lazuli and amber. Pulverized the stone 

 was used as a tonic and purg^ative by the 

 Greeks and Romans. The name lapis 

 lazuli means blue stone. Armenian 

 stone is another term by which the stone 

 is known in trade. 



AMBER. 



Few minerals have been longer in fa- 

 vor for ornamental purposes than amber. 

 Among- remains of the earHcst peoples 

 such as the Egyptians and Cave-dwellers 

 of Switzerland it is found in carved 

 masses indicating that it was highly 

 prized. The Phenicians are said to have 

 sailed to the Baltic for the purpose of 

 procuring it, while the Greeks' knowl- 

 edge of it is indellibly preserved in our 

 word electricity derived from their word 

 elektron. The high favor in which the 

 ancients- regarded amber has hardly en- 

 dured however to the present time. 

 Were it not for its use for mouthpieces 

 of pipes and other smokers' articles and 

 the occasional amber necklace to be seen, 

 amber would hardly be known among 

 the present generation in our country. 



Amber is a fossil gum of trees of the 

 genus Pinus and is thus a vegetable 

 rather than mineral product. In color 

 it is yellow, varying to reddish, brownish 

 and whitish. Its hardness is 2 to 2.5, it 

 being slightly harder than gypsum and 

 softer than calcite. It cannot be 

 scratched by the finger nail but easily 

 and deeply with a knife. It is also brit- 

 tle. Its specific gravity is scarcely 

 greater than that of water, the exact 

 specific weight being 1.050 — 1,096. It 

 thus almost floats in water, especially 

 sea water. It is transparent to trans- 

 lucent. On being heated it becomes soft 

 at 150 degrees and at 250 degrees to 300 

 degrees melts. It also burns readily and 

 at a low temperature, a fact which has 

 given rise to the name of bernstein by 

 which the Germans know it, and to one 

 of the Roman names for it, lapis ardens. 

 Rubbed with a cloth it becomes strongly 

 electric, attracting bits of paper, etc. As 

 already noted, our word electrici!;y comes 

 from the Greek for amber, this seeming 

 to be one of the first minerals in which 

 this property was noted. Amber being a 

 poor conductor of heat feels warm ra- 

 ther than cold in the hand, contrary to 

 most minerals. , It is attacked but slowly 



by alcohol, ether and similar solvents, a 

 property by which it may be distin- 

 guished from most modern gums and 

 some other fossil ones. In composition 

 it is an oxygenated hydrocarbon, the 

 percentages of these elements being in 

 an average sample, carbon 78.94, hydro- 

 gen 10.53 ^"d oxygen 10.53. The min- 

 eralogical name of amber is succinite, a 

 word derived from the Latin succum, 

 juice. One of its constituents is the or- 

 ganic acid called succinic acid. 



The present source of most of the 

 amber of commerce is the Prussian 

 Coast of the Baltic Sea, between Memel 

 and Dantzig, although it is found as far 

 west as Schleswig-Holstein and the Fri- 

 sian Islands and even occasionally on 

 the shores of Denmark, Norway and 

 Sweden. From time immemorial pieces 

 of amber have been cast upon the shore 

 in these localities and their collection 

 and sale has aft'orded a livelihood to 

 coast dwellers. Such amber is called sea 

 stone or sea amber and is superior to 

 that obtained by mining, since it is 

 usually of uniform quality and not dis- 

 colored and altered on the surface. Ow- 

 ing to its lightness the amber is often 

 found entangled in seaweed and the col- 

 lectors are accustomed to draw in masses 

 of seaweed and search them for amber. 

 Amber so obtained is called scoopstone, 

 nets being sometimes used to gather in 

 the seaweed. In the marshy regions 

 men on horse-back, called amber riders, 

 follow the outgoing tide and search for 

 the yellow gum. It is also searched for 

 by divers to some extent. From the 

 earliest times the title to this amber has 

 vested in the State and its collecting has 

 been done either under State control or 

 as at present when a tax is levied by the 

 government upon it. This tax Is levied on 

 the amber that is mined as well as that 

 obtained from the sea and brings a rev- 

 enue at the present time of about $200,- 

 000. 



Up to i860 the methods of procuring 

 amber were largely confined to obtain- 

 ing it in the manner above noted. As it 

 was evident however that the sea amber 

 came from strata underneath and that if 

 either by dredging or mining these 

 strata could be reached a much larger 

 supply could be obtained, explora- 

 tion was carried on by mining methods 



1C.5 



