370 Mineralogy and Geology of Nova Seotia. 



of a brown colour will, upon passing this whinstone, deposit a considerable 

 quantity of this carbonate, and become perfectly clear. 



It appears that a certain portion of vitriol is useful in freeing water from 

 the peat, as that is in separating the vitriol ; for on granite barrens, where 

 there is generally no vitriolic mineral, the water is invariably brown ; and 

 upon the granite islands, where there is very little soil except turf, it is 

 nearly black, and seems to be poisonous to cows and sheep. So far be- 

 low where a brook issues from a swamp as this substance is deposited 

 the water has a fertilising quality, producing florin grass, and crow-foot ; 

 but when it has deposited all the carbonaceous matter, the herbage changes 

 to the common plants of moist barren soils. As whinstone soils generally 

 hold but a small quantity of vitriol, the water from swamps retains a por- 

 tion of this substance for a greater distance in running upon them, and 

 may be often profitably employed as a manure for grass, by turning the 

 brook along the side of a hill. On a rusty slate soil, the vitriol will so 

 quickly change it to a stony substance, and precipitate it, that it is there of 

 little value. 



This substance has been used as a paint. It is a very dark brown. To 

 prepare it for a paint, it ought to be heated red-hot in a covered crucible, 

 or other vessel that will bear the fire; then ground, and mixed with 

 water, which should be allowed to stand for a few seconds, that the sand 

 may fall ; from which it should be poured off into another vessel ; and, 

 when it has all subsided, the water may be carefully drained off. It will 

 then, when dried, be in a proper state to grind with oil. (The box which 

 contains the specimens is stained with it.) Agate. Lawrencetown beach. 



Flints. Fl. 1. A fragment of a piece of transparent quartz encrusted with 

 flint, from Mr. G. White, Cornwallis. 



Fl. 2. Flint and chalcedony from Mr. Scot's farm, Ballynan River, being 

 part of a stone of more than 1 cwt. 



Fl. 3. Clements farm, Ballynan, about nine miles north of Shubenacadie. 

 In both places found near fetid limestone. 



Fl. 4. Rolled piece ; twenty miles up Windsor Road. Properly 

 jasper. 



Crystal, Fragment of; granite hills north of Preston. 



Mail. Clements farm, Ballynan River. It is a mixture of decayed 

 freshwater snail-shells, and the white earth commonly found at the bottom 

 of peat earth, that is under cold spring water. It appears to be a valuable 

 manure. 



Garnets, separated from a portion of slate 1 0, that had fallen to dust by 

 exposure to the air. 



L. W. The two specimens with this mark are pieces of a West India 

 limestone. One of them is manifestly the soil of the sea shore petrified 

 by water dripping from limestone. The condition of the shells proves 

 that they were inhabited by living animals at no very remote period, and 

 that the petrifaction is of recent formation. The other (a fragment of the 

 same stone) differs little from the steatities, which, by cementing together 

 fragments of quartz, forms the burr millstone. Could not these millstones 

 be made by arranging fragments of quartz within hoops, in situations 

 where they would be exposed to the drip of water which strains from the 

 fissures of shivered limestone, and partially excluding the air ? For 

 water usually dissolves a portion of most kinds of limestone that contain 

 but a small portion of other earths ; and this water generally forms petri- 

 factions when it falls into caverns from which the external air is partly 

 excluded. 



Lapis ollaris. A rolled stone containing specks of soap-stone. 



Fragments of selenite from slate. 



Micaceous and semicrystallised iron ore from Cobequid. This last ap- 

 proaches to plumbago, and would probably make pencils. 



