GEMS OR DECORATIVE STONES. CUP OP THE PTOLEMIES. (p. 224.) THE NATURAL HISTORY GEMS DECORATIVE STONES. BY C. W. KING, M.A., FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE ; AUTHOR OF ' ANTIQUE GEMS,' ETC. HOSPITA SACRA FERENS, NULLI MEMORATA PRIORUM." Manil BELL & DALDY, , COVENT GARDEN. , BELL, & CO. 1867. ^-:ERA!j R PBINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STKKET, AND CHABING CBOSS. PEEFACE. IN the Preface to the 4 Natural History of Precious Stones, &c.,' I have fully stated the principles which have guided me in altering the arrangement of my subject from that observed in the First Edition, and in recasting my materials (largely augmented during the interval) into two separate and independent parts. But, for the information of those who may read the present volume alone, and might other- wise be surprised at its apparent incompleteness, it is necessary to mention beforehand that this, omitting the precious, treats exclusively of the commoner species of decorative minerals the term " Gems" being used for want of any more definite appellation, to designate such as have been claimed as its special dominion by the Glyptic Art of all ages in the world's history, while at the same time subserving, though in a less degree, the purposes of the jeweller. The previous Part, on the other hand, comprises the History of the rise and progress of Mineralogy, as far as regards this province of the science, from the earliest times down to the seventeenth century ; the Description of Precious Stones properly so denominated ; of the Precious Metals considered chiefly in their relation to art ; and of the more important remains exemplifying this relation anywhere preserved. In both divisions the same method of treating the subject has been pursued; but the very \ 58272 viii PREFACE. nature of the articles seemed of itself to suggest the pro- priety of classing them in two separate groups (especially when the increase of matter necessitated two volumes for their republication) instead of discussing them in mere alphabetical sequence as I had done at first. To avoid unnecessary repetition, reference is occasion- ally made in this volume to its companion on ' Precious Stones,' but to no great extent, it having been my object to render each division of my subject complete in itself. For the same reason, some observations properly belonging to the other Part, have been reintroduced in this, when absolutely required for the elucidation of the points under consideration. It would be most ungrateful for me to close my labours in this field of ancient and modern science without avail- ing myself of the occasion to acknowledge great obligation to Mr. Maskelyne, Professor of Mineralogy at Oxford, for the ready kindness with which he has constantly favoured this- pursuit of mine ; by giving his judgment upon the true character of antique materials that I have from time to time submitted to him in all cases of doubt ; by the free access he has allowed me, for the purpose of verifying specimens, to the rich store of mineral treasures so ad- mirably displayed in the department of the British Museum over which he presides ; and lastly, for numerous valuable suggestions that have guided me in many difficult questions to sound and satisfactory conclusions. During the time these sheets were passing through the press I fortunately obtained permission, for which I have to return most sincere thanks to Mr. Newton, to minutely examine, with exemption from all embarrassing restrictions, PREFACE. 1* tlie Blacas Gems recently added to the department of our National Collection under his care. The long-established celebrity, and the importance of this Cabinet, the public interest which it has so strongly, and to an unlocked for degree, excited since its happy acquisition by ourselves, and what is more to the present purpose, the skilful and judicious measures which have been taken to render these treasures really " publici juris," and to give all interested in ancient Glyptics the power of studying them with facility and pleasure, are considerations which have in- duced me to quote from it in illustration of my remarks as largely as the advanced stage of the printing would allow. So rich is the collection in examples of the finest quality of the productions on which I treat, that infinitely more information of the highest value might have been derived from its contents had they been accessible to me at an earlier period of my undertaking. C. W. KING. Trinity College, April 29^, 1867. (G.) CONTENTS. FAGS ACHATES: AGATE P , 1 AETITES: EAGLE-STONE 11 - ALABANDICUS : GARNET ... ALABASTRITES : ALABASTER 22 AMETHYSTUS: AMETHYST. r 27 ASTERIA: GlRASOL-SAPPHIRE .. 37 BASANITES: BASALT 40 BATRACHITES: TOAD-STONE 43 BERYLLUS: BERYL- 50 CALLAIS, CALLAINA: TURQUOIS " 57 CAMAHUTUM: CAMEO 70 CERAimiA: EUBY^; BELEMNITE 77 CHALCEDONIUS : CALCEDONY 82 CHRYSOCOLLA 88 CHRYSOPRASIUS : CHRYSOPRASE 90 OHRYSOLITHUS : ORIENTAL TOPAZ 93 CORALLIUM: CORAL .. .. 100 CRYSTALLUS: EOCK-CRYSTAL 104 CYANUS: LAZULITE 123 EUMITHRES: AMAZON-STONE; MITHRAX ; LABRADOR .. .. 127 GAGATES: JET 130 HELIOTROPIUM : BLOODSTONE , 133 xii CONTENTS. FAGB JASPIS: CALCEDONY OF VARIOUS COLOURS 137 LAPIS LYDIUS: TOUCHSTONE 152 LYNCURIUM: JACINTH; ESSONITE 160 MAGNES: LOADSTONE 169 MOLOCHITES: GREEN JASPER : MALACHITE 176 MURRHINA: AGATE-VASES 179 NAXIUM: EMERY 192 LAPIS NEPHRITICUS: JADE 203 OBSIDIANUM: OBSIDIAN 209 ONYX 213 OPALUS: OPAL 239 OSTRACIAS: PYRITES 248 OVUM ANGUINUM: ADDER-BEAD 251 PANTARBES: RUBY 259 PORPHYRITES: PORPHYRY 261 PRASIUS: PLASMA 265 SANDASTER: MATRIX OF OPAL 269 SAPPHIRUS: LAPIS-LAZUL: 273 SARDIUS: ORIENTAL CARNELIAN 278 SARDONYX 287 SOLIS GEMMA: MOON-STONE 300 SUCCINUM: AMBER 303 TOPAZIUS: PERIDOT 312 ZMILAMPIS: CAT'S-EYE 319 VITRUM ANNULARE: PASTES 323 DESCRIPTION OF THE WOODCUTS 365 INDEX . 371 OF THE | UNIVERSITY OF NATURAL HISTORY OF ANCIENT AND MODERN GEMS. ACHATES : 'A^a-n^ : Agate and Jasper. THEOPHRASTUS in his notice of the gems used for signets (31) has : " A handsome stone, too, is the Achates, brought from the river of that name (the Drillo) in Sicily, and is sold at a high price." But Pliny observes (xxxvii. 54) : " The Achates was anciently in high estimation; now in none at all. Found, at first, in Sicily on the banks of a river so called, but afterwards in a great number of other places, exceeding in size, and fruitful in varieties." Sicily, as Castellani informs me, continues to supply the Neapolitan lapidaries with abundance of Agates and Jas- pers of every kind. Assyria, likewise, furnished the Greeks with Agates in the times of Dionysius Periegetes, from the bed of the Choaspes, washed down from the mountains by the winter-rains. Of the Malwa mines, the most productive of all. a detailed account will be given in its appropriate place under ONYX. But as regards curiosity, the most astonishing workshop of Dame Nature for the production of these stones, in endless and fantastic variety, is to be seen in the desert valley, some seven miles distant from Cairo, popularly believed the original bed oi the Nile. Besides these gems that lie about in the shape (<0 E 2 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. of water- worn pebbles, including the remarkable " Egyptian Pebble" (to be noticed hereafter), whole trunks of trees are to be observed retaining their natural characters, but completely metamorphosed into semi -Opal and Agate. The stone intended by Theophrastus had evidently, from the terms in which he mentions it, no more than one sort ; but, as he gives no definition of it, its character remains a matter of conjecture : certain it is that the modern " Agate" never presents itself amongst the Glyptic remains of his times. One thing, however, can be asserted positively, that it was not the stone now known as the " Tri-colour Agate," because formed of bands of light-brown, transparent- white, and opaque-black; each band sharply defined in strong contrast to its neighbour ; that being his OVV^LOV (ONYX). On such a stone, next to the Sard, occur all the best engravings of the early Greek and Etruscan schools ; but hardly ever any works in the peculiar style of Imperial Koine. " Agate," in the modern nomenclature, signifies an im- pure kind of Calcedony, presenting the most brilliant and varied colours, arranged in opaque wavy lines around a crystallised centre, and upon a translucent ground ; thus being distinguished from Jasper, which, though much of the same nature, is always opaque, and contains a larger proportion of iron. No better definition can be found for it than that given by De Boot (ii. 95) : " Next in appear- ance and in colour to the Onyx is the Agate. The Onyx is adorned with zones of colour; the Agate is not. For, instead of zones, it is ornamented by Nature in a wonderful manner with lines or spots of various colours, which exhibit images of different objects ; some, for instance, represent, far from obscurely, trees, animals, fruits, flowers, clouds, &c." But the Achates of the Eomans was a much more comprehensive term than that of the Greeks, or even of ACHATES. 3 modern mineralogists. Besides the species still retaining the name, it embraced all the inferior quartz -gems, the clouded Carnelians, and the like, as well as those now called Jaspers : fur the ancient name " Jaspis" was properly re- stricted to the green translucent species of Calcedony, the Plasma, and the Heliotrope (JASPIS). How wide the sig- nification of the term "Achates" had become in ancient times appears from Orpheus (604), who sings its praises as "the multiform, excellent Achates, invested with every colour; for numerous to be seen are the dyes of the Achates. In it thou wilt find, on looking, the glass-like Jaspis, the blood-red Sard, and the sparkling Emerald. Amongst them is found one of a vermilion aspect, moreover a copper-colour, and the hue of the summer apple ; but chiefest of all that, canst thou obtain it, picturing the tawny hide of the fierce lion dappled all over with spots ; red, white, dusky, and green," this last sort evidently the Brocatella. These varieties are all distinguished in Pliny by compound names expressing the different shades or conformation of the subject-matter. Thus his Jasp- achates would be an Agate with a green ground ; his Cerachates, one yellow and opaque ; his Sardachates, one mixed with translucent red; his Haemachates, our rare Red Agate, of the deepest blood-colour, traversed by translucent veins of a lighter sanguine ; the Dendrachates, ** decorated with little trees," our Moss- Agate.* The Corallachates, " besprinkled with gold-dust like Lapis- lazuli, and entitled sacred" is unmistakably our Aven- turine-quartz, of a translucent reddish-brown, filled with * Sometimes called " Mocha-stone," and consequently believed tc come from Arabia. But in reality " mocha " is merely the Saxon patois for " moss ;'' the stone having the same name in both languages. The filaments giving the appellation are not petrified vegetation as they appear, but particles of clay suspended in the pure silicions matter of the Agate whilst yet in a liquid state. B 2 4: NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. gold-like particles of Mica (SANDASTER). This, says Pliny, was found abundantly in Crete : at present the finest speci- mens are brought from Cape de Gatte, in Spain. That amongst these varieties our Red Jasper was included may be suspected from the singular pretence of the Magi "that the single * coloured sort rendered athletes invincible : the test being that, if boiled in a pot of oil along with other pigments, it should within two hours reduce the whole liquid to its own vermilion dye." That Pliny's Leucachates and Cerachates were whitish and yellowish Calcedonies, seems borne out by his remark, "jam e cerea staticula, et equorum ornamenta." The staticula, properly "steelyard-weights," were possibly those heads in Calce- dony, still very abundant, the perforations through which show the intention of attaching them to the dress, perhaps as weights to the ends of robes, in order to make them set well, like the metal po'io-Kol terminating the Grecian chlamys. And the mention of " horse-ornaments " explains the existence of the larger specimens rudely worked into Isis or Gorgon-heads, and traversed by large diagonal holes evidently intended for a stout cord. Now a Pompeian bas- relief of a negro in a biga, led by a warrior, displays very conspicuously on the breast of each horse a grand Medusa's head in front-face, similarly suspended. This sculpture illustrates Pliny's words ; and both, taken together, throw light, equally, upon the original purpose of these singular Glyptic remains. The Agates from India were greatly admired as lusus naturae, " because they represented rivers, groves of trees, f * " Unius coloris," probably a corruption of " sanguinis ;" which .seems implied in the vermilion tinge it produced. t The Agates of (Eta, Parnassus, &c., were " similes limitum floribus," a description out of which no sense can be extracted. " Limitum " must be a corruption of " illilse," which would give us " painted with flowers," n definition consistent with nature and with Pliny's style. ACHATES. 5 cattle, and even more defined objects, such as chariots, pilasters, and the ornaments worn by horses." All these figures were suggested to the imagination by the capricious arrangement of the veins in many Agates, notably in the " Egyptian Pebble," which latter, indeed, often presents images so accurately defined that it is difficult to believe them the mere unaided freaks of Nature. In the Case of Jaspers, in the British Museum, may be seen the exact portrait of Chaucer in such a pebble ; the Strawberry Hill Collection possessed another of Voltaire ; De Boot had one no larger than the nail of the middle finger, marked with a perfect circle of a brown colour, within which was the veritable figure of a bishop with his mitre on. On turning the stone a little, a different image became visible ; and again turning it, two more, of a man and a woman, &c. Numerous other examples equally illusive will occur to the recollection of every mineralogist. Epiphanius, though so much later than the Eoman naturalist, appears to have derived his notice of the Achates from some much earlier Greek source belonging to the times when the name was confined to one particular species. "Eighth Stone (in the Kationale) the Achates. This has been supposed to be that called Perileucos, already described under * Hyacinthus.' This is an admirable gem, somewhat black (or blue) in colour, having externally a white zone, like marble or ivory, running round it. This, too, is found in Scythia. And amongst these there is an Achates having the colour of a lion's skin, which, powdered and mixed with water, smeared upon the bite of any rep- tile, counteracts the poison of the scorpion, the viper, and such like things." Isidorus also (Orig. xvi. 11) makes but one species of the Achates : " It is a black stone, having in the middle circles of white and black joined together and variegated ; and likewise resembling the Haematites." And 6 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. again it is more clearly defined by Marbodus as " a black stone girt by a zone of white ;" which expresses, as it would seem, the first part of Epiphanius' article.* One would conclude from Theophrastus' mentioning it in the next following paragraph, that he regarded as a novel variety of the Achates the stone found in the gold-mines at Lampsacus, which, on account of its beauty, was cut into a signet and sent for a present to the king (Alexander) at Tyre. The Macedonian hero was, as appears from his exclusive patronage of Pyrgoteles, a connoisseur in en- graved gems, like Julius and Hadrian after him. In the Roman times, after the stone had completely gone out of fashion for signets, it was in higher repute than ever, on the score of its medicinal and talismanic virtues. The fanciful patterns so often drawn upon its surface by the finger of Nature had suggested to the superstitious Magi, the authors of all such notions, the idea of some wondrous occult virtue residing in the substance thus conspicuously signalled out by the Creator. Hence Orpheus sings (230) how, " if thou wear a piece of the Tree- Agate upon thy hand, the immortal Gods shall be well pleased with thee. If the same be tied to the horns of thine oxen when ploughing, or about the ploughman's sturdy arm, wheat- crowned Ceres shall descend from heaven with full lap upon thy furrows." And again (604) how " every kind is an antidote to the asp's bite, if taken in wine ; but the more potent Leontoseres, if merely tied over the wound, cures the scorpion's sting ; enables the wearer also to gain * This must have been also the nature of the sole ring-stone no- ticed by Pliny as the production of Italy, the Veientana, so called because found at Veii, " in which a white boundary divided a black ground." Similar Agates very likely are yet to be 'picked up in the pebbly bed of the brook Trebia, that yet murmurs around the preci- pitous sides of the plateau which formerly supported the ancient rival of Koine. ACHATES. 1 the love of women ; obtain his petitions from princes ; and heal the sick man whose thread has not actually been severed by Clotho." And Pliny jocosely adduces the Magi as teaching " that in Persia, by burning the lion's hide sort storms could be averted, and thunderbolts to boot;" the proof of its efficacy being that, if thrown into a caldron of boiling water, it immediately cooled the same, but in order to do good, the gem ought to be strung on the hair of a lion's mane. On the contrary the kind coloured like the hyaena's skin they viewed with detestation as the exciter of domestic strife. The Corallachates was an anti- dote against spider and scorpion stings, a virtue for which Pliny was quite ready to give full credit to the Sicilian species, because the air of that island was fatal instanta- neously to those insects. The Tree-Agate was good for the sight, and was used by physicians for palettes whereupon to grind down their medicines. To these virtues the mediaeval sages added others more transcendental. The Agate besides bestowing health upon the wearer, gained him the favour of heaven, and of man- kind. Marbodus, interpreting Virgil's " fidus Achates " literally, ascribes the escape of ^Eneas from all his perils to the potency of this talisman which he always carried about with him. Others again, with more learning and equal want of sense, derived the name from a^os, " because the gem protected the wearer against all pain and trouble." Immeasurably the first amongst the "nature-pictures," instanced above, would stand the celebrated Agate of King Pyrrhus, if the description of it given by Pliny (xxxvii. 3), from tradition (" dicitur") were indeed to be received as true. It displayed Apollo holding his lyre, attended by the Muses Nine, each with her proper attribute ! all exactly depicted by the native shades and veins of the substance, and without the slightest assistance from art. A suspicion NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. irresistibly obtrudes itself that such a group, though actu- ally existing in the royal ring, was nothing more than a cameo-engraving, but passed off by the jocose Greek, sporting with their simplicity, upon the Eoman envoys, utter novices then in art, as an unparalleled miracle of Nature. To give a few examples of similar deceptions in later times. The Shrine of St. Elizabeth (Marburgh), made in 1250, had for its chief glory, amongst the innumerable precious stones embellishing its surface, a large Cameo set above the statuette of the Virgin. It was a fine Sardonyx of three layers, representing the heads of Castor and Pollux, and was through the whole extent of the Middle Ages re- garded as an inestimable production of Nature, and for which a former Elector of Mayence once offered in ex- change, but without success, the whole village of Anemo- neburgh. Even Camillo, the contemporary of Lorenzo del Medici, is still so far under the influence of Gothic notions as to admit the possibility of the existence of similar lusus Naturae. " In the second manner, stones seem as if en- graved by the hand of Nature, when a portion of one stone adheres to the surface of another stone : or again, when some parts out of the same stone are deficient, through which addition or diminution a certain figure is produced, as is done by art in the case of Camel (in chamainis). And so, after this manner, it is possible for there to be stones engraved by Nature as well as engraved by Art " (III. p. 174.) Again, that Camei were popularly regarded in Gothic times as the work of sportive Nature is almost demonstrable from the way in which Agricola notices one then shown in the Church of the Three Kings, Cologne. He terms it an Onyx, more than a palra wide, in which the white veins mark out the heads of two youths, with a serpent in black, running from the one forehead to the ACHATES. 9 other ; also another Onyx with a negro's head, bearded, in black. To return to the Agate of Pyrrhus, it is a singular coin- cidence that, when Camei first came into fashion in this country for ornaments, they went by the name of Agate- stones. Shakespere, for example, puts into Hero's inouth the simile " If low, an Agate very vilely cut." Not to mention his hackneyed description of Queen Mab " In shape no bigger than an Agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman." In the latter passage the comparison as to shape, where one of size would be the more natural sequence, must neces- sarily refer to the shape cut upon the Agate, the tiny Cameo Nymph or Bacchante, those favourite subjects with tho artists of the day. Amongst Queen Elizabeth's jewels is entered : " An Agath of her Majesty's visnomy." Similarly Vanderdoort calls his catalogue of Charles I.'s Collection, " an inventory of the pictures, coins, and Agates, &c." Nevertheless, it will be owned by all mineralogists who have attended to this particular, that Nature has really sometimes drawn such artistic pictures upon the Agate as to predispose us not altogether to reject as a mere fable the account of that marvellous ring of the Epirote prince. In fact, an Agate was lately presented to myself, which contains within a natural circular frame a charming little sea-view, taken by moonlight. In the foreground lie craggy rocks, then comes the sea, receding gently in parallel lines with the due gradations of shade ; in the far distance rises a rocky island supporting a pharos; the crescent -moon riding high in the heavens illumines the scene, aided by a twinkling star or two. The whole, painted in different 10 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. shades of brown and white, is full of a dreamy repose, and of a feeling strongly recalling Bewick's inimitable little cuts in the same line. Camillo also mentions that the doorway of the " study " in Cesare Borgia's palace at Pesaro was adorned with plaques sawn from a column (antique) of a certain variegated stone, which exhibited so many dif- ferent objects, that no one could believe it who had not seen the same. The Chinese manufacture monster Agates exhibiting the loveliest colours very fancifully disposed, by staining thin slabs of alabaster by some process of their own : and these fictitious lusus Naturae are often to be seen in this country- treasured up as wonderful curiosities of mineralogy. But far more wonderful was the invention of the Florentine anatomist (the secret died with him) of petrifying human viscera into real Agates. In the Hospital of S. Spirito may be inspected still by the incredulous a table-top made up of hearts, lungs, livers, &c., thus agatised into one large slab meet board for a banquet of vampyres. How firm was the belief of our forefathers in the pro- phylactic virtues of the Agate, is remarkably illustrated by a jewel presented by Archbishop Parker to Queen Elizabeth (now in the possession of Mrs. Barwick Baker). It is a large oval Agate engraved by a contemporary hand with an intaglio of Vulcan in his forge, with Venus look- ing on, and is set for a pendant. The parchment accom- panying the gift contains a long list of the properties of the stone, winding up with the dedicatory couplet, which evidently was considered by the learned donor to contain the happiest of conceits : " Kegni &xos Elizabetha gerit ; Matthspus achatem Cantuar ei donat fidus dum vivit Achates." AETITES. 11 AETITES: Eagle-Stme. THE lively fancy of the Greeks discovered in the forms of many natural objects resemblances to other organic forms, and, by a step not very logical, ascribed to them inherent virtues analogous to this interpretation. Of this system the Aetites is perhaps the most illustrative example, and the one also that the longest maintained its ancient reputa- tion. Pliny describes four species of it (xxxvi. 21). The first was egg-shaped, white, and filled with a soft sweet- tasted clay : this was the female. The second, reddish- coloured externally, contained a stony substance, and passed for the male. The third was filled with a sweetish sand. The fourth, the Laeonian, had inside it a crystalline core, called the Callimus. The best kind were asserted to be found only in the nests of eagles which could not breed without their aid ; hence their name. They, for this reason, were of the greatest benefit to women in labour ; a notion which even Dioscorides appears to endorse. The substance itself, as the specimens figured by De Boot plainly show, was one of those calcareous hollow concre- tions, sometimes white, sometimes tinged with iron, well known to geologists, and which appear to be accidental for- mations, not petrifactions of older organised bodies. The Aetites must not, however, be confounded with another stone named in a fragment of Theophrastus rj Ai#os TWV TiKTOTxrwi/, " the gem of parturient women ;" to which he also alludes (in section 5) by, " The most wonderful and 12 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. most important property is that of the stones that bring forth others."* This was the Pwonites, described by Pliny under that name, as reported to conceive at a certain time and bring forth another ; on that account very serviceable to women in labour ; found in Macedonia, and in appearance like water frozen. It was therefore a gem, as the feminine gender in the Greek denotes, not a mere rough stone, like the Aetites. Marbodus says of it " The mountains of the Macedonian bold Within their mines the Pseonites hold ; Unknown the cause, with imitative throes It heaves and all the pangs of childbirth knows. Hence pregnant women its protection bless In that last hour when travail's throes oppress." This faculty of propagating its own species was after- wards attributed by mediaeval belief to the most precious of all, doubtless as being the most worthy of such a pri- vilege. " Euseus relates that a lady of Heveren, belonging to a noble Luxemburgh family, possessed two diamonds, heirlooms, which frequently brought forth others, so that whoever inspected them at certain fixed intervals could clearly discern them giving birth unto an offspring of the same nature as their own." Of the Aetites another most singular property is alluded to by Dioscorides, that of detecting theft. His meaning is explained by the traditional practice of the Greek monks, described by De Boot from his own experience. " All the persons suspected of the theft being called together, the monk kneads up in their presence flour and water, sprinkled with the powder of this stone, repeating at the same time * A statement that the sceptic Pliny would not accept for proved, though endorsed by the authority of his all-powerful patron Mucianus ' ter Consul.' " Idem Theophrastus et Mucianus esse aliquos lapides qui pariunt credunt." AETITES. 13 a certain incantation, and, moulding the paste into balls as big as eggs, gives three to each, with a little drink. The guilty party either finds it impossible to swallow one mouthful, or is ready to choke in the attempt." By an odd coincidence the Hindoos still employ a similar ordeal, but substitute dry rice for the paste. No doubt, where all are believers, the mere effect of the guilty conscience on the nerves will suffice to hinder the culprit from getting down the enchanted morsel ; but De Boot affects a pious horror at the whole proceeding, and ascribes its efficacy to dia- bolical agency. He attributes all its medicinal virtues to its natural attrac- tive power; to which was due its effect as an antidote against poison, which it through this property extracted from the system. On this, too, depended its more special use ; for, if tied round the female's arm, it kept up the foetus until ma- turity, but, if transferred to her thigh, it attracted it down- wards, and thus ensured a speedy delivery. Such was its established reputation for this object, that, at the time he wrote, ladies used to pay from ten to twenty thalers for a genuine Eagle-stone. 14 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. ALABANDICUS : Almandine: Precious Garnet. " GARNET " Lessing conjectures to be an Italian corruption of " Garamanticus," an inferior kind of the Carbunculus according to Pliny's classification ; but a much less far- fetched derivation presents itself, viz., that the common gem has borrowed its present name (Anglicised from Grenat; Granato) from the Granaticus specified by Mar- bodus as early as the llth century. This was the Eed Hyacinthus of the Romans, so called from the resemblance of its colour to the crimson juice of the pomegranate. For stones of the same colour were promiscuously classed under one head by the ignorance of the Middle Ages (unacquainted with even the ancient test of comparative hardness), whence has arisen that strange interchange of names between ancient and modern precious stones so perplexing to ever} T mineralogist. But in the present instance the confusion is the more excusable, seeing that every variety of the Eed Hyacinthus (Euby) has an exact counterpart in colour amongst the various kinds of Garnets, and in many cases they can only be distinguished from each other through hardness, specific gravity, original crystallisation, and other properties not obvious to the eye, till lately the sole cri- terion. The Father of Mineralogy, Theophrastus, evidently is describing several very different stones under the head of "h.v6pa. (18) ; for although his first kind, "brought from Carthage and Massilia, blood-red, but like a live coal when held against the sun, and of extreme value, eo that a very ALABANDICUS. 15 small one sold for 40 gold staters (40 guineas)," seems to have been the true Ruby, yet that found near Miletus in "polygonal pieces" must have been our Garnet, the primary form of which is the rhombic dodecahedron. Similarly those named by him as found in various parts of Greece, and as being of little value (33), and which he distinguishes from the precious *AvOpa by giving them the lowering name 'A.v6pa.Kiov, must have been the Common Garnet. These were, that found at Orchomenus, darker than the Chian sort, and out of which mirrors were made ; the Trcezenian, red clouded with white ; and the Corinthian, still fainter in colour. The plane surface of a dark Garnet will reflect objects with considerable distinctness ; the " mirrors " here mentioned were, it is not impossible, " table " Garnets of this kind :* (the only gems employed in the Merovingian jewels of the 7th and 8th centuries are in fact Garnet tables neatly inlaid, so as to form patterns in the fibulae of copper gilt) : Theophrastus thereupon remarks that all the kinds found in Greece were common enough and of trifling value, but that the better sort were rare, and brought only from few places Carthage, Massilia, Egypt, and Syene. Pliny divides his Carbunculi into male and female, the former of a brilliant, the latter of a duller lustre. In the males of the Carthaginian kind, as it were a blazing star shone within them, whereas the females diffused their entire lustre externally. These Carthaginian stones were smaller than those coming from India. It may be deduced from these characters that the male Carbunculi were our Rubies, the females our Garnets. * This is almost made out from Pliny's description of the Hsephas- titis (which Marbodus adds was found in the Corinthian Isthmus), as " although of a fiery-red colour, possessing the nature of a mirror in reflecting the images of objects. . 16 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. The precious varieties, according to Pliny, were the Indian, the Garamantic or Carthaginian, the Ethiopic, and the Alabandine. The last were so called because, though found in the Orthorian rocks, they were worked up (per- ficiuntur) at Alabanda. This was the sort called by Theo- phrastus the Milesian, both places being in the same province, Caria. The Almandines of the moderns are the finest species of Garnet, of a beautiful crimson tinged with violet, and are brought from Siriam in Pegu, hence they are vulgularly called Syrian Garnets. These were the Amethystizontes of Pliny, then, as now, considered the best of the whole species, though it is probable he, or at least his Greek authorities, included the Balais under the same designation. He notices how some amongst the males pos- sessed a more liquid, others a darker fire ; how some were lighted up with a colour not their own, and shone more than others in the sunlight. The description he quotes from Archelaus of the Carthaginian sort exactly applies to our best Indian Garnet, " that it was of a darkish aspect, but kindled up more brightly than the others when held and turned about in the light of the fire or sun. In the shade within doors the colour was purple ; in the open air flamy ; the wax sealed with such a gem would melt even though in the cool." These descriptions of the several varieties of the ancient Carbunculus will be rendered more intelligible by a brief account of the various Garnets known to the modern lapi- dary. First in value comes a rarer sort, the Almandine, already described. It is a splendid stone, of great lustre, and, when of the first quality, can with difficulty be dis- tinguished from the purple Spinel, which indeed usually passes under the same name in its antique specimens. Fine Roman intagli frequently, and sometimes imperial ALABANDICUS. 17 portraits, occur in this admirable material.* Closely ap- proximating to the Jacinth in colour, a pure, pale orange, and therefore usually confounded with it, is the Essonite, or Cinnamon-stone, although in its composition a true Garnet. It comes to our jewellers exclusively from Ceylon, but the Vesuvian-garnet, found in small crystals in the cavities of the lava flowing from that mountain, is exactly identical with it, both in appearance and constitution. The Common Garnet is precisely of the colour of Burgundy wine, more or less diluted, according to its goodness. The Pyrope differs slightly from this chemically (magnesia replacing in it the peroxide of iron), but not in appearance, except in being clearer and brighter. The Carbuncle is somewhat darker than the last, and is, in fact, the common Garnet cut " en cabochon," or " tallow-drop," to use the genuine old English term, that is, into a very convex form on the upper surface, whilst the base is hollowed out more or less to give trans- lucency to the stones ; for in their native state they are so dark in tint as to be nearly black until held against the light, when the red becomes visible. Many antique Car- buncles are found with the back hollowed out, precisely in the modern manner; but, if the quality of the stone allowed it, the ancients preferred cutting the under side of the gem to a plane surface, instead of increasing the risk of fracture to so brittle a material by diminishing its substance. The Vermilion Garnet, or Vermeille, so called from its unmixed red tint, is only a jeweller's name for the Pyrope, the Bo- hemian Garnet. Garnets seem to have been little employed by the Greeks for engraving upon, but were largely in favour with the Eomans of the Empire, though not at a very early date, as may be concluded from the frequent occurrence of splendid * A still rarer shade of the Almandine, but also known to the an- cients, is of a pale rose-colour, much resembling the Balais, now exactly imitated by the burnt Brazilian Topaz. (G) c 18 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. specimens completely disfigured by the wretched abortions in the way of intagli cut upon them, evidently the produc- tions of the very decrepitude of the art. Nevertheless, many tolerable, and a few excellent intagli do occur on Garnet, but for the most part on the Almandine, a testimony to the superior estimation in which that variety has ever been held. That very intaglio to which, as Kohler justly observes, neither ancient nor modern art has ever produced an equal as regards the skill and industry displayed in its execution, the " Head of the Dog Sinus " (Marlborough), is engraved in a perfect Indian Garnet of unusual size and beauty. The impression from this intaglio presents the head in full relief, with open jaws, the interior of the mouth represented with miraculous fidelity; and its value still further enhanced by the legend on the collar, PAIO2 EHOIEI. The antiquity of this work has been disputed, without much cause : certain it is that the artist Natter, to whom it has been assigned, was far from capable of pro- ducing such a masterpiece. A smaller replica of the same head on an Almandine is in my possession; the hot and fiery nature of the stone was doubtless regarded as analogous to the subject upon it, the blazing Dog-Star. Another famous Almandine is that of the same cabinet, engraved in the highest style of Roman art with the heads of Socrates and Plato ; a gem which above all other antique remains has served to identify the portrait of the latter philosopher. A few fine heads besides in this stone might be quoted, but such are of excessive rarity, and belong all to Imperial times. The Sassanian kings, however, frequently appear upon this gem ; in fact, it would seem to be have been regarded by the later Persians as a royal stone, from the preference they have given it for the bearer of the sovereign's image and superscription. ALABAND1CUS. 19 Callistratus states that some of the Indian Carbunculi attained such extraordinary dimensions as to admit of being formed into cups holding a sextarius, or nearly a pint. Such stones, according to Satyrus, were never clear, but generally foul within, and of a harsh, disagreeable tint. Such a description applies to our commoner Carbuncle, which does indeed attain a very great bulk, though the fact mentioned by Callistratus is tinged by the usual ex- aggeration of the Grecian traveller in the far East. Yet I have seen an antique cup, hollowed out of a solid Garnet, as large as a half goose-egg, and which was engraved internally with the name of its ancient owner, Codrus;* and a heart-shaped tablet (Hertz Collection), covered with a long Gnostic formula on both sides, an Alexandrian work of the 3rd century, is 2 x li inches in extent, showing the immense magnitude of the crystal from which it has been sawn. In these two works the material was of bad quality, confirming Pliny's quotation from Archelaus (30), that " those found near Thebes were brittle, full of veins, and like burning coals nearly ex- piring." f These garnet bowls, or at least paste imitations of them, are certainly what Martial means by his " Amethy- stinos trientes " (x. 49) ; now, as the triens, according to its name, held four ounces of liquid, such bowls would have no more than equalled a small tea-cup in capacity. On the * The inventory of the French Crown Jewels, drawn up in 1791, mentions, " An oval cup of a single Garnet, rich in colour, 3 X 2| inches wide, and 3 high, valued at 12,000 francs ; and a round cup oi Oriental Garnet, full of flaws, 3 inches wide by 1| deep; a third is " vermeille d'Allemagne," 2i deep, at 6000 francs ; besides six others of less size. f To give a notion of the magnitude attained by this species it will suffice to adduce two specimens from the cabinet of the Marquis de Dree ; one, a Siriani Garnet of the finest quality, octagonal in shape, was 7i X 6| inches in measurement, and sold for 3550 francs. The other of a flame-colour, 10? x 6], for 1003 francs (1221. and 40Z.)- C 2 20 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. other hand, specimens of all kinds show that the usual scyphus in silver, or earthenware, or glass, was quadruple that size. Pliny concludes his long dissertation (of six chapters) upon the Carbunculus with the observation that all the varieties of this species obstinately resist the engraver, and the wax adheres to them in sealing. This is quite correct as regards the soft sealing material used by the ancients, a composition like our modelling- wax, made of bee's-wax, rendered plastic by the addition of a few drops of turpen- tine to the melted mass, and a little vermilion to colour it. Although the great artists of the Eenaissance have left us a few magnificent works in Carbuncle, both in relief and intaglio, yet modern artists have seldom employed it, except for the small cameo portraits intended to pass, when foiled, for done in Euby. The stone is extremely hard to engrave, and, besides this, very brittle, difficulties that they cannot overcome ; a thing which bears so much the stronger testimony to the skill of the ancient masters, who have left such highly finished works in so refractory a material. Our Garnets and Carbuncles, aluminous silicates coloured by iron oxide, are now supplied in large quantities from the mines of Zoblitz in Silesia, from the Tyrol, and from Hungary. These are all inferior, both in beauty and hardness, to those from Siam, which continues to send us Garnets of the richest red, tinged with yellow, besides its peculiar purple-tinted Ahnandines. The latter also come in abundance from Ceylon ; which gives them their popular name of Ceylon-rubies, by means of which our jewellers obtain a better price for them from the ignorant. In spite of this abundance, even now a stone of a certain size, of a fine rich tint, and free from flaws, is of con- siderable value, ranging from 81 to 10Z. One of five ALABANDICUS. 21 carats is put down at 1200 francs in the inventory above quoted. But its estimation has greatly fallen since the days of Mary Queen of Scots, the pendent carbuncle to her necklace worn at her marriage with the Dauphin being worth 500 crowns an enormous sum in that age. To the same effect De Boot, about the year 1600, states (II. 36) that small Bohemian Garnets, up to the bigness of a pea, were found abundantly in the fields around Prague, but that one the size of a hazel-nut would equal a Kuby in value. This kind he prefers to the Indian. The latter he estimates at 2 thalers * per carat up to 20 carats ; then at 3 up to 40 ; at 4 up to 60 ; and at 5 up to 100. But in De Laet's time, fifty years later, both Indian and Bohemian were become of little value. * The thaler of this date equalled our crown-piece in intrinsic, and at least its quadruple in current value in Germany. 22 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. ALABASTEITES. THIS is the stone now known as the Oriental Alabaster (Carbonate of Lime), as is manifest from Pliny's descrip- tion (xxxvi. 12) of the best sort, the Carmanian, " of a honey-colour, variegated with spiral spots (vortices) and not transparent ; for the colour of horn, or fatty white, or anything resembling glass in it, are considered blemishes." To this the name of Onyx was originally given from the resemblance of its layers and tints to the shades in the finger-nail of a " well-bred person," to quote Epiphanius. This last writer mentions a conjecture of some, that its formation was due to the dropping of water: in which they were altogether in the right, for it is identical in constitution with Stalagmite. But this same ignorant transcriber concludes his article on the Onyx with a hopeless confusion between the marble and the gem of the same name. To avoid such ambiguity, the Eomans finally restricted the term Onyx to the gem so called at present : one kind of which, the Agate-onyx (made up of layers of opaque and transparent white), exactly resembles that regularly stratified variety of this marble, the Albatre- onyx of the French. The Onyx-marble now lost its ancient title, and became the Alabastrites, from its being chiefly employed as the best material for the Alabastra, or perfume jars, shaped like minute amphorse, but " without handles," as their Greek appellation signifies. Such ALABASTEITES. 23 alabastra were made in all materials pottery, glass, the precious metals ; but this stone was above all the most in use. Hence St. Mark's oAa/foorpov /x,vpov vapSov THO-TIK^S,* and Horace's " Nardi parvus Onyx," meant one and the same thing, the latter retaining the ancient designation of the substance. The slender necks of these jars were readily broken off to come at their contents (perfumed oils), having been closely sealed down by the maker on leaving his laboratory. To their reputation for preserv- ing the perfume unimpaired for a great length of time being perfectly deserved, a convincing testimony is offered by certain large alabastra from Pompeii (now in the Museo Borbonico) still diffusing a strong odour of their ancient contents : whereat the Emperor Nicholas on his visit "rimase sorpreso," as the custode tells you; and not without reason. The inferior Onyx-marble chiefly used for this purpose was quarried, says Pliny, near Thebes in Egypt, and Damascus. Yast numbers of Canopi, or sacred jars, of a squat form, with the head of a mummy for a lid, still exist in this Egyptian stone, which is identical in quality with the Derbyshire Alabaster so much worked up now into cheap ornaments for the plebeian mantle-piece. This common Alabaster certainly deserves the name of "Finger-nail stone " better than the more precious substance, the stratified Agate, that has usurped its original title, for it often exhibits layers, slightly curved, of flesh colour and opaque white arranged like the shades in the human * His " two-hundred denarii" was the regular price for the pound- weight of uiiguentum. Martial (xii. 65) debates with himself whether he shall reward a kind nymph with " Utrumne Cosmi, Nicerotis an libram," or with " De moneta Caesaris decem flavos," ten "yellowboys," that is with 250 denarii in value. 24 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. original. The Greeks however made a subtle distinction in the appellations of the two species, not observed by the Latin mineralogists ; giving the name of 'Ovv^iov to the gem, and of 'Owxirrjs to the marble. 'Ovi^m? /\.<$os, in the feminine, to distinguish its precious quality, is used by Appian for the Murrhine-agate, in speaking of the treasures of Mithridates. (See MURRHINA). The Oriental Alabaster, when first imported into Rome, was considered a highly valuable material, in fact almost a precious stone, thought to be produced in Arabia alone. Brought over in such small pieces as only to be worked up into cups and the feet of couches and chairs (the lion's- paws so often seen serving in that capacity), some amphora} carved in it, as large as the Chian wine-vessels, exhibited by P. Lentulus Spinther, were regarded, says Corn. Nepos, as wonderful curiosities.* Yet, five years later, so greatly had the importation of it increased, he had seen actual columns 32 feet long of that very marble. Four middling- sized columns were placed by Balbus in his theatre as an unprecedented ornament ; this was under Augustus, whereas Pliny's contemporaries had with him admired thirty such, of larger proportions, in the banqueting-hall built by Cal- listus, the most powerful of the freedmen of the Emperor Claudius. Superb examples of such magnificence are yet preserved in some of the older Eoman churches, relics of the times alluded to by Pliny ; but none have ever approached to the magnitude of those presented by Mohammed Ali to the new fabric of S. Paolo fuori le Mura, columns and pilasters, 40 feet long, each of a single block and the most beautiful quality. Under this Pacha the ancient Egyptian quarries had been re-opened, and furnished the material of which * A most elegant example of this pattern may be seen in the Temple Room (Brit. Mus.), and also a cinerary urn in the same beautiful sub- stance. ALABASTEITES. 25 his sumptuous mausoleum at Cairo is exclusively con- structed : a piece of extravagance beyond the ambition of even Nero.* It is singular that Pliny should have noticed no other quarries of this marble as then worked besides those in Asia and Egypt, for the mountain on which Volterra is built yields large blocks of a variety richer in point of colour than the Oriental, a warm brown variegated with lemon vortices : his omission is the more unaccountable as the stone had been much in use with the Etruscans, as their sepulchral monuments remain to attest. The mag- nificent and huge vases, now exported from Tuscany, belong to the Volterran fabrique. It is indeed true that the Volterra stone differs chemically from the Oriental, being a Sulphate of Lime or Compact Gypsum ; but such an analytical distinction would have had no significance in ancient mineralogy. Thus the Lygdinus subsequently mentioned as dug up in Paros, but in small slabs, never exceeding the measure required for a dish or a bowl, and equal to the Egyptian stone as a preservative of perfumes, appears to have been Compact Gypsum, from its distinctive character adduced of superlative whiteness, "candoris eximii." The fact that some of the sorts were burnt for lime and used in plasters (as depilatories ?) also indicates that the Onyx-marble included both the Carbonate and the Sulphate of Lime. The French clearly distinguish the two species, con- * Nero actually built the temple of Fortuna Seia enclosed within the precincts of his " Golden House " out of a translucent marble, the Phengites, then just discovered in Carmania. This .edifice, when the door was closed, was perfectly light within, though without a window. In certain very ancient Italian churches (as S. Miniato) the windows are filled in with single slabs of a translucent stone, which is not Talc, and thus, probably, preserve an example of this Phengites. 26 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. founded under the common name Alabaster in English, designating the hard Carbonate of Lime Albatre Oriental when dappled, and Albatre-onyx when regularly stratified : the softer Sulphate of Lime on the contrary (the common European kind) is their Albatre Gypseux, or Alabastrite. The Albatre-onyx has been frequently used by modern artists for camei instead of the pietra dura, the Agate-onyx, which it closely resembles in stratification, colour, and texture. AMETHYSTUS. 27 AMETHYSTUS: 'ApeOvw. 'A^wrro?: Amethyst. OUR Common Amethyst, and the stone (perhaps) generally designated amongst the ancients by this name, is nothing more than rock crystal coloured purple by manganese and iron, and on this account is more properly termed in modern mineralogy Amethystine Quartz. It is therefore of an entirely distinct species from the true Oriental Amethyst, a most rare and valuable variety of the Precious Corundum, and which is in fact a purple Sapphire, but its Durple shows little of the red (jponceau) seen in the common Amethyst, being rather an extremely deep shade of violet.* The name of " Oriental " is, however, improperly applied by the English lapidaries to the Amethystine Quartz when very brilliant and of two shades of colour (qualities dis- tinguishing the Indian from the German), the true gem of the name, from its rarity, being known to very few among them. The name " Amethyst," though most probably a mere corruption of the Eastern name for the stone, a trace of which seems preserved in the Hebrew Achlamath,f was by the fanciful Greeks interpreted as though formed in their own language, from a /xe#i> " wineless," and on the strength * The common Amethyst, formerly brought from Carthagena in Spain, and now only to be met with in old-fashioned pieces of jewelry, alone of its species exhibits this pure violet colour. t Perhaps the true origin is, as Von Hammer suggests, the Persian " Shemest." 28 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. of this etymology the gem was invested by them with the virtue of acting as an antidote to the effects of wine.* Hence the point of several epigrams in the Anthology, as that of Antipater's (or Asclepiades) on the signet of Cleo- patra, an Amethyst engraved with the figure of Me'% the genius of intoxication (ix. 752) Ei/tl Me'077, rb Se y\v/j.f yey\v/j.fj.ai' Te'x^Tjs, 8' T] \iOos a\\OTplr)' a\\a KAeoTTciTpas tepbv Kreap' kv yao avd(Teu> /cat "A Msenad wild, on amethyst I stand, The engraving truly of a skilful hand ; A subject foreign to the sober stone, But Cleopatra claims it for her own ; And hallow'd by her touch, the nymph so free Must quit her drunken mood, and sober be." Another, more briefly playing on the same fancy (ix. 748) 'A \iOos etrr' a/j.49va'TOS eyw 5' 6 TTOTOS Ai6vvcros, f) vfjtyeiv Treicret /A, $) (jiaOeTCt) /xe0ue/. On wineless gem, I, toper Bacchus, reign ; Learn, stone, to drink, or teach me to abstain ! Or, as Pliny explains the import of the name (xxxvii. 40), " because these gems never come up to the colour of wine, since before they touch it their lustre falls off into the colour of the viola " (i.e. pink cyclamen). Pliny divides the Amethystus into five kinds, the Indian holding the first rank ; others coming from Arabia Petraea, Armenia Minor, Egypt, and Galatia ; inferior sorts from Thasos and Cyprus. The Indian displayed the precise colour of the imperial purple ; a variety of these " degene- rated into that of the Hyacinthus (Sapphire), and was * Mohammed Ben Mansur affirms that wine drunk out of an amethyst cup does not intoxicate. 'HYSTUS. 29 called by the Indians Sacondion, Sacon being their term for that particular tint ; if still lighter, it took the name of Sapenos." The fourth sort was of a wine (we should say, " Burgundy") colour ; the fifth and worst of all was so pale as to resemble Crystal. The most admired tint was where a slightly rosy hue shone out from amidst the purple, and became more conspicuous when viewed by transmitted light (in suspectu) ; such were distinguished by the title of Paederotes (Cupids), or the " Gems of Venus," on account of the pre-eminence of their kind and their beauty. The deeper the tint the less brilliant is the stone, for which reason the ancient engravers preferred the light- coloured variety, which of all gems, next to the Jacinth, possesses the greatest degree of lustre ; or they may have used it for cutting upon on account of its greater cheapness, remarked above. That Amethysts * of a fine colour (now so worthless) were deemed too valuable by the ancients to have their substance diminished by the sinking of intagli into them, appears from many examples extant. They were either worn as mere ornamental jewels uncut, or else polished to an extremely convex form, presenting in their exact centre a diminutive intaglio, a Gorgon's Head, or a mask, in the nature of a talisman that augmented the supposed virtue without detracting much from the native beauty of the gem. Pliny notes the suitableness of all the Amethyst family for engraving upon (scalpturis faciles), a sufficient proof that no species of this stone was the Hya- cinthus (the common explanation of archaeologists from De Boot to K. 0. Miiller), which Solinus with justice calls * The rich Indian Amtthyst evidently was then equally precious with the Sapphire ; Pliny undeniably regarded the latter as merely a variety of it ; for this reason the two are often found set side by side in ancient jewels. 30 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. the hardest of all geins, and only to be touched by the Diamond-point. Intagli of all dates and in every style occur upon Amethysts, but so much more generally on the pale sort that an engraving upon one of a rich dark colour may, on that very ground, be suspected as modern. Besides the foregoing remarks as to the high value of such a shade in antiquity, the modern artists have usually employed the Hungarian Amethyst as being now the most abundant, of which the tint is a fine reddish purple, though the lustre is far below that of the Indian. Amongst the few exceptions to this rule that have come under my own notice is a head styled of Mithridates, but, in my judgment of some Bactrian king of the line of Euthydernus ; perhaps the noblest Greek portrait in existence, cut in a large Amethyst of the deepest violet colour, found a century ago in India ; which, however, being doubtless the royal signet, rather corroborates than weakens the previous statement. For such a use the most precious material procurable would naturally have been selected; "ut alibi ars, alibi materia esset in pretio," to use Pliny's expression. Another fine Greek intaglio, a head of Pan, in front face, on a similar stone, the antiquity of which could not be called in question, was in the Uzielli Cabinet; and, above all, stands the unrivalled Marlborough Omphale, the first amongst the numerous repetitions of that favourite subject, where the Amethyst (of the Indian kind) possesses equal lustre and richness of colour. In a large circular, convex stone of this sort is engraved the Berlin Atal an ta, justly styled by Winckelmaun "une des gravures les plus parfaites qu'on puisse voir." The swift- foot nymph is figured running at full speed and holding down with both hands the folds of her voluminous peplum distended by the agitated air. Through its gauzy material AMETHYSTUS. 31 the elegant contour of her whole body is distinctly visible. She is turning round her neck and looking back as if about to stop to pick, up the golden apple thrown down by her competitor. Heads, and even busts, both in full and in half-relief, often occur of antique workmanship in this stone : as some perfectly preserved remains show they served to complete statuettes in the precious metals. The grandest of Medusa- heads, the Blacas, is carved out of an Amethyst of the darkest violet, two inches in diameter. Although the Amethyst came into use amongst the earliest materials used by the gem-engraver, for we find in it an abundance of Egyptian charms (pendants for necklaces), in the form of vases, shells, hands, &c., and sometimes scarabaei, the last of Etruscan work also, and Roman intagli in it are sufficiently numerous, yet it is a singular fact that we rarely meet with works in the highest style executed in this material. Probably the superior kind was too precious to be so employed, whilst the paleness of the other and cheaper sorts was repugnant to the taste of first-rate artists. But besides the stone known at present by the same name, there can be little doubt the Roman " Aniethystus " included amongst its varieties a totally distinct species of gem some kinds of our common garnets. This conjecture is supported by the authority of De Boot, who says (ii. 30), "Aniethystus veterum nunc Granati nomen obtinet."* * There can be no question that the Amethyst (purple quartz) of the moderns was considered by the ancients as one species of their Jaspis. In no other way can Pliny be understood ('67), where, describing the latter, he thus classifies them : " Minus refert nationes quam bonitates distinguere. Optima quse purpurse aliquid habet ; secunda qua? rosse ; tertia quse smaragdi." And such a classification is perfectly accurate, all being equally quartz crystals, variously coloured by different metallic oxides. Agaiu, he alludes to another Jaspis resembling the Sard; 32 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS. We cannot resist such an inference if we carefully examine some of the characters given by Pliny of certain varieties of this gem. Thus he describes the Indian as " having the exact tint of the royal purple, and the dyers direct their endeavours to produce the colour, taking this gem. for their pattern. For it diffuses a hue softly gentle to the sight, neither does it flash upon the eye like the Carbunculus." Be it remembered that he has already described the best purple as the colour of clotted blood, dark in one aspect, bright red if viewed against the light.* Again, we find " the fourth sort has the colour of wine ; " now Italian wine generally (and more especially that grown about Rome) shows the richest Burgundy colour, than which nothing more accurately expresses the deep hue of the common Pyrope. It is a manifest absurdity to suppose a comparison between the bluish red of our Amethyst and the unmixed red of various shades peculiar to any sort of wine.f Again, his " Amethystus " was exactly counterfeited by staining amber with either alkanet-root, or murex-blood; both reds with no tinge of blue. The Carbunculus of Pliny was doubtless our Spinel Ruby, and to the eye alone (the sole criterion of the ancient lapidary) the Oriental (Siriam) Garnet and the Spinel are almost undistinguishable from another mimics the viola (or pink cyclamen) ; the Cappadocian was a sky-blue mixed with purple (ex purpura Cferulea), but dull and not lustrous. The last definition applies exactly to our German Amethyst. * A description closely applying to what is now called the Carbuncle. This dark shade of the ancient Tyrian dye is well exemplified by the remark of Augustus, preserved by Macrobius amongst his other facetiae. When that prince was finding fault with the darkness of some purple purchased to his order, and the vendor repeatedly bade him " hold it up higher and look at it," he retorted, " Must I then be always walking on a balcony if I wish the Eomans to know I am richly attired? " t Theophrastus includes (30) rb ajue0u