1868. ] Amber ; its Origin and History. 167 
of manufacturing artificial stone may, with certain modifications, 
be found capable of being adapted. It is now used extensively in 
England and all over the Continent, as well as in America, where 
amongst other buildings it has been extensively used in the deco- 
rative portions of Cranston’s Hotel in New York. It is being 
employed in the construction of a glass roof over the beautiful 
Indian Court at the new India Offices in London, and a great 
quantity of ornamental work has been sent out by the Patent 
Concrete Stone Company for public buildings under construction 
in Calcutta. They have received orders also from China; and large 
quantities of the silicate of soda and chloride of calcium have from 
time to time been shipped for different parts of India, with the view 
of manufacturing artificial stone on the spot where it was required 
to be employed. 
IV. AMBER; ITS ORIGIN AND HISTORY, AS ILLUS- 
TRATED BY THE GEOLOGY OF SAMLAND. 
By Dr. G. Zappacu, Professor in the University of Kénigsberg, 
and Director of the University Museum. 
Tse Natural History of Amber still presents its many problems, 
although for the last century numerous investigators have en- 
deavoured to solve them. One of the few places at which some 
of these questions may be elucidated is Samland, which has for 
ages been celebrated for its richness in Amber, and which even 
now possesses in deep-seated deposits an inexhaustible store of this 
valuable fossil. I therefore undertook, some years ago, the geo- 
logical examination of this district in the employment of the 
‘ Physikalisch-dkonomische Gesellschaft’ of Konigsberg, and I have 
lately published the results of my survey in a detailed essay, accom- 
panied by several maps, in the ‘ Schriften’ of that body. A short 
summary of these results will, I hope, be of some interest to the 
readers of this Journal. 
By the name Samland is distinguished that part of the Province 
of Prussia which is bounded on the west by the Baltic; on the 
north by the same sea, the Kurische Nehrung, and the Kurische 
Haff; on the east, by an arm of the Pregel (the Deime); and on 
the south, by the Pregel itself and the Frische Haff. The north- 
west part of this region, which constitutes the promontory of 
Briisterort, is hilly, from 100 to 150 feet in height on the average, 
but reaching in many places to the height of 2U0 feet, and in some 
even to 300 feet. On the other hand it becomes flat towards the 
north-east and east, and gradually sinks down towards the south- 
eastern angle, where, upon a peninsula lying between the sea and 
