Page:The history of silk, cotton, linen, wool, and other fibrous substances 2.djvu/60



at an enormous price from nations, to which our commerce has not yet extended, in order that our matrons may display their persons to the public no less than to adulterers in their chamber!—Yates's Translation.

The Seres must be supposed to have dwelt somewhere in the centre of Asia. Perhaps those geographers who represent Little Bucharia as their country, are nearest the truth, and thus far neither Greeks nor Romans had penetrated. Silk was brought to them "from nations, to which even their commerce had not yet extended." Hence their inaccurate ideas respecting its origin.

SENECA, THE TRAGEDIAN.

Nec Mæonià distinguit acu, Quæ Phœbeis subditus Euris Legit Eois Ser arboribus.

''Herc. Œtæus'', 664.

Nor with Mæonian needle marks the web, Gather'd by Eastern Seres from the trees.

Seres, illustrious for their fleece.

Thyestes, 378.

Remove, ye maids, the vests, whose tissue glares With purple and with gold; far be the red Of Tyrian murex, and the shining thread, Which furthest Seres gather from the boughs.

Hyppolitus, 386. (Phædra loquitur.)

At a very early period the art of dyeing had been carried to a very great degree of perfection in Phœnicia. The method of dyeing woollen cloths purple was, it is said, first discovered at Tyre. This color, the most celebrated among the ancients, appears to have been brought to a degree of excellence, of which we can form but a very faint idea: