colossal lions. On the roadside near Miltenberg we passed one of those dilapidated crosses of unknown antiquity which bear the name of Rappenkreuz, or Raven-cross,—why, it is hard to say, unless it was believed that ravens brought them from heaven. We were conducted by the hospitable clergyman of Klein-Heubach to a spot in a pinewood on the side of a mountain towards the Odenwald, where lie in two heaps six huge columns of sandstone, some twenty feet long or more, with protuberances on the upper side, which may have been made with a view to transporting them. They are now quite covered with the fine moss of the wood. There are seven other such scattered about in different directions. The popular story is, that the giants meant to build a bridge over the Main with them, but that they were thwarted by divine interference. It is commonly supposed that they bear witness to the catastrophe which cut short the colonising energy of the Romans in these parts, and that they were intended for a temple or public building at Miltenberg. Many other Roman relics—some of glass—have been found scattered about, and at Great Heubach, in the wall of the church, is to be seen an alto-relievo representing warriors in action. On the other side of the Main, on the hill called Eulshöhe, is a stone called the Hainenschüssel. Whether this is of Celtic origin, having been used as an altar for human sacrifice, or an unfinished work of the Romans, has not been decided. There is a magnificent view from the hill opposite Klein-Heubach, called Engelsberg, from the little monastery at the top dedicated to St. Michael the Archangel. The picturesque beauties of the Main cease at Klingenberg, although Trennfurt, Wörth, and Obernburg are places of antiquarian interest. A slumbrous post-omnibus plies between Miltenberg and Aschaffenburg, on a road which is one straight line for about seven English miles, at the rate of five miles an hour. Such a conveyance is only welcome after a thoroughly fatiguing walk.
PAPER-MAKING IN ENGLAND.
Nearly eighteen centuries have rolled away since the art of making paper from fibrous matter, reduced to a pulp in water, was first discovered by the Chinese. The leaves of some trees, and the skins and intestines of animals, had previously been made fit for writing on; wherever the Egyptian papyrus was introduced, all these things fell into disuse, except parchment. But when the Saracens conquered Egypt, in the seventh century, papyrus could no longer be procured in Europe, and parchment became extremely dear. In China paper is mostly made from the inner bark of the bamboo, from cotton and linen rags, and from rice-straw. The Arabians, in the seventh century, either discovered or learned from the Chinese the art of making paper from cotton; this they carried to Spain, where they also made paper from linen and hemp. The oldest manuscript on cotton paper is one which Montfauçon saw in the French king’s library, bearing the date of 1050, but supposed to belong to the ninth century. In Spain, flax being grown, linen rags were substituted for cotton, because the latter was only to be obtained by importation.
Mr. Ottley, a sound authority, contends that paper was manufactured from mixed materials from a very early period; and that the notion of distinguishing the kinds by one sort being made of linen, the other of cotton, rags, is wrong; for one is as ancient as the other, and they were often intermixed (“Archæologia,” xxvi. 69, 70).
We have in the Tower of London a letter addressed to Henry III. (between 1210 and 1222) upon very strong paper, and certainly made, in Mr. Ottley’s judgment, of mixed materials; while in several of the time of Edward I., written upon genuine cotton paper, of no great thickness, the fibres of cotton present themselves everywhere at the backs of the letters so distinctly that they seem as if they might even now be spun into thread. The antiquity of linen paper is a much disputed question. The earliest distinct instance found by Mr. Hallam, and believed by him to have been hitherto overlooked, is an Arabic version of the aphorisms of Hippocrates, the manuscript bearing the date of 1100. It does not appear whether it were written in Spain or brought from Egypt or the East. Peter, abbot of Clugni, in a treatise against the Jews, speaks of books “ex rasuris veterum pannorum,” interpreted “of linen rags.” “And,” says Mr. Hallam, “as Peter passed a considerable time in Spain, about 1141, there can remain no rational doubt that the Saracens of the peninsula were acquainted with that species of paper, though perhaps it was as yet unknown in every other country” (“Literature of Europe,” vol. i. p. 58). Andrès asserts, on the authority of the members of the Academy of Barcelona, that a treaty between the Kings of Aragon and Castile, bearing the date of 1178, and written upon linen paper, is extant in the archives of that city. Andrès refers the invention to the Saracens of Spain, using the flax of Valencia and Murcia; and conjectures that it was brought into use among the Spaniards themselves by Alfonso X. of Castile.
Bagford speaks of a letter from the King of Spain to Edward I., which is on what he calls “a species of paper,” and is of an earlier date by twenty years than any paper that has fallen under the notice of the Rev. J. Hunter (“Archæologia,” xxxvii. p. 448). In this article from the great abundance of accounts written on paper coming into England from our Aquitanian possessions, and the small number of documents originating in England in the same early period, written on any other material than parchment or vellum, Mr. Hunter concludes that paper was a substance much more familiarly known in the South of France than in England; whence arises a strong probability that it is to our connection with our Aquitanian provinces, especially with Bordeaux itself, that we owe the first introduction of this most valuable substance into England. Indeed, paper having the same mark being found in documents prepared at nearly the same time at Bordeaux and in England, seems to show either that we received our paper from Bordeaux, or that Aquitaine and England were supplied from the same market.