Chap. 27.] 
THE BOOKS OF NTTMA. 
191 
spots, too, may be detected by the eye ; but the streaks that 
run down the middle of the leaves where they have been 
pasted together, though they render the paper spongy and of 
a soaking nature, can hardly ever be detected before the ink 
runs, while the pen is forming the letters ; so many are the 
openings for fraud to be put in practice. The consequence is, 
that another labour has been added to the due preparation 
of paper. 
CHAP. 26. THE PASTE TTSED IN THE PREPAEATION OF PAPEE. 
The common paper paste is made of the finest flour of wheat 
mixed with boiling water, and some small drops of vinegar 
sprinkled in it : for the ordinary workman^s paste, or gum, 
if employed for this purpose, will render the paper brittle. 
Those, however, who take the greatest pains, boil the crumb 
of leavened bread, and then strain off the water: by the 
adoption of this method the paper has the fewest seams caused 
by the paste that lies between, and is softer than the nap of 
linen even. All kinds of paste that are used for this purpose, 
ought not to be older or newer than one day. The paper is 
then thinned out with a mallet, after which a new layer of 
paste is placed upon it ; then the creases which have formed 
are again pressed out, and it then undergoes the same process 
with the mallet as before. It is thus that we have memorials 
preserved in the ancient handwriting of Tiberius and Caius 
Gracchus, which I have seen in the possession of Pomponius 
Secundus,^^ the poet, a very illustrious citizen, almost two 
hundred years since those characters were penned. As for the 
handwriting of Cicero, Augustus, and Yirgil, we frequently 
see them at the present day. 
CHAP. 27. (13.)— THE BOOKS OF KTJMA. ' 
There are some facts of considerable importance which make 
against the opinion e:^pressed by M. Yarro, relative to the 
invention of paper. Cassius Hemina, a writer of very great 
antiquity, has stated in the Fourth Book of his Annals, that 
Gneius Terentius, the scribe, while engaged in digging on his 
~8 See B. vii. c. 18, and B, xiv. c. 6. Also the Life of . Pliny, in the 
Introduction to Yol. i. p. vii. 
