throwing out buds; sometimes it is a stick, the side branches of which
have been roughly lopped, leaving projections where they grew; sometimes
it is in the likeness of a reed or cane, the stalk being divided into
joints. Most of those which have been found in the buried cities are of
bronze; some few of iron. In their general plan and appearance there
is a great resemblance, though the details of the ornaments admit of
infinite variety. All stand on three feet, usually griffins', or lions'
claws, which support a light shaft, plain or fluted according to the
fancy of the maker. The whole supports either a plinth large enough for
a lamp to stand on, or a socket to receive a wax-candle, which the
Romans used sometimes instead of oil in lighting their rooms. Some of
them have a sliding shaft, like that of a music-stand, by which the
light might be raised or lowered at pleasure.

We may here say a few words on the art of inlaying one metal with
another, in which, as in all ornamental branches of the working of
metals, the ancient Italians possessed great skill. In the time of
Seneca, ornaments of silver were seldom seen, unless their price was
enhanced by being inlaid with solid gold. The art of uniting one metal
to another was called by the general term _ferruminare_. Inlaid
work was of two sorts; in the one, the inlaid work projected above the
surface, and was called _emblemata_, as the art itself was called,
from the Greek, _embletice_. It is inferred, from the inspection of
numerous embossed vases in the Neapolitan Museum, that this embossed
work was formed, either by plating with a thin leaf of metal figures
already raised upon the surface of the article, or by letting the solid
figures into the substance of the vessel, and finishing them with
delicate tools after they were attached. In the second sort, the inlaid
work was even with the surface, and was called _crusta_, and the
art was called, from the Greek, _empaestice_. This is the same as