GRIMSLEY. | History and Distribution. 21 
(Latin Capio) = to take, so named because the rock is smooth 
and slippery and difficult to handle. Another writer gives an 
Arabic origin, from al batstratron, meaning a white stone. 
Some even connect the word with the Latin albus = white. A 
derivation which seems most probable connects the word with 
the town of Alabastron, in Egypt, where in early times there 
was a manufactory of urns, vases and other ornaments made 
from the gypsum stone found in the mountains near by. This 
old town was situated, according to Mr. James Burton, south 
of the ruins of Antinoe, on the east bank of the Nile, in lati- 
tude 27° 43’ and longitude 30°. The word alabaster was also 
used by the ancient people for a liquid measure which would 
hold ten ounces of wine or nine ounces of oil. 
The alabaster used in these early days came mainly from 
Syria and upper Egypt. The statues and basso relievos of the 
mausoleum of the Connetable de Lesdiguieres, of the Cathedral 
of. Gap, were made from alabaster taken from Boscadon near 
Kmbrun, in the High Alps. Important deposits were found 
near Coblentz in Germany, near Cluny in France, and near 
Rome in Italy. The Encyclopedia Perthensis, written in 1816, 
states that 
‘There is a church in Florence still illuminated, instead of by panes of glass, 
by slabs of alabaster near fifteen feet high each of which forms a single window 
through which light is conveyed.”’ 
Kighteenth Century Gypsum Literature. 
Gypsum rock was not very thoroughly examined or investi- 
gated until the present century. Chambers’ Dictionary of Arts 
and Sciences in 1753 gives the following summary of the knowl- 
edge concerning this mineral down to that time: 
‘*Gypsum in natural history, the name of a class of fossils; the characters of 
which are these: They are composed of small flat particles irregularly arranged, 
and giving the whole masses something of the appearance of the softer marbles; 
they are bright, glassy, and in a small degree transparent; not flexile nor 
elastic, not giving fire with steel, nor fermenting with or dissoluble in acid 
menstruum, and calcine very readily in the fire. Of this class of bodies there are 
two orders, and under those, four genera. The first order is of the gypsums 
which are of a firm, compact texture and considerably hard. The second, of those 
which are of a lax or loose texture and are accordingly soft and crumbly. 
“The genera of the first order of the gypsums are these: 1. Those which are 
