The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-11-27 00:00:00

SCIENCE AND ART.

ARTISTIC METAL-WORK AT ST. SOPHIA'S, CONSTAN-
TINOPLE, AND IN ROMAN CHURCHES, IN ANCIENT
Trams.---The conversion of Constantine the Great
(said Mr. Skidmore, in a paper read lately at the
Architectural Museum) opened a vast field to the de-

191

velopment of greater richness in the decoration of
Christian churches. The fact of the removal of the
seat of empire by him to Constantinople in the fourth
century, joined to the vastness and beauty of his pre-
sents to the church, gave an impetus of the strongest
kind to works in metal and other adornments of an ec-
clesiastical character. The chalices of that period,
which were large, with two handles, were frequently
used, not only for the purposes of administration, but
were hung in numbers near the altar. The same
emperor gave to the churches he founded at Rome
forty chalices of solid gold, each weighing llb. and
fifty of 21bs. each, and twenty of 201bs. each. At
another period we find Charlemagne presenting one of
solid gold, weighing the enormous quantity of 521bs.
Again, still later, appear accounts of a circle of ten
great chalices, with forty others arranged between the
columns of the altar, weighing altogether 2671b5.
Time, and the subsequent refusal of the cup to the
laity, have left few of these relics of the customs of the
early church and the piety and liberality of these
emperors. Patens of early periods were correspond-
ingly costly,---sometimes of solid gold, at others com-
posed of metals of various qualities enriched with gems
and precious stones, they present in the descriptions
ideas of costliness utterly exceeding the expenditure on
these vessels in the present day. On the removal of
the seat of empire by Constantine to Byzantium,.
Roman metal-work had engrafted on to it the peculi-
arities of Greek workmanship, and it is from this
period we may date the rise of Christian art. In the
wars by the Mahomedans upon the Eastern Christians,
many of these works came to the use of Westen Europe.
The early Mahomedan conquerors, limited to the most
hardy life by the then existing rules of their faith, sold
to the Jews whoflocked there vasttreasures, which beinc,
purchased at a value set upon them by the children a
the desert, afforded them at once a profitable specula-
tion, and spread through the Western Church num-
berless models of Byzantine art. At Santa Sophia, at
Constantinople, rich mosaics and colour, and gold were
to be found : vessels in gold, perhaps unprecedented in
quantity and richness, 6,000 candlesticks, and seven
crosses of gold, each 2001bs. in weight ; also twenty-
four copies of the Evangilists, with bindings of the
same material, each weighing 2001bs. and set with ex-
quisite enamels, and covered with delicate filigree.
These, and such as these, became at once the type for
Moors, Persians, Russians, and Italians, while there is
reason to believe the Oriental goldsmiths who continue
this peculiar kind of workmanship to the present day,
originally derived their knowledge from the court of
Justinian and the works• at Santa Sophia.—The
Builder.
APPLICATION OF COLD TO SPRAINS.—Many different
opinions have been entertained as to whether recent
sprains should be treated by warm or cold application.
Mr. Cook, of Guy's Hospital, entertains as the result of
his large experience, a strong preference for cold. He
states that the consequence of a sprain may be very
much limited, both in duration and severity, by the
early and efficient employment of cold. It should
either be done by iced water' or by irrigation. Mr."
Cook is accustomed to quote, by way of illustration of
powerful cold, the certainty with which the applica-
tion of ice will induce the absorption of effused blood
in an ordinary ecchymosis, a power which, in certain
cases of " black eye," may be turned to good account.
—Medical Times.
SHIP-BUILDING.—A paragraph relative to tubular
spars for ships in your journal for October, recals a
suggestion I made about two years ago to a nautical
friend, which was of course pooh-poohed down with a
gentle rebuke for a landsman's presuminc, to think
anything nautical capable of improvement. I proposed
to construct lower masts of large ships, and especially
steamers, of hollow iron cylindrical tubes, the topmasts
either of timber or iron, to slide within them, and
being fitted at the heel with a cupped leather, like the
ram of a hydraulic press, the topmast could be raised
by hydraulic pressure, applied by means of a small
force-pump between decks—the mast, when raised,
being fidded, and the water 'allowed to run Out. By
employing a lever fid, which could be withdrawn with-
out taking off the weight of the upper mast, it might
be struck at once, the air contained in the hollow mast
regulating its descent to any required speed by means
of valves or cocks below.—Correspondent of the
Builder.
ANCIENT ENAMELS. —Byzantine or Cloisome enamel
(says Mr. Skidmore) was made after the following