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substances impregnated with pitch, tallow, oil, wax, &., and a 
Discus or metal plate with a hole in it was used to protect the 
hand from the scalding drops. The Romans likewise used 
bundles of rushes, papyrus, &c., twisted like a rope and smeared 
with wax, &c., and this was called a ‘‘ Funalis.’’ The Greeks called 
it ‘Skolax” (cxoAdé), and we call it a “link.” This was 
ordinarily used by the Romans for lighting their banqueting 
halls, and Cicero says that C. Duilius with many a link and flute 
player delighted himself *‘ delectabatur crebro funali et tibicine.”’ 
This form of torch was also called ‘‘ Cereus,” a wax light, and 
the holder or candlestick was called ‘‘funale.”” What the Greeks 
and Romans called a ‘‘ Lampas ” was the (brass) case for such a 
torch something like the case of a Palmers candle or carriage 
lamp which was principally, if not exclusively, used in the 
‘« Lampas ”’ races. 
The Candle ‘Candela,’’ which was either of wax (cerea), or 
tallow (sebacea), had a rush wick, and was generally made very 
thin, like what we now call a taper. Juvenal speaks of the 
short light of a candle ‘‘ breve lumen candele,” and Livy (xl., 29), 
calls a waxed string used for tying a bundle “candela” (fasces 
candelis involuti). Similar thin rush lights were common in this 
country less than a century ago, and the pincers which served as 
candlesticks are still to be found in old houses in Scotland and 
elsewhere. Gilbert White in his ‘‘ History of Selborne’’ letter 
xxvi., Nov. 1st, 1775, tells us that a pound of peeled rushes, 
about 1,600 in number, could be bought from the gipsies for a 
shilling, and he says these may be dipped in six pounds of 
grease obtained by saving the skimming of the bacon boilings 
for a year. He adds that a rush will burn about half-an-hour, 
and so calculates that a pound of rushes dipped in six pounds of 
bacon fat would give light for about 800 hours. Gilbert White 
expatiates on the great advantage it would be if the poorer 
classes only knew of this; but now-a-days we should not think 
much of such a miserably poor light. It is, however, almost 
certain that 100 years ago nine people out of ten rarely, if ever, 
used any artifical light in their homes excepting the fire. 
The City of London was first lit in 1735, but outside the 
gates the streets were unlit, and people carried torches, and 
seventy years ago all the better houses had iron extinguishers 
fixed at the entrance to put out torches. A few of these still 
remain. In Scotland, up to the beginning of this century, much 
use was made of the half-fossilised pine from the peat bogs, 
which was split into ‘“‘cannles’”’ and dried for six months in the 
chimney corner, and then burnt for light ina V shaped “ clivvie’’ 
at the end of a rod, which allowed the splinter to be set more or 
less obliquely.—Bundles of rushes smeared with wax are still 
used by tin-smiths for soldering with the blowpipe. 
