150 
much of a dirty-looking substance, rather of a carbona- 
ceous appearance. 
I have not seen British Amber so large, and free from 
what is commonly called foul, or cracks, as the foreign ; 
but the present specimens pretty well include all the usual 
colours of Amber. All the fine and clear specimens that 
fa]l into the hands of the dealers are sure to be deprived of 
their coat, as this has been, or to be cut into some fanciful 
form so as to make them more saleable. 
Amber is sometimes of considerable size. I have seen a 
fragment measuring fourteen inches and a half in girth 
Jengthwise, by seven inches and a half in girth the shortest 
way. It weighed nine ounces and a quarter. Itis how- 
ever said that there was in the possession of the Grand 
Duke of Tuscany a column of Amber of ten feet in height. 
It is said to have been well known to the Arabians, who 
called it Ambra, and to the Greeks, who called it *HAexrgov*. 
* Some may be led to suppose from reading in Ezekiel i. 4, and 27, and 
will. 2, “as the colour of Amber,” that this substance was known to the 
Hebrews in the time of the Prophet; but on further investigation it will ap- 
pear hardly safe to found such an opinion upon the received English Version. 
Junius and Tremellius render the passage “ tanguam color vividissimus :” and 
Dr. John Taylor in his Hebrew Concordance has S5nwn, which occurs only 
in the above-cited three passages, pruna ignita. The LXX have as dgucw 
gaéxroe, and the Vulgate “ quasi species electri ;” but Zaexrgay, electrum, here 
doubtless signifies, as it often does, an alloy of gold and silver, and not Amber. 
And the account given in the Synopsis Criticorum of the word bown, 
chasmal, is probably right. It is supposed that Ezekiel borrowed the word 
from the Chaldee, in which diaiect it signified a brilliant alloy, mixed not of 
gold and silver, but of gold and brass, being the yaaxoyedoiv, OF xaAxds 
xeveoudas of Diodorus, and that it is composed of the Chaldee words Wm3, 
nachas, lrass (the 3 being dropt as in other analogous instances), and bbn, 
dn, malal, gold. Some commentators, desirous of extracting all the 
meaning they can out of a word, have maintained that the Prophet selected 
this substance, as expressive of the union of the divine and human nature 
in Christ. 
Amber having been first found on the shores of the Baltic, Skinner is of 
opinion that the Arabs were indebted for their name Ambra or Antar, as 
well as for the substance itself, to the Teutonic nations. In Dutch 4eil- 
bern is to burn up, and %Aen-bern-steen, lapis ustilis, the comlustible stone. 
Bern-steen is still its name in Holland. It appears from Tacitus (De Mor. 
Germ.) that the ancient Germans called it Glas, which is probably the same 
word with our Glass. 
