Kinahan — On Irish Marbles and Limestones. 381 



neighbourhood, but the works were accidentally burnt down a few 

 years prior to 1870, and since then the manufacture has not 

 been resumed. Gypsum has been found associated with salt near 

 Carrickfergus ; also in the valley of the Lagan, Co. Antrim. 

 Dr. Euttey, in his Natural History of Dublin, mentions it as 

 occurring at Multikartan, near Lisburn, and it has also been 

 found at Coagh, Co. Tyrone. 



The variety called alabaster, suitable for architectural and orna- 

 mental purposes, is not recorded as having been found. 



MAEBLES. 



The Irish marbles are not only very varied, but some of them 

 are handsome, and even beautiful. They occur among the Carbo- 

 niferous limestone and the Metamorphic rocks, the latter being of 

 Ordovician and Cambrian ages. For the most part they are lime- 

 stone ; but some are more or less chemically changed, and are 

 known under the general name of Serpentine. The latter name, 

 however, not only includes the altered limestones and dolomytes, 

 but also certain altered volcanic rocks. The metamorphosed lime- 

 stones and allied rocks will be more specially mentioned here- 

 after. 



CAEBONIFEEOUS. 



The limestones of Carboniferous age capable of being worked 

 as marble occur in various shades of red, black, grey, and other 

 colours. The red varieties of limestones are rarely of one uniform 

 colour, being usually more or less clouded or variegated. Some of 

 these are beautifully and fantastically marked in lines or clouded 

 tints of grey, white, purple, green, and yellow, and deserve to be 

 much more generally known than they are at present. Some of 

 the black limestones are world-famed, and cannot be surpassed for 

 blackness, or for the beauty of the stone ; while others are more or 

 less mottled or spotted with white, generally owing to the presence 

 of fossils. The grey tints graduate from dark to almost white, 

 being often more or less clouded with darker shades, and also 

 with purple, changing them into dove-colour. 



