"In at the hall door all suddenly There came a knight upon a steed, And up he rideth to the high board."
Medallions, prior to the time of Hadrian, are rare and of great value, one of the most beautiful and most famous being a gold medallion of Augustus Cæsar. Of the Roman medallions, some were struck by order of the emperors—some by order of the senate. No portrait of a person not princely occurs on any ancient medal—a remarkable circumstance, considering the numerous contemporary poets, historians and philosophers.
Catherine de Medicis made a vow, that if some enterprises which she had undertaken terminated successfully, she would send a pilgrim on foot to Jerusalem, and that at every three steps he advanced he should go one step back. A citizen of Verberic offered to accomplish the queen's vow most scrupulously, and her majesty promised him an adequate recompense. She was well assured, by constant inquiries, that he fulfilled his engagement with exactness, and on his return he received a considerable sum of money and was ennobled.
In testimony, oaths have always been associated with something to be touched or kissed. In England people used to kiss their thumbs instead of the Bible, and so supposed that they had saved their consciences. A rustic, in one of Mr. Meredith's novels says, "I swore, but not upon oath," meaning that he had kissed his thumb, not the book. Arthur Orton, in the Bush, laid his hand on a copy of Sheridan's plays, "which, though not a Bible, bore a cross." So Zeus lays his hand on the earth, in Homer, when he swears by that planetary body. People had to touch relics when they swore in the Middle Ages, as in the famous oath of Harold. The Danes, when they invaded England, were ready to take any oath with impunity, save that of touching a certain sacred ring or armlet. Hamlet made his comrades lay their hands on the blade of his sword.
At the Thames public office, in London, some years ago, two Chinese sailors were examined on a charge of assaulting another Chinese sailor. The complainant was examined according to the custom of their country. A Chinese saucer being given to him, and another to the interpreter, they both advanced toward the window, directed their eyes to heaven, and repeated in their own tongue the following: "In the face of God I break this saucer; if it comes together again, Chinaman has told a lie, and expects not to live five days; if it remains asunder, Chinaman has told the truth, and escapes the vengeance of the Almighty." They then smashed the saucers in pieces on the floor, and returned to their places to be examined.