DOMAIN IX. ANOMALOUS. 



beautiful stones which I have ever beheld. The 

 largest blocks, and there were some from 30 to 

 40 feet in diameter, were of a granitello, com- 

 posed of white felspar and black schorl* in plates. 

 These two kinds of stone were mingled in all the 

 proportions, and under all the forms imaginable. 

 Upon one, were large parallel fillets of the 

 purest white and black ; on another, nodules of 

 the most beautiful black, surrounded with con- 

 centric veins alternately white and black. Others 

 presented veins in zigzag, between parallel veins. 

 Those which astonished me the most by their 

 structure, were the stones which displayed pa- 

 rallel layers, terminated by other layers which 

 cut them at right-angles, without any appearance 

 of rent or subsequent junction, the block appear-? 

 ing completely uniformf. I greatly regretted 

 that these beautiful masses were not within the 

 reach of a manufactory, where they might be 

 sawn and cut, to make vases, and above all 

 tables, which would be of the most perfect 

 beauty. For there is no marble which can ap- 

 proach to these stones in regard to the size of 

 the veins, their extreme precision, and the bright- 



* The language of that time for hornblende or siderite. 

 f So quartz sometimes appears in clay slate. P. 



