91 



TAB. CXLVIIL 



CALX carbonata fcetida, 

 Ochraceous Stinkstein. 



Div. 2. Imitative 



1 he formation of this substance, however singular, seems 

 hitherto to have escaped notice. It may nevertheless lead 

 us to a determination in many cases. It might at first be 

 taken for a Coralline ; but we have by comparison of speci- 

 mens convinced ourselves that it is rather an assemblage of 

 funnel-shaped Stalactites formed in a fluid medium^ the 

 surface of which has become encrusted at regular intervals^ 

 especially around the Stalactite. Although there is a variety 

 of specimens, yet the structure coincides very accurately in 

 many of them. Some indeed are more puzzling to account 

 for than the present. It not uncommonly happens that 

 Stalactites are hollow, (see tab. 6.) and others undulated. 

 They also evidently form a deposit or case after case, on the 

 outside in a concentric manner. This does not seem to 

 have been formed so ; the peculiar state of the substance of 

 which it appears to have been composed, having only a 

 certain quantity of moisture, enough to form a kind of paste, 

 which may have allowed it to have dropped into one mass 



