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160 NATURAL HISTORY OF GEMS.
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The Lyncurium
derives its name from the strange notion that it was the urine of the
Lynx petrified, and it is so described by Theophrastus (28) : " Equally
wonderful is the Lyncurium (for out of this also signets are engraved,
since it is very hard, exactly like a real stone), fur it attracts in
the same manner as Amber, some say not only straws and bits of wood,
but even copper and iron, if they be in thin pieces, as Diocles also
hath observed. It is highly transparent and cold to the touch.
That produced by the male lynx is better than that by the female, and
that of the wild lynx better than that of the tame, in consequence both
of the difference of their food, and of the former having plenty of
exercise, the latter none—hence the secretions of the wild are the more
limpid. Those practised in the search find it by digging ; for the
animal endeavours to conceal the deposit by scraping up ihe earth after
having voided it. There is a peculiar and tedious method of working up
this substance also (as well as the Smaragdus)." Ovid repeats the same
story (Met. xv. 413).
"
Victa racemifero lyneas dedit India Baccho E quibus ut memorant
quicquid vesica remisit Vertitur in lapides et congelât aëre tacto."
Pliny
indeed (xxxvii. 13), after apologising for mentioning the Lyncurium,
"to which he was forced by the pertinacity of writers on mineralogy,"
quotes the above passage from Theophrastus; and declares that unless
the thing- were
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