Notes . 
[November, 
! 77 ° 
alba , and that at Chicago, a chemist, in want of antimony 
sulphide, could find in the shops merely marble-dust blackened 
with soot. 
Metallurgy, Mineralogy, Mining, &c 
In a recent report of the proceedings of the Manchester Lite- 
rary and Philosophical Society there is a description, by Charles 
A. Burghardt, Ph.D., of a precious garnet (almandine) from 
Ramsbottom, Lancashire. Dr. Burghardt was asked to examine 
certain red granules present in a small specimen of rock, in 
order to ascertain whether they were garnets or not. The rock 
itself is a conglomerate of milky quartz grains, cemented to- 
gether with silica and calcium carbonate ; and disseminated 
throughout this conglomerate are the garnet grains in question, 
the whole constituting a 14-feet “ fault” in the coal-seam known 
as the Sand-rock or Feather-edge Seam in the “ Shipperbottom 
Mine,” near Grant’s Tower at Ramsbottom. A microscopical 
examination of the rock showed the garnets to be very irregular 
in form and to vary considerably in size, the largest attaining a 
width of about 2*25 m.m., and the smallest about 075 m.m. 
Both the garnets and the quartz grains could be extracted from 
the matrix, a cast of their forms v being left behind. The red 
grains fused easily and quietly before the blowpipe to a black 
bead, which was not, however, magnetic : they were somewhat 
attacked by hydrochloric acid, with a slight separation of pow- 
dery silica; the presence of iron was also detected. The hard- 
ness of the mineral was 7*5, and its specific gravity 4*09 at g°C. 
Dr. Burghardt hopes shortly to determine the chemical compo- 
sition. A microscopical examination of the garnet grains 
showed them to be crystalline, exhibiting certain marked pecu- 
liarities, and after a careful examination of many of them he came 
to the conclusion that the form in which they crystallised was 
the rhombic dodecahedron. It is somewhat difficult to draw a 
conclusion as to the origin of these garnets in such a locality. 
From the microscopical examination of the rock it would appear 
that the cement and the garnets were both in a soft and pasty 
condition, the latter being probably formed whilst in the pasty 
matrix, and prevented from attaining a normal development. 
The quartz grains were probably formed previously to the gar- 
nets, as they appear to be waterworn pebbles, and were most 
likely carried along with the semi-paste-like mass which con- 
tained the constituents of garnet and calcite in its substance. 
When the paste hardened, the quartz grains and the garnets 
were enclosed in the manner exhibited on the specimen of rock 
from Ramsbottom. All the constituents of garnet were at hand, 
namely, aluminous shale, which would furnish the alumina and 
silica) and iron pyrites, which would furnish the iron, whilst 
water impregnated with calcium carbonate, adting upon the shale 
