176 NATURAL HISTORY of NORWAY. 



fon« der " ^ ie ceraune i lapide, thunderbolts, which were formerly ac- 



counted thunder-ftones, are now unanimously allowed to be ftones 

 artificially wrought into axes, hammers, wedges, and knives, 

 which in the heathenifh times were ufed at fuch facrifices, as, ac- 

 cording to their fuperftition, did not admit the ufe of a tool, or 

 inftrument of any other fubftance ; they are found both here and 

 in Denmark, and chiefly on fuch eminences as v/ere appointed for 

 facrificing. I have them of different fubftances, colour, fize, and 

 figure. The laft has the ftrongeft marks of being the work of 

 art and not a natural form, efpecially in thofe which have a cir- 

 cular hole where the handle or grafp was inferted. 



Eagie-ftone. Aetites, or the eagle-ftone, is found here as in other parts in 

 the nefts of eagles, who, probably, lay it there, to moderate the 

 violent heat exhaling from the breaft of the dam, the eagle being 

 a bird of extreme heat. They are generally of a dark yellow, 

 oblong, and conical at both ends. I have one, which when 

 fhook, rattles, fome folid body unqueftionably being mclofed 



Mefeurs, therein. Of the feveral virtues afcribed to it, Ol. Wormius dif- 



p * ?8 ' courfes more than becomes him, fancy and fuperftition having in 

 my opinion the greateft fhare in them. 



SECT. XII. 



stones plain- I ftiall now m a ^ ew wor ds mention fome pieces pf ftone in my 

 tLk fob? collection, which at flrft fight confirm what I have before faid on 

 foft C a e nd°fluid tne origin of rocks, namely, that the fubftance of marble, and of 

 induced 61117 tne mo & denfe and folid ftones were formerly, and probably at the 

 Plate i 5 . ^ me Q f t fe deluge, foft and fluid, but afterwards coagulated or 

 fublided into their prefent fituation, like metals after fufion. Of 

 this I fay, four pieces of ftone are palpable proofs ; the flrft has 

 very much the appearance of a fmall parcel of hog's-briftles, with 

 their thick ends inverted againft each other, and with a ftraight- 

 nefs which fhews the rapidity of their fluid motion, this piece is 

 white; the fecond piece is a connexion of feveral very remarkable 

 diftincl; quadrangular parts, each of the length of a larding-pin, 

 but of the thicknefs of a ftraw, palling through each other fome- 

 times longitudinally, fometimes tranfverfally ; it is of a dark 

 brown, and vitreous. The third piece confifts of long, fine, light- 

 grey ftri«, ten and more in a fucceilion, and others of a like fi- 

 1 g ure 



