92 Lieut. Baddeley ~» the geagnosy 
and glicteniug, while at the same time its texture is loose and 
soft, and its colour of a yellowish and watery white. It pos- 
sesses considerable translucency on the edges, a quality which, 
however desirable in statuary marble when of a fine grain, from 
the softness which it gives to the outline, only increases the dis- 
agreeable aspect of the Parian by the angular reflections of 
light which takes place on the pellucid edge and surface from 
the innumerable faces of the small plates. It is certain indeed 
that the Greek sculptors abandoned the marble of Paros after 
the quarries of Luna and Carrara were discovered, the supe- 
rior fineness and whiteness of these marbles, which at present 
cause them to excel any with the places of which we are 
now acquainted, rendering them also at least equal to the 
best of those ancient ones of which the native places are now 
unknown. 
“¢ Independently of the injurious effects which the large grain 
of the Parian marble produces on the transparent surface of sculp- 
tured works, and the false lights which it thus introduces into 
the contour, it interferes materially with the requisite correctness 
of drawing in the lesser works, and is thus inapplicable to the. 
details of small sculptures in relief, It is, nevertheless, suscep- 
tible of a good polish, a quality, however, of little value in the 
eyes of the statuary, and one which in this variety only serves 
to render the defects of its texture more apparent. It is also 
said to have been deficient in size, since it was so intersect- - 
ed_ by fissures as to be incapable of yielding blocks of more 
than five feet in length. I may add that, in the present state 
of the public habits with regard to white marbles, there is 
no demand for modern works executed in Parian marble. Its 
celebrity is consigned to the metaphors of poets. 
* The quarries of Luna produce a compact white marble, 
susceptible of a high polish, and capable of being wrought 
with the most minute accuracy. Hence it is preferable for 
the 
