1 6 The Natural History of Selborne 



vitrified coat like glass, that it is well preserved from injuries 

 of weather, and endures thirty or forty years. When chiseled 

 smooth, it makes elegant fronts for houses, equal in colour 

 and grain to the Bath stone ; and superior in one respect, that, 

 when seasoned, it does not scale. Decent chimney-pieces are 

 worked from it of much closer and finer grain than Portland ; 

 and rooms are floored with it ; but it proves rather too soft 

 for this purpose. It is a freestone cutting in all directions; 

 yet has something of a grain parallel with the horizon, and 

 therefore should not be surbedded, but laid in the same posi- 

 tion that it grows in the quarry.* On the ground abroad this 

 firestone will not succeed for pavements, because, probably 

 some degree of saltness prevailing within it, the rain tears the 

 slabs to pieces. -j- Though this stone is too hard to be acted on 

 by vinegar, yet both the white part, and even the blue rag, fer- 

 ments strongly in mineral acids. Though the white stone will 

 not bear wet, yet in every quarry at intervals there are thin 

 strata of blue rag, which resists rain and frost ; and are ex- 

 cellent for pitching of stables, paths and courts, and for build- 

 ing of dry walls against banks, a valuable species of fencing 

 much in use in this village, and for mending of roads. This 

 rag is rugged and stubborn, and will not hew to a smooth face, 

 but is very durable ; yet, as these strata are shallow and lie 

 deep, large quantities cannot be procured but at considerable 

 expense. Among the blue rags turn up some blocks tinged 

 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 



* To surbcd stone is to set it edgewise, contrary to the posture it had 

 in the quarry, says Dr. Plot, " Oxfordshire," p. 77- But surbtdding does 

 not succeed in our dry walls ; neither do we use it so in ovens, though he 

 says it is best for Teynton stone. t "Firestone is full of salts, and 

 has no sulphur : must be close-grained, and have no interstices. Nothing 

 supports fire like salts ; saltstone perishes exposed to wet and frost." 

 PLOT'S " Staff.," p. 152. 



