Catullus (64.), speaking of the black sail which Ægeus furnished for the ships of his son Theseus, calls it "Carbasus Ibera," "an Iberian sail." As, on the one hand, he here uses the proper term for cotton, without intending to describe the sail as cotton, so on the other hand he calls the sail Iberian merely because Iberia was a country adjoining Colchis, and from Colchis (as will be shown in Part IV.) the Greeks and Romans obtained a great supply of flax and sail-cloth.
Tibullus, or Lygdamus, entreats (iii. 2. 17.), in the contemplation of his death and funeral, that after his bones have been washed, first with wine, and then with milk, they may be dried "carbaseis veils," with linen napkins. Although he uses the proper term for cotton, he probably did not intend to denote any preference for cotton rather than linen. His bones, after being wiped, were to be deposited in a marble urn.
Propertius seems to have aimed at a display of knowledge on these subjects (see Part First, chapter II.); and in the following passage (iv. 3.) he probably used Carbasa in its proper sense, as he is referring to Eastern habits:
Raptave odorata carbasa lina duci.
Muslins taken among the spoils from a scented general.
In the last Elegy of the same Book he refers to the story of the young Vestal virgin, who, when the flame was extinguished upon the altar committed to her care, and when the scourge appeared to await her for her neglect, threw upon the ashes a fillet of muslin from her head, and saved her life by its ignition, which was supposed to be effected by the favor of the goddess:
Vel cui, commissos cum Vesta reposceret ignes,
Exhibuit vivos carbasus alba focos.
The fire had died, and Vesta urged her claim,
When the white cotton show'd a living flame.
The story is related by Valerius Maximus (i. 7.). Although we are not informed of the date of the event, it appears from his language that the fillet was of fine muslin: "Cum carbasum, quam optimum habebat, foculo imposuisset, subito ignis emicuit." This description is well suited to the nature of cotton, than which nothing was more easily ignited.
The passage in Virgil's Georgics, which mentions cotton, has
