76 Short Communications. 



ally lived upon the stratum where they occur, as he formerly 

 supposed, it is scarcely possible that more entire skeletons 

 should not have been discovered. — f-J-f 



The very fragile Texture of the Limestone which forms the 

 secondary Marble from the Meusc. — Sir, Many public build- 

 ings in Belgium are constructed of the secondary marble 

 from the Meuse, which is also wrought into posts, door slabs, 

 window sills, &c. It is a blue, close-grained, fetid limestone, 

 and has a peculiarity which is worth notice. If laid firmly 

 throughout its length, and not resting hollow on two sup- 

 porters at its extremities, the slab is apt to break asunder: 

 therefore most of the door steps where it is used are left 

 hollow underneath, or scooped out, to prevent an accident of 

 this kind. The peculiar inclination of this stone to fracture 

 was shown during the four days of October, 1830, when the 

 houses around the park in Brussels were exposed to the fire 

 of die Dutch troops. Nothing which occurred to the build- 

 ings about Waterloo equalled the ruin which befell the Hotel 

 de Bellevue, the Cafe de PAmitie, the old palace of Prince 

 Frederick, or the gates of the park. The surfaces of the 

 three former buildings were completely destroyed : the musket 

 balls merely left a mark of lead upon the stone ; but the grape- 

 shot starred it, and the cannon-shot chipped out great masses, 

 which flew about in all directions, like splinters on board ship. 

 When it is considered that nearly 4000 shot marks were 

 counted in one front of the Bellevue hotel, some idea may 

 be formed of the ruin which it suffered. At the Cafe de 

 PAmitie, most of the shot struck the wall at an acute 

 angle : the stone was therefore chipped off in a more longi- 

 tudinal direction; but the stone chain posts, in front of the 

 two buildings, and, in fact, all along the Rue Royale, were 

 better examples of the fragile nature of the marble in question. 

 The tops of many of them were cut off in a sloping direction, 

 as neatly as the angle of a cube of fluor spar is cleaved by the 

 knife; in this case the shot did not chip the stone, but cleaved 

 it, another form of breakage similar to that observed in the 

 flat slabs. The magnificent gate of the park leading into the 

 Place Royale was completely destroyed : it was chipped and 

 cleaved into fragments, and the splendid marble statuary on 

 the top of the pillars carried away piecemeal. Several of the 

 figures were cut in two, a calamity which happened also to 

 the beautiful sculptures in the avenues of the park itself, most 

 of which have for ever been crippled. One specimen of art, 

 a lion of most exquisite workmanship, was singularly muti- 

 lated. When the French, during the old revolutionary wars, 

 attacked Brussels, this famous fellow lost his tail by a shot; 



