ONLY A PEBBLE. 11 



ranges itself in wondrous stars and circles. What strange 

 power has the so-called Bononian stone to keep the rays 

 of the sun or the light of earth-kindled fire captive, and 

 to let them loose again, long after it has been hidden in 

 utter darkness? What gives the blood-red Turmalin its 

 electric power 1 ? But electric currents pass even now, un- 

 seen and unnoticed, through the heart of the earth, and, 

 under their influence, crystals arise and assume most 

 beautiful shapes. Their forms are most simple, it is true, 

 but so varied in their very simplicity, that man's ingenuity 

 and most fertile fancy has not yet invented a new one. 

 Nothing but straight lines are seen there, cubes and pyra- 

 mids, rhomboids and prisms, but they all glitter and glare 

 in strange brilliancy, when a ray of light illumines them 

 for an instant in their dark, inaccessible homes. 



And if the stone itself does not live, and labor, and 

 change, friends come from all sides to gladden his silent 

 house and to deck it with precious colors. In the very 

 midst of the rocky world live the merrier metals, and 

 form a thousand delicate veins, bright crystals, and tender 

 foliage. Imprisoned in the cold, hard rock, dwell iron 

 and lead, gold and silver, now in safe inaccessible caves, 

 and now mysteriously mixed with its very substance, as 

 if they were lost, frozen rays of heavenly light. There 

 they hide, buried in eternal night, and fancy they have 

 escaped all foes from beneath; but they dream not of 

 the much more dangerous enemies who live above them 

 and know their secret chambers, even if they cannot look 

 down into the impenetrable darkness of the rocky world. 

 The bold miner digs and drills, and fearlessly descends 



