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Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead

Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead Page of 453 Ch. 1: Pantarbes Text size:minus plus Restore normal size   Mail page  Print this page
282                                OVUM ANGUINUM.
pure white marble dispersed throughout an unmixed green mass, much resembling Jasper in its colour and slight translucency. The Ophites (Green Serpentine), on the contrary, is dull, opaque, and merely speckled with white. Pliny makes two kinds : the pale and softer, the dark of superior hardness. He notes that it did not afford columns, except of very small dimensions. In fact existing remains show that the Romans used it chiefly in veneers for coating the walls of rooms, or for inlaying in their " pavi-menta sectilia." The Romans evidently knew nothing of the quarries at Prato near Florence, that now furnish Green Ser­pentine, " Verde di Prato," in inexhaustible quantities, and extensively employed by the Tuscan marble-workers for vases, inkstands, and similar artistic manufactures.
Ovum Anguinum, Druid's Bead Page of 453 Ch. 1: Pantarbes
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