ANTIQUITIES, 



667 



observes, that the metal of the 

 horses of the Carrousel, taken as 

 it is, yields copper, tin, lead, gold, 

 and silver. If the surface be filed, 

 so as to remove all the gilt part, 

 nothing is found but copper, tin, 

 and lead. If a piece perfectly 

 free from cracks be taken, and 

 thoroughly cleaned by the file, it 

 yields copper and tin alone : but 

 it is difficult to procure such 

 pieces, for the copper is full of 

 flaws, and the mixture of lead 

 and tin, with which the horses 

 were partly filled, has insinuated 

 itself into every crack. On ana- 

 lysing some select pieces, he found 

 copper 99-177, tin 0-823 : but as 

 sulphuric acid disturbed the trans- 

 parency of the solution, he sup- 

 posed a little lead was present, and 

 that part of the tin might come 

 from the alloy of tin and lead, 

 which had covered the inside of 

 the pieces he used. 



He could not procure a piece 

 well gilt, to examine in what way 

 the gold was applied ; but he ob- 

 serves, that the brittleness of the 

 metal seems to indicate that 

 quicksilver was employed. 



On the Forcing- Houses of the Ro- 

 mans. By Sir Joseph Banks, 

 Bart. K. B. P. R. S. 



[From the Transactions of the Horticul- 

 tural Society.] 



Mr. A. Knight was the first per- 

 son among us members of the 

 Horticultural Society, who ob- 

 served, in reading Martial, strong 

 traces of the Romans having en- 

 joyed the luxury of forcing-houses. 

 I shall cite the principal passages 

 upon which he has founded this 



observation, the truth of which is 

 not likely to be controverted, and 

 add such remarks as present them- 

 selves upon the Roman hot- 

 houses, with a few words on the 

 subject of our own. 



The first epigram is as follows : 



Pallida ne Cilicum timeant pomaria bru- 



mam, 



Mordeatet tenerum fortior aura nemus: 



Hibernis objecta notis specularia puros 



Admittunt soles, et sine faece diem, &c. 



Martial, lib. viii. 14. 



Qui Corcyrsei vidit pomaria regis, 



Rus, Entelle, tuae praeferat ille domus. 

 Invidapurpureosuratnebrumaracemos, 



Et gelidum Bacchi munera frigus edat; 

 Conditaperspicuavivitvindemiagemraa, 



Et tegitur felix, nee tamen uva latet. 

 Foemineum lucet sic per bombycina 

 corpus : 



Calculus in nitida sic numeratur aqua. 

 Quid non ingenio voluit natura licere ? 



Autumnumsterilisferrejubeturhiems 

 Martul, lib. viii. 68. 



The four last lines of the first 

 epigram are omitted, as having 

 no reference whatever to the sub- 

 ject. 



From these passages, and frora 

 that of Pliny, in which he tells 

 us that Tiberius, who was fond of 

 cucumbers, had them in his gar- 

 den throughout the year by means 

 of ( specularia ) stoves, where they 

 were grown in boxes, wheeled out 

 in fine weather, and replaced in 

 the nights or in cold weather, 

 Pliny, book xix. sect. 23, we may 

 safely infer that forcing-houses 

 were not unknown to the Romans, 

 though they do not appear to have 

 been carried into general use. 



Flues the Romans were well 

 acquainted with ; they did not use 

 open fires in their apartments as 

 we do, but, in the colder countries 

 at least, they always had flues un- 



