MODE X. GREEN MARBLE. 



any other. But the whole passage again de- 

 serves attention : " Some marbles are esteemed 

 VERY PRECIOUS, as the Lacedemonian green, 

 more cheerful than all the rest. So ALSO the 

 Augustean, and afterwards the Tiberian, first 

 discovered in Egypt in the reigns of Augustus 

 and Tiberius. The difference between them and 

 ophites is, that the latter is spotted like a ser- 

 pent, whence it received the name; while the 

 others present spots of a different form, the 

 Augustean being crisped into wavy spots, while 

 in the Tiberian the white (canities) is scattered, 

 not convolved." 



Such is this celebrated passage, which has led 

 to many errors in mineralogy, as it has been 

 conceived that the ophites was green porphyry, 

 and that the other kinds were green ; whereas it 

 is clear from the subsequent part of Pliny's de- 

 scription, that the ophites was grey or whitish, 

 being a spotted ollite, and when the spots, were 

 of golden mica it became the most esteemed 

 Lapis Thebaicus of the ancients. In like man- 

 ner the " sic, so the Augustean," only implies 

 that both were esteemed very precious, like the 

 Laconian, but not that they were of a green 

 colour*. 



* For the ancient testimonies concerning the green marble of 

 Laconia, the reader is referred to the learned work of Blasius Gary- 



