CORSICA. 



247 



Gorsica. fu] coral is obtained upon the coast opposite to Sardi- 



<— -y— ' nia : it is of all the three kinds, white, red, and black. 

 There are several marshes towards the shore, some of 

 which being filled with sea water, yield salt sufficient 

 for the consumption of the island. 



^kes. The principal lakes of Corsica are the Ino and the 



Crcna, which are situated in the interior of the island, 

 at the distance from each other of about two miles, but 

 they have both their origin in the same mountain, viz. 

 the Gradaccio. They are both of considerable extent. 



livtrs. T{ le c ] H - e f f t ] le r ivers is the Golo, which, taking its 

 rise from the lake Ino, traverses several provinces, and 

 runs a course of upwards of 70 mile3 before it falls into 

 the sea. The Tavignano, rising from the lake Crena, 

 has also a long course through a very rude tract of 

 country. The Restonica is a small river, but is no- 

 ted on account of the clearness and the agreeableness of 

 its water, and for its quality of whitening every thing 

 over which it passes. There are several other rivers of 

 less consideration, and likewise many rivulets, which 

 serve at once to enrich and to beautify the country. 

 The fish which chiefly occur in those fresh waters are' 

 the trout and the eel : these are found in great plenty, 

 very fat, and of an uncommon size. There are many 

 mineral springs both of the hot and cold kind, in diffe- 

 rent parts of the island, which the inhabitants of the 

 country consider to be very efficacious for the cure of 

 various distempers. 



Corsica is very rich in mineral productions. The 

 mountains yield lead, copper, iron, silver, antimony, 

 alum, granite, porphyry, and jasper. Fine serpentine 

 stone, talc,- asbestos, and saltpetre, also rock crystals, 

 are likewise procured here. Some of the silver mines 

 are very rich, and the iron is said to be of a superior 

 quality, not yielding in hardness to the prepared iron 

 of Spain, which is the best in the world. 



M. Ram passe, who had been some time an officer in 

 the Corsican light infantry, gives an account of a stra- 

 tum of a particular iron ore which he found in this 

 island. It occurred in a plain above the village of Ca- 

 lenzana, to the eastward of Galoria. It is placed ho- 

 rizontally in a yellow earth, which at times disappears 

 throughout the whole length of the ore, and the mi- 

 neral of which is presented in three different views. 

 First, it appears under the character of scaly iron, ar- 

 ranged in thin layers, mixed with a yellowish ochrey 

 earth ; afterwards it assumes the aspect of a heavy 

 blackish iron, compact, and almost entirely disengaged 

 from every heterogeneous substance ; and, lastly, it 

 presents itself in elongated spheroids, from four to five 

 inches in diameter, exfoliating at the surface, and com- 

 pressed at the two sides, and at intervals consequently 

 assuming an angular appearance. In consequence of 

 the sandy character and composition of this ore, M. 

 Rampasse denominated it arenaceous iron ; and having 

 procured specimens of it sufficient for making the ne- 

 cessary experiments, he ascertained that it was a very 

 productive ore. The quality of this iron will probably 

 be made known by the result of the assays of the coun- 

 cil of mires, to which portions of the ore were, with a 

 -. iew to the farther trial of it, transmitted by the dis- 

 coverer. 



The same gentleman was at considerable pains in en- 

 deavouring to find specimens of the so much celebrated 

 orbicular granite of this island. Having arrived at the 

 I Ulage of Olmetto, on the gulf of V alinco, which had 

 been pointed out to him as the place containing this 

 granite, he examined minutely every corner in the vi- 

 < inity. He sounded the small lake in the neighbour- 



hood; he visited the sea-shore;' he explored by every Conic*. 

 means the river Taravo, which flows in this quarter, -— •— 

 and endeavoured to ascertain the composition of the Mineral.. 

 granites lying upon the heights surrounding the great 

 valley through which this river passes. Having then 

 made a comparative examination of the various speci- 

 mens of rocks which he had seen in the course of this 

 investigation with the orbicular granite, he found that 

 though in some of these specimens there were hom- 

 blend and feldspar, yet they were not disposed in the 

 same order as in the orbicular granite, nor in the same 

 arrangement. He conceives, however, that from the 

 appearance which these present, there is some prospect 

 that the primordial masses of this magnificent granite 

 may yet be discovered. He is at least confident, that 

 the small mass of it already known could have come 

 from no other place : it was found isolated upon the 

 beach of Taravo, half a league from the sea, in the gulf 

 of Valinco ; the angles of it were rounded. 



M. Rampasse farther takes notice of a new rock, 

 which he considers as an appendage of this beautiful 

 granite of Corsica, and which he discovered in the 

 Nicolo, one of the most considerable mountains of the 

 island. Here he says he found a block of stone almost 

 square, and about \-\ feet long. It was sunk into the 

 ground, and exhibited on one of its sides globular bo- 

 dies, remarkable from their disposition and colour, and 

 which were fixed in the stony mass. Some of them 

 were about an inch in diameter ; others were larger or 

 smaller, but all of them presented a peculiar character, 

 which this writer had never seen in any stone. Not • • 



more than six inches of the rock appeared above 

 ground, but the earth surrounding it having been re- 

 moved, it was found to be two feet and some inches in 

 thickness. Its angles also were observed to be entire 

 and acute, from which it seemed probable that it had 

 never been removed since it had been placed there. 

 This was the more probable, as the part of the slope 

 of the mountains where it was found was bare, and 

 as among the various blocks and .masses surrounding 

 it, it was the only one covered with vegetable earth. 

 This rock, the heart of which seemed to be porphy- 

 roidal, was ascertained, upon examination, to have its 

 paste composed of stony elements of a petro-siliceous 

 nature, irregularly disposed in small grains, in points 

 and in lineaments more or less rounded off, and which 

 tied as it were with each other, varying in colour in 

 proportion to the various degrees of alteration which 

 the ferruginous principle, that is very abundant in 

 this rock, had undergone. The general aspect, how- 

 ever, when the rock was viewed from a certain dis- 

 tance, was the reddish brown, mixed with white spots, 

 shaded with red. In the midst of this paste, there 

 were observed regular spheroidal bodies, from one to 

 three inches in diameter, scattered here and there at 

 unequal distances, and imbedded in the mass. The 

 system of the formation of these balls appeared to be, 

 that they were the result of a globular crystallization, 

 which had taken place rapidly, and not that like geo- 

 dites they had been formed apart, and enveloped sub- 

 sequently in a porphyritical substance. This method 

 of crystallization is remarkable, and may be best con- 

 ceived by representing a circle, into which a multitude 

 of small stony bodies, oblong and compressed, of a 

 petro-siliceous nature, and placed very close to each 

 other, have been directed in radii, proceeding as it 

 were from end to end, from the circumference towards 

 the centre of the circle, and thus assuming the appear- 

 ance of divergent radii. The globulous solid, which 



