CONSUMPTION OF THE
CHAP. v.
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the gold and silver would suffer, comparativelywith the present time, little or no loss by fric-tion in the use of it. Many of those appli-cations of gold and silver, which in the presentday contribute to its greatest waste, were ut-terly unknown to the ancients. Some of themhave only been introduced into practice invery modern times, and what had in somemeasure been known to the ancients had onlybecome so less than one hundred years beforethe reign of Augustus . The Romans were notquite ignorant of the art of gilding, though theyhad not brought it to the degree of perfection,nor carried it on to the extent, which it hasattained in modern times. We are informed byPliny that the first gilding was seen in Rome during the censorship of Lucius Mummius ,soon after the destruction of Carthage .
The art of spreading out gold over a largesurface, as practised in the time of Pliny , seemsto have been plating rather than gilding. Itis shown by that author \ that by the hammergold could be so extended, that an ounce of itwould make seven hundred and fifty leaves, eachof them four fingers in breadth and in length.When it is considered that our modern gold-beaters have so much farther availed themselvesof the malleability of that metal as to make each