TOL. XLIX.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 703 



Any quantity of brimstone might be fetched from this mountain, even ship- 

 loads. It might be refined on the spot, or made up into lumps to be sold^ and 

 shippetl in the ore, if necessary ; but it is too cheap a commodity to be worth 

 gathering up in a country, where the price of labour is so high from the scarcity 

 of hands. Bright yellow brimstone with a greenish cast might be gathered round 

 the vent-holes of the burning gulf, also large quantities of fine natural flowers, 

 or very pure sulphur. What passes in this mountain may be called a natural 

 analysis and distillation. The brimstone takes fire in the centre of the earth, as 

 in chemical operations, when the mixture of spirit of nitre and oil of turpentine 

 suddenly produces a surprising heat and flame : in like manner an oily and sul- 

 phureous exhalation inflames and sends forth fires, which the ignorant vulgar 

 take for shooting or falling stars. The flowers rise with the acid spirit, which 

 being condensed by the cool air, falls down in drops. By fixing bell-glasses to 

 the apertures of the funnels, one might collect a spirit, that rises naturally. One 

 of them having thrust his cane too far into one of the funnels, and not being 

 able to pull it out again, helped himself with the blade of his sword to catch hold 

 of it. In an instant they saw the hilt quite wet, and the water dropping off, and 

 when he drew it out, they were surprised to find the blade extremely hot. 



LXXXFI. Of the Earthquake, felt Feb. 18, 1756, along the Coast of Eng- 

 land, betiveen Margate and Dover, in a Letter from Mr. Samuel Warren. 

 Communicated by John Pringle, M.D., F.K.S. p. 579- 

 This earthquake happened a little before 8 in the morning. Many persons 



felt it by the shaking of their beds, &c. at Margate, Deal, Dover, Sandwich, gcc.} 



LXXXP^II. On the Stones in the Country of Nassau, and the Territories of 

 Treves and Cologn, resembling those of the Giants-Causey, in Ireland. By 

 Abralmm Trembley , F.R.S. From the French, p. 581. 

 These stones were in a quarry, near Weilbourg in the country of Nassau, on 

 the declivity of a hill; it had not been dug into above 20 feet deep, and 40 long. 

 This quarry consists of a mass of stones of an almost regular form. He could 

 not discover at what depth these stones extended under-ground. They appeared 

 very near the surface of the earth, where the quarry lies. And there was a pretty 

 considerable space of ground, in which the top of the stones appeared, and where 

 it was easy to examine the shape of their upper ends. It is very far from being 

 the same in all of them :, but when a number of them are comjjared with one 

 another, we find reason to conclude, that the hexagonal form is the most com- 

 mon. The more regular the figure of these extremities is, the more it approaches 

 to that of a hexagon. The two ends of every stone appeared, for the most part, 

 to have the same shape. The sides of the stone are of the same form with the 

 ends, and are plain. Every stone is therefore a prism of a certain rjumber pf 



