ENVIRONS OF NICE. 433 
This stone is peculiarly hard, brittle, and very sonorous : 
the colour is a light brown, tinged with red. Here, also, the 
action of the weather leaves the petrified portions projecting, 
and produces a very rough and arid surface. I understand 
this coral limestone has been described by M. Sr Fonp as a 
particular formation. No doubt the beds which contain these 
organic bodies, differ from such as contain none. They, how- 
ever, form portions of the same series of stratification, and, so 
far as I understand the term, are parts of the same Forma- 
tion. 
Having described the characters and composition of the first 
limestone, I shall proceed to notice the caves which so fre- 
quently occur in it. These are found, not only on the shore 
of the sea, but high on the summits and sides of the hills, 
where no running water, according to the present order of 
things, could ever have existed. I have also seen portions of 
cavities displayed in a much more instructive situation, in the 
line of the new Genoa read, pompously denominated Le Che- 
min de Rome. Were they have been cut through in the pro- 
gress of that useful, but now abandoned undertaking, and the 
sections laid completely open to view. To what these cavities 
are to be attributed, it is very difficult to determine ; but from 
the appearance of dislocation which is observed accompanying 
those last mentioned, it is probable they are indebted for their 
formation to some great concussion ; but whether proceeding 
from above or below, we may perhaps be better able to hazard 
a suggestion in the sequel. 
Connected, as I conceive, with these caverns, is the broken 
and fragmented state in which we very frequently find the first 
limestone, forming the Brésche en place of Saussurr, one of 
the most interesting circumstances which occur in the history 
of this substance. Upon the tops of the mountains, in loose 
Vor. VIII. P. IL. 3I fragments, 
