10 NATURAL HISTORY 



with, a stain of yellow or rust colour, which seem to be nearly 

 as lasting as the blue ; and every now and then balls of a friable 

 substance, like rust of iron, called rust balls. 



In Wolmer Forest I see but one sort of stone, called by the 

 workmen sand, or forest-stone. This is generally of the colour 

 of rusty iron, and might probably be worked as iron ore ; is 

 very hard and heavy, and of a firm, compact texture, and 

 composed of a small roundish crystalline grit, cemented to- 

 gether by a brown, terrene, ferruginous matter ; will not cut 

 without difficulty, nor easily strike fire with -steel. Being 

 often found in broad flat pieces, it makes good pavement for 

 paths about houses, never becoming slippery in frost or rain ; 

 is excellent for dry walls, and is sometimes used in buildings. 

 In many parts of that waste it lies scattered on the surface of 

 the ground ; but is dug on Weaver's Down, a vast hill on the 

 eastern verge of that forest, where the pits are shallow, and 

 the stratum thin. This stone is imperishable*. 



From a notion of rendering their work the more elegant, 

 and giving it a finish, masons chip this stone into small frag- 

 ments about the size of the head of a large nail ; and then 

 stick the pieces into the wet mortar along the joints of their 

 freestone walls : this embellishment carries an odd appearance, 

 and has occasioned strangers sometimes to ask us pleasantly, 

 "whether we fastened our walls together with tenpenny 

 nails "f. 



* [On the property of my friend the Rev. George Cardew, called "The 

 Wilds," and situated in the midst of a wild part of this district, the no- 

 dules of iron-stone have assumed the most extraordinary forms, many of 

 them having the appearance of being ingeniously worked by the hands of 

 skilful workmen. Mr. Cardew's collection of specimens, obtained from 

 the excavations made in forming an extensive lake and other improve- 

 ments on his grounds, are exceedingly interesting and curious. T. B.] 



t [This curious embellishment still exists in some old walls, and 

 notably in the western wall of the church. T. B.] 



