BLACK MARBLE. Ill 
fine close grain, but not very hard. The flowering in 
it is light, and beautiful, like fine needle-work, or rather 
resembling the frosty fret-work upon glass windows, in 
a winter morning. 
The cutting and polishing of marble appear to have 
been performed by the ancients nearly in the same man- 
ner as it is with us. In polishing, the first substance 
employed is a sharp, coarse-grained sand. Afterwards 
a finer sand is used, then emery (58) in different degrees 
of fineness. These are followed by a red powder called 
tripoli (119) : and the last polish is given with putty. 
184. BLACK MARBLE is a species of limestone, of uni- 
form black colour, and easily distinguishable, by an exces- 
sively disagreeable smell, which is emitted on rubbing two 
pieces of it together, or striking it with a hammer. 
Few minerals are susceptible of a more beautiful 
polish than this. It is consequently much used for 
chimney-pieces, small columns, vases, and other orna- 
mental work. There are two quarries of black marble 
near Bake well, in Derbyshire : and it is manufactured 
to a considerable extent by Messrs. Brown and Co. at 
Derby, who have fixed up in their ware-rooms a large 
slab of it as a looking-glass. 
By the ancients it was much prized. Marcus Scau- 
rus is said to have ornamented his palace wjth columns 
of black marble, each thirty-eight feet high"; and many 
of the monuments of ancient Persepolis were executed 
in it. M. D'Avejan, Bishop of Alais, used a kind of 
black marble for paving the apartments of his palace; 
but the friction and heat rendered it so fetid that his 
successors were compelled to substitute another species 
of stone in its place. The pavements, however, of many 
churches, and of the porticos of several galleries, on the 
Continent, are of black marble. 
185. CALCAREOUS ALABASTER is a species of lime- 
stone of somewhat tchitish or yellowish colour, translucent, 
and internally splendent or shining. 
It is nearly a pure carbonat of lime; and occurs in masses, 
