ISLAND OF ANTIPAROS. 127 
its chemical constituents from the alabaster of CHAP. 
ii- 
modern times, or gypsum, which is a sulphat of y ' 
lime. The formation of the carbonated alabaster 
by the stalactite process is now so well known, 
that its explanation may be comprehended in 
very few words. Nothing is more common 
than the presence of carbonic acid in water: and 
when a superabundance of this acid is present, 
the fluid is capable of sustaining, in solution, a 
portion of lime carbonate; but upon the slightest 
agitation, or division, or exposure to atmo- 
spheric air, or change of temperature, the car- 
bonic acid makes its escape, and the fluid, thus 
losing its solvent power, necessarily lets fall 
the lime. All this is very simple, and very 
easily comprehended. The paradox remains Pamdoxi- 
.... ca Phse. 
now to be stated: it is this; that these enor- nomenon. 
mous stalactites, thus formed, during a series of 
ages, by the slow and gradual deposition of lime- 
water, filtering drop by drop from the roof of 
the cavern, offer concentric layers only towards 
their superficies; their interior structure exhi- 
biting a completed crystallization, which sepa- 
rates, by fracture, into semi-transparent rhombs, 
as perfectly formed as if they had resulted from 
a simultaneous instead of a, continuous process. 
Almost every mineralogist may have noticed a 
rhombo'idal termination of the small translucid 
8 
