ounce to four ounces; the largest or purest pieces of which are used for jewelry, and the impure for incense or medicine.
3. The nodules are still smaller.
4. The varnish stones
are still smaller than the former, but are very pure and hard, so as to
be easily pulverized, and are used for varnishes, sealing-wax, &v.
5. The sandstones are very small, opaque, and perforated pieces.
6. The lumps are
large but impure specimens, unfit for a lapidary's use; they are sold
as specimens, employed as incense, or for the manufacture of succinic
acid.
1. Refuse are those pieces which fall off at the lapidary's bench.
The pure amber receives from the lapidary distinct names, according to the shades of color it possesses, such as egg, pale,
and light yellow, and so into its brownish shades. The assorted amber
is treated according to the various purposes it is intended for, and
receives its requisite form by cleaving with an appropriate instrument,
by which, also, the external crust is removed. It is generally believed
that the worse the crust is in appearance, the more beautiful is the
interior of the amber.
Amber,
taking a very high polish, is employed for a great many purposes of
jewelry, and for various ornaments, such as beads, necklaces,
bracelets, ear-rings, buttons, rosaries, mouth-pieces for pipes,
cane-heads, snuffboxes, work-boxes, &c. It is generally wrought oft
the turner's lathe, by steel instruments, and is easily bored ; it is
polished on a leaden wheel, with pumice-stone, then with linen or a
hat-body and rotten-stone, and lastly by rubbing it with the hand.
Common specimens are polished with a linen rag, chalk, and water. Beads
of amber must be drilled before receiving the facets. In cutting and
working amber, care
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