ofOXFO %$>~S HMJB. -67 



rooms within (aslfawat Stoerford) as to point walls without rj 

 but at Stunsfidd there was no body knew of its ufe. 



49. Other earths there are that I find in this County,fbr whofe 

 names, as well as natures, I am quite at a lofs ; whereof there is 

 one in Sir Thomas Vennyfions Park, which for the ftrangenefs of 

 its qualities deferves the firft place. Of colour it is extreamly 

 white, of little taft, and lefsfmell; lying in veins in ayellowifli 

 clay, like a medulla about the bignefs of ones wrift; taken out 

 with a knife, it falls into a fine powder, fomwhat gritty, but of 

 fo very great a weight, that its double at leaft to any other earth 

 of its bulk ; put in the fcale againft white Marble dusl, itequali'd 

 its weight, and exceeded that ofAlabafter by almoft a fourth part : 

 fetin fandin a glafs retort, and driven with a quick and ftrong 

 fire, it fublimed to the fides of the glafs a little, but ftill preferved 

 its colourand weight, till put between two Crucibles, one invert- 

 ed upon the other ; well luted, and ftrongly forced in a wind- 

 furnace for about two hours,it loft above the moiety of its weight: 

 for as I well remember, of three ounces put in, there came not out 

 full one and a half, and yet nothing fublimed in the top of the 

 Crucible : the colour ftill remained as white as ever, and the bulk 

 (as near as I could guefs) the fame, but now of a ftrong fait and 

 urinous taft ; which after folution, filtration, and evaporation, 

 came at laft, to what people as little underftood, as what became 

 of its ponderous ingredient. 



50. Wetrycd it alfo at Cornwell, in Sir Thomas Penny tf?o's 

 Laboratory, becaufeof its weight with divevsfluxingfalts, in hopes 

 of fome kind of metalline fubftance, but all* as before, to little 

 purpofe. So that I cannot tell what to divine it (Tiould be, ex- 

 cept the Gur of the Adeptifls congealed, which they defcribe in 

 their Books to be much fuch a thing, which for want of more 

 time to fpend in its fervice, I leave to the difcovery of future 

 ages. 



5 1 . In the Chalk-pits almoft every where in the South-eaft 

 parts of Oxford-fljire y they finde a fort of iron-colour'd terra la- 

 pidofa, in the very body of the chalk, which I think they call 

 Iron-moulds, and particularly at a place between Brightwell and 

 Berricki of an oval figure : how they came to be of that (hape, 

 or at all grow, in a fubftance of fo different a nature as chalk., t 

 confefs to be a problem beyond my knowledge, as well as the 



t 2 ufc 



