292 A POPULAR TREATISE ON GEMS.
Two
very beautiful flower-vases of black onyx, colored with natural white
veins, two large cups of red chalcedony colored, long square links of
chalcedony, connected together without joints, and alternating in
colors, also a very beautiful snuff-box of green jasper, were seen at
the London Exhibition, manufactured by Wild & Robinson, in Oberstein.
Some
modern works of cameo, from the hand of the celebrated Puckler, are in
the collection of Robert Gilmore, Esq., at Baltimore, and in that of W.
J. Lane, Esq., of this city, who possesses also a Washington head of
black and white onyx, by Isler, which is extremely beautiful; also a,
very fine modern cameo in onyx, two inches in length, I saw in Stephen
H. Palmer's establishment.
CHRYSOPRASE.
The
ancients by this name designated a stone of a green color, with a
yellowish tinge; but it is not certain whether that which goes by this
name, at the present day, is the same. We find, in the fourteenth
century, this stone used as ornaments in churches and other places, but
it was not known by the above name until 1740, when it was discovered
by a Prussian officer in Silesia. Frederick the Second ornamented his
palace Sans Souci with this mineral.
The common peo'ple of Silesia wear the chrysoprase around the neck as a charm against pains.
Chrysoprase
occurs massive and in plates; the fracture is even and splintery; it is
translucent; lustre, resinous; sometimes dull apple-green, grass-green,
olive-green, and whitish-green color; it scratches white glass
distinctly, but is not so hard as true chalcedony; specific gravity,
2.56; it is infusible before the blowpipe, but loses its color when
heated; it consists of silex, with a little carbonate of lime, alumina,
oxide of iron, and nickel; its color is imparted by
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