BOOK XXXI\'. xLi. i46-\Liii. 149 



with oil, for fear that water might harden them and 

 make them brittle. And it is remarkable that when 

 a vein of ore is fused the iron becomes hquid Hke 

 water and afterwards acquires a spongy and brittle 

 texture. Human blood takes its revenge from iron, 

 as if iron has come into contact with it, it becomes 

 the more quickly Hable to rust. 



XLII. \Ve will speak in the appropriate place Lode-stme. 

 about the lode-stone and the sympathy which it has f^ff^I.^' 

 with iron. Iron is the only substance that catches 

 the infection of that stone and retains it for a long 

 period, taking hold of other iron, so that we may 

 sometimes see a chain of rings ; the ignorant lower 

 classes call this ' Uve iron,' and wounds inflicted with 

 it are more severe. This sort of stone forms in 

 Biscaya also ** not in a continuous rocky stratum 

 like the genuine lodestone alluded to but in a scattered 

 pebbly formation or ' bubbhng ' — that is what they 

 call it. I do not know whether it is equally useful 

 for glass founding, as no one has hitherto tested it, 

 but it certainly imparts the same magnetic property 

 to iron. The architect Timochares had begun to use 

 lodestone for constructing the vaulting in the Temple 

 of Arsinoe ^ at Alexandria, so that the iron statue 

 contained in it might have the appearance of being 

 suspended in mid air ; but the project was interrupted 

 by his own death and that of King Ptolemy who had 

 ordered the work to be done in honour of his sister. 

 XLIII. Iron ore is found in the greatest abundance 

 of all metals. In the coastal part of Biscaya washed 

 by the Atlantic there is a very high mountain which, 

 marvellous to relate, consists entirely of that mineral, 

 as we stated ° in our account of the lands bordering 

 on the Ocean 



235 



