[ 127 ]
LI. The Lapis Lyncurius is pellucid, and of a fire Colour: And thoſe Stones which are produced from the Animal in its native Wildneſs, are better than thoſe from the tame; as alſo thoſe from the Male, than thoſe from the Female: As the different nouriſhment the Creature eats, and the different Exerciſe it uſes, as well as the Difference of its whole Habit of Body, in being either dryer or moiſter, make great Differences in the Stones.
a Grain, as we call it, any way reſembling that of a Stone, but compoſed of a number of tranſverſe Striæ; and of the Texture, ſpecific Gravity, and Hardneſs of Talk, which could never give it a Title to what our Author ſays of the Lyncurius; that it was not only hard and ſolid, but ϛερεωτάτη, extremely ſo. Hence, I preſume, I may firſt venture to pronounce this, which is the common Opinion, evidently erroneous, and that the Lapis Lyncurius of the Antients was not the Belemnites.
The few who diſſent from this Opinion, of the Number of whom are Geoffray, Geſner[B 1] &c. hold, that the Lapis Lyncurius of the Antients was no other than Amber. This is the ſecond and only other Opinion worth naming; and the Favourers of it bring many Paſſages from the Copiers of the Antients, to confirm it: All which ſerve to prove what I have before obſerved, that many quote the Antients who have never read them; and ſhew how uſeful, and, indeed, abſolutely neceſſary, a correct Edition of this Work of our Author is, in Reſearches of this kind. This Opinion is even more eaſily than the other proved erroneous from the Words of Theophraſtus; who not only compares the Lyncurius, in ſome of its Properties, to Amber, which, as I have before obſerved in a parallel Caſe in the Note on the
- ↑ Ego Lyncurium a ſuccino differre non video: et id quoque pro Gemma habitum olìm, præſertim quòd aureo colore pellucet et ſplendet, minimè dubito.
