The J^tural H'tjlory 
hood may have hie the mark, who doubts not but they are made 
of the fame matter with Gems^ and therefore gives them place 
htiv^^etn Gems znd. Stones^ Inter Gemmas is^ lapides medium locum 
obtinent fluores^ fays he*, to whom in this matter I readily fub- 
fcribe, finding many of them to participate with Gems in iufter, 
but with oi\\tx Stones in foftnefs and brittlenefs ; whence it comes 
to pafs, that they will not polidi like other ftones, and are only 
fit to be mix'd with other metals, w^hich they render much more 
quick \n fufion^ than otherwife they are inclined to be of them- 
felves. 
54. After Stones fo purely made out of V/aters^ that they 
readily return into fluids again, or have only fuch figures, into 
which that Element feems moft naturally to compofe it felf, as the 
Stalagmites and Lafides ftillatitii ; come we next to fuch as re- 
prefent its Inhabitants, the ¥iP:ts of the Sea zxid.fr eftj Waters too : 
of which there are fome of fo great variety of texture, that in 
cafe they were not heretofore the fpoils of real Vijfjes indeed, 
and now petrified,requirea much higher principle for their effor- 
mation ; concerning which before we attempt any thing, let us 
firftconfiderfome of their particular fhapes, with the places and 
poftures they are now found in. 
55. Of fuch as refemble any of the frejh water kind, I have 
met with only one in this County, which did we but know where 
elfe to put it, fliould not be placed here neither ; for it was taken 
out of a block of coal (whereof there is none dug in Oxford-Jhire'y 
by the ingenious and obferving Sir Thomm Pennyfton^ at his Houfe 
*t Cornvrell ; and feems to reprefenC a Carp or Barbel^ the belt 
of any Fifli I have yet compared it with, and rather indeed the 
latter of the two, becaufe of the ftiort and thick fcale : It was 
broken, in taking it out of the Coal, into feveral pieces, whereof 
that is exactly engraven Tab, 3. Fig, 11. kindly beftowed on 
me by that worthy Gentleman^ and by whom the reft ar^ carefully 
preferv'd ; which were it not for want of the variety of co- 
lours, i 111 ould take (for the fcales fake) to be the Lepidotes of 
Plinj^ 
$6. IhtftonesxhTilwc find in this In-land Country, having 
the fliapes of Sea fijh^ are many, but chiefly of the teUaceom kind; 
whereof there are fome that lie in a mafs of ftone together, and 
« tlat. Hiri.lih. 37.C. 10. 
Others 
