing
on the "Imam Aziz Billah," who was reigning in Egypt in 980. This
cruet has a gold stand. The handle is cleverly cut in the same
piece of crystal, but a band of gold is carried down it to give it
extra strength. The forming of this handle in connection with the
rest of the work is a veritable _tour de force_, and we should have
grave doubts whether Theophilus with his goats could have managed
it!

[Illustration: CRYSTAL FLAGONS, ST. MARK'S, VENICE]

Vasari speaks with characteristic enthusiasm of the glyptics of
the Greeks, "whose works in that manner may be called divine."
But, as he continues, "many and very many years passed over during
which the art was lost".... until in the days of Lorenzo di Medici
the fashion for cameos and intaglios revived.

In the Guild of the Masters of Wood and Stone in Florence, the
cameo-cutters found a place, nevertheless it seems fitting to include
them at this point among jewellers, instead of among carvers.

The Italians certainly succeeded in performing feats of lapidary
art at a later period. Vasari mentions two cups ordered by Duke
Cosmo, one cut out of a piece of lapis lazuli, and the other from
an enormous heliotrope, and a crystal galley with gold rigging
was made by the Sanachi brothers. In the Green Vaults in Dresden
may be seen numerous specimens of valuable but hideous products
of this class. In the seventeenth century, the art had run its
course, and gave place to a taste for cameos, which in its turn
was run into the ground.

Cameo-cutting and gem engraving has always been accomplished partly
by means of a drill; the deepest point to be reached in the cutting
would be punctured first, and then the surfaces cut, chipped, and
ground away until the desired level was attained. This is on much
the same principle as that adopted by marble cutters to-day.

Mr. Cyril Davenport's definition of a cameo is quite satisfactory:
"A small sculpture executed in low relief upon some substance precious
either for its beau