CAT'S-EYE
Is named from its resemblance to a cat's-eye.
It is a variety of chrysoberyl found in Ceylon, China, and Brazil.
Crystallization trimetric, occurring in composite crystals containing minute internal striations.
Hardness, 8.5; specific gravity, 3.5 to 3.8.
Lustre brilliant, with iridescent ray; translucent.
Cleavage imperfect; fracture conchoidal.
Doubly refractive; dichroic.
Composed of alumina, 78 to 79; glucina, 18 to 20; a trace of lime and oxide of iron.
Infusible alone, but melts with borax or salts of phosÂphorus ; unaffected by acids.
Colors are gray, brown, black, modified by yellowish or greenish tints.
It is cut en cabochon.
Symbol: warns of danger and trouble.
A
similar stone, the quartz cat's-eye, lacks the brilliancy and soft
coloring of the true cat's-eye. It is found in various shades of
greenish and yellowish gray, and brown. HardÂness, 6 to 7; specific
gravity, 2.6. Melts with soda to a clear glass; soluble in hydrofluoric
acid, and is never dichroic. It is composed of silicon, 48; oxygen, 51;
oxide of iron, etc., 1. When cut convex, a band of light appears across
the parallel fibres of asbestos which are included in this variety of
quartz, as it does in the Oriental cat's-eye.
