124 GRAND CAIRO. 
CHAP, in Mosaic were by the Greeks appropriated to 
. the pavement of their temples and dwellings. 
Many of the floors in the houses at Pompeii 
have this kind of covering. It was in a later 
age that the same sort of ornament was used 
for the facing of walls, and for coating the 
interior of domes and vaulted buildings'. In 
process of time, tables were thus constructed, 
which, being fixed in marble frames, might be 
moved without looseninsr the tessera. Cele- 
brated pictures in Mosaic, the work of Grecian 
artists, existed among the Romans^. This ad- 
mirable invention, capable of giving perpetuity 
to works in painting, has survived the downfall 
of letters ; but it has never been practised 
Present bcyoud the ^Ips: it still exists in Iia/y, where 
state of ths •■■i i • -i , -i n r j • 
Art. it has been carried to a degree oi perfection 
unknown in any former age. The finest works 
of Raphael, and of other great masters, have 
(1) " Pulsa deinde ex liumo paviraenta; in cameras transi^re, e 
vitro : novitiuin et hoe inventum." (Ibid.) " Ensuite elle a servi k 
revStir les vo6tes des b&timens." TVinkelmann, Hist, de I'Arl, uli 
supra, p. 158. 
(2) Witness the celebrated worli of Sosus ol Pergamus, mentioned 
hy Pliny, (lib.xxw'i. c. 25.) of The Dnve drinkinjj out of a Vase of 
Water, found in /Adrian's Villa at Ttvoli, and lately preserved in the 
Capitol at i2ome ; the celebrated works of jDwscor/We« of 5<wno5, found 
in Herculaneum ; and the famous Mosaic of Palesh'ina, See JVinkel- 
munn, lib.'iv. c. 8. sect.A~t. also lib. \\. c.7. sect. \E, Sfc. , 
