ETCHING ON GLASS—GLASS-CUTTING.

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lion of the wheel; tke silversmith using hard ahd well tem-pered steel, whilst there is room to believe the lapidary,perhaps, and glass-cutter, employed soft iron, with its poreswell filled with diamond powder.

Some have thought that drinking cups and vessels mayhave been formed from the glass metal whilst in a state offusion, by means of this wheel; to this they think thosewords of Martial refer, for in his 14th ep. 94, he says,calices audaces, having reference to the boldness of theartisan’s touch; those vessels he was constructing oftenbroke under the last touch he bestowed upon his transparentlabours, although perhaps of the most costly Value; theseaccidents must of necessity have rendered those articlesextremely expensive.

There are not wanting many who affirm the art of glass-cuttihg, with the instruments necessary for that operation,to be of modern invention. Those assign it to the ingenuityof Caspar Lehmann , originally an engraver on iron andsteel, and who, as Beckmann informs us, made an attempt,which succeeded, of cutting crystal, and afterwards glass,in the same manner. This artist, we are told, was in theservice of Rodolphus, the second Emperor of that name,who, in the year 1609, besides giving him valuable presents,conferred on him the title of lapidary and glass-cutter tohis court, and gave him a patent, allowing him the exclusiveprivilege of exercising this new art. He worked at Prague ,where he had an assistant named Zacharias Belzer; butGeorge Schwanhard, the elder, one of his pupils carriedon the same business to a much larger extent. The lastnamed was a son of Hans Schwanhard, a joiner at Rotlien-liurg, and was born in 1601; at the age of seventeen he wentPrague, to learn the art of cutting glass from Lehmann .His good behaviour won so much upon the affections of hismaster, that on his death, in the year 1622, being abachelor, he left him his heir; he also obtained from theEmperor Rodolphus a continuation of Lehmann ’s patent.Schwanhard removed to Nuremberg , where be wrought formany of the chief nobility and potentates of that district.This was, we understand, the occasion of that cityClaiming the honour of being the birth-place of this newHrt. In the year 1652, he worked at Prague , and also atRatisbon , by command of the Emperor Ferdinand III.and he died in 1676. He left two sons, who both followedthe lucrative occupation of their father; the elder, of thesame name with his father, died as early as 1676, but hisbrother, Henry, survived him several years. Afterwards,