thin superficial coating of metal, which, when broken, is in consequence found hollow: Cumberland Cavern and elsewhere. CUPRIFEROUS CALAMINE in beautiful green, diverging spheroidal tufts-on common calamine and calc: spar: Rutland Cavern. SILICIOUS OXIDE OF ZINC, crystalized and stalactitic, somewhat similar to the carbonate, occurs associated with cadmiferous calamine, which is radiated of a greenish colour: Rutland and Cumberland Caverns. IRON PYRITES Occurs massive and crystallized, in cubes and tetrahedrons of a yellow colour; sometimes brilliantly iridescent, often embedded in fluor spar. It is a sulphuret of iron, and is found generally. IRON PYRITES, crystallized in cubes and massive, in flat pieces with fluor spar. Do. in tetrahedrons variously modified, also aggregated in stalactitic masses, assuming the most extraordinary forms-fracture divergent -colour yellow and irridescent: Botstone Mine, Staffordshire. COCKSCOMB PYRITES is nearly tin-white crystallized, in modified rhombic prisms, aggregated, divergent, or stellular, with fluor spar, &c., often embedded: Ashover, &c. UMBER, a dark, dull oxide of iron, from the shale of Elton. COPPER ORES.-Copper Pyrites, (Sulphuret of Copper,) crystallized in tetrahedrons or coating cawk, or dog tooth spar: Ecton Mine, Staff. EARTHY BLUE and GREEN CARBONATE OF COPPER, with calc: spar, and sometimes with a brown oxide of copper: Middleton and Hopton. BLACK OXIDE OF MANGANESE is found as a thin seam in the clay beds and yellow ochres; it is generally pulverulent or friable, rarely compact, it is also called black wad: Ball-eye, Bonsall, &c. FLUOR SPAR.-Fluate of Lime (Lime and Fluoric Acid.)—This forms a most beautiful family, and is nowhere found workable but in this county. It occurs nodular in clay, sometimes in flat lumps, striated, massive, and crystalized, of every colour and shade, but chiefly blue and yellow. This last forms the matrix of the richest vein of lead ore found in the county (Gloria Mine, Crich Cliff.) It is extremely fragile or brittle, being fractured in all directions, hence the term spar or sparry, notwithstanding it is worked into the most delicate forms by the skill of the workmen. The colours are extremely brilliant and beautiful. (See remarks, page 224.) BLUE FLUOR SPAR (Blue John).-Structure prismatic or striated. AMETHYSTINE,* FLUOR SPAR (see note p. 225.) There is a natural colour of this, called Bull beef. The veins of this variety, 6 or 7 number, are extremely beautiful. WHITE OF CLEAR FLUOR SPAR, with one delicate blue vein. EARTHY BLUE DO.-Compact and friable; sometimes crystallized in beautiful cubes: Ball-eye, Bonsall, &c. YELLOW DO.-Massive and in cubes, sometimes beautifully iridescent, and when polished, called moss-spar, frequently found with lead Crich Cliff, &c. ore. YELLOW, GREY, and BLUE FLUOR SPAR, with Cawk: Bradwell Spar. TRANSPARENT Do.-Crystallized in cubes with Iron Pyrites, seen embedded coating the enclosed crystals, very beautiful: Matlock and Ashover. *A variety of this called the "dice spar" exhibits. when worked, triangular configurations, and the play or iridescency of the colours are extremely vivid and beautiful. A yellow or grey variety of this also occurs. CALCAREOUS SPAR.-Carbonate of Lime. DOG TOOTH SPAR, with double hexagonal pyramids occurs amber coloured, but generally clear and transparent (scalon dodecahedron) frequently aggregated in immense masses, and sometimes coated by copper pyrites (Ecton Mine, Staffordshire.) It occurs in great quantities throughout Derbyshire; the modifications of this crystal are exceedingly : numerous. RHOMBOIDAL Do.-When transparent it is double refracting, like the Iceland spar. It occurs white and opaque, in thick seams in the lime stone. Do. Do. with copper pyrites embedded. FIBROUS OF STRIATED CARBONATE OF LIME.-Colour pinkish; the structure is similar to the Satin Spar of Cumberland: Speedwell Mine, Matlock Bath. (Rare.) STALACTITES.-These are also carbonates of lime, but of more recent formation, and the product of every period. Their formation is still rapidly proceeding in many places by the percolation of water through the limestone beds, carrying with it particles of lime in solution, which is deposited on the roofs and sides of caverns and mines, by the evaporation of the water and escape of the excess of the carbonic acid gas. Their structure is massive, granular and radiated. Suspended from the roofs of Caverns in conical and spiral masses (sometimes hollow) found from the most delicate quill size to the gigantic pillar, reaching the floor and supporting the massive roof, or hanging in exquisite folds like drapery on the sides, and are of every colour and variety of shade, from the purest transparent and milky white to dark brown, often interlineated like agate. The Stalagmites are mammillated and exhibit concentric rings of different colours when cut, but they often occur flat and even laminated on the floors of mines and caverns. COMMON STALACTITE.-Compact, striated or ribbed. Moor, and generally in the limestone. Middleton Do.-Hollow, pipe-like or tubular. Castleton & Bradwell Caves. WHITE DO.-Transparent,veined, and milky white (oriental alabaster). Hopton Moor. RIBBON DO. (Bacon Stone.)-Brown and dirty whitish bands. Newhaven. WAVED DO.-A beautiful variety (rare). Wirksworth. GREENARRAGONITE.-Coloured by green or blue carbonate of copper, which is sometimes found in it. Hopton Moor. ARRAGONITE. Botryoidal and Mammillated on Magnesian limestone, (snow fossil.) Cumberland Cavern. SELENITE.-Sulphate of Lime, locally termed snow fossil, as the preceding, but distinguished by its being much softer and the brilliancy of its crystals, it is crystallized in flat octahedrons, or in delicate four-sided prisms, then called capillary gypsum or hair fossil, transparent, but crumbles to pieces by the slightest touch: both the last in Cumberland Cavern. BARYTIC FAMILY.-BARIUM (Terra ponderosa) a Sulphate of Barytes is found abundantly in Derbyshire, often forming the matrix of the These pyramids, when broken, are found to be composed of Rhombic crystals (primitive Rhomb) the line of cleavage, of which is sometimes distinctly visible in the larger ones. If broken into millions of fragments, each particle would be found to retain the form of the original Rhomb. The clear are beautifully and powerfully double refracting richest lead veins, of a dull earthy white or yellowish colour. It occurs massive and botryoidal or in fibrous tufts radiated, and sometimes crystallized in thin folia or tabulated crystals. The massive white (cawk) is extensively used as a pigment, under the name of Dutch Lead, being washed and ground down at various mills for this purpose. WHITE OF YELLOWISH SULPHATE OF BARYTES.-Massive and botryoidal. Found generally. RAMOSE OF ARBORESCENT Do.-Colour whitish, with brown earthy oxide of iron. (Brain stone.) Bonsall Moor, &c. FOLIATED DO.-In flat rhomboidal tables singularly grouped and some transparent: occurring in a loose red earth in the limestone.Staffordshire. PINK Do.-Coloured by oxide of iron: Ashover. Do. Do.-Striped or veined with earthy blue fluor spar: Crich. CALCIFEROUS Do.--Radiated and Stalactitic, colour brown or dark reddish brown; it takes a high polish, and then presents a great variety of configurations (Onyx-stone) and is manufactured into various fancy articles. The transverse section of the Stalactite is beautifully radiated with concentric rings. This peculiar mineral is only found in one place, and first in the year 1832, in a cross vein in the Dunstone, embedded in clay on " Arbellow," Middleton by Youlgreave. It contains about 20 per cent. of lime and 4 of oxide of iron. SILICIOUS BODIES.-QUARTZ occurs crystallized in six-sided pyramids on limestone: Ashover, Matlock, &c. Do. in detached crystals in hexagonal prisms, with double hexagonal pyramids Buxton or Derbyshire Diamond. Some are very small and perfectly transparent, others highly ferruginous or of a Topazine colour. They scratch glass easily: Buxton, Priestcliff, &c. MILLSTONE GRIT AND SHALE-SECOND DERBYSHIRE ORDER. These measures form some of the highest and most sterile tracts in the county, the grit frequently covered with a fine purple heath, (Erica vulgaris and cinerea) the shale "with bluish sedgy pastures." The grit is generally found ur der the form of a coarse grained sandstone, and is raised in immense blocks ;* but it is sometimes highly feldspaothic and micacious when it becomes finely laminated, and raised in thin plates for roofing slates, &c. It is usually of a brown or yellow colour, the fine-grained varieties often beautifully figured with red and yellow bands, forming the most graceful flexures. Beds of shale alternate most frequently with the grit of a similar character to the one described.† Quartz, Iron Pyrites, Bitumen, Asphalt, Petroleum, nodules of Ironstone, crystallized Barytes, and blue Lead Ore sometimes occur. Naphtha has been discovered occasionally. On the preceding rests the coal measures, with their immense beds of Ironstone and alternating measures of Shale and Sandstone, exhibiting in prodigious numbers the beautiful floral productions of a preceding state of things. Lead has sometimes though rarely been found in the coal, but Iron Pyrites exist in abundance. Septaria and Muscle Ironstone are frequently found. We have grouped these with the former, and shall now give the list together. * Huge blocks of this stone have been quarried and formed into pillars, &c. for the Birmingham Railway Station. + Sometimes thin beds of indifferent coal are found in these measures. MILLSTONE GRIT.-Coarse grained and at times pebbly. ELASTIC BITUMEN.-Mam Tor, Castleton. ASPHALT.-Compact Bitumen: colour brownish black. MUSCLE SHELL IRONSTONE.-The Myce ovalis embedded : near Chesterfield. CLAY IRONSTONE WITH CALC: VEINS.-Septaria or Turtlestone. SALIFEROUS FORMATION-THIRD DERBYSHIRE Order. This group includes the new Red Sandstone, Red Marl and Magnesian Limestone measures, with their subordinates or Gypsum beds. It contains few organic remains. This order is developed in great force in the south and eastern divisions of the county, and presents a striking contrast to the preceding. Gentle knolls supply the place of the dark gritstone crags and beautiful interlineated beds of fine red, green, and yellow Sandstones and Marls, that of the dark shales and steril grits. The prevailing colours of the Magnesian bed are grey and yellow, frequently salmon colour. Structure compact and glistening, but often porous and conglomerate, with concretional and botryoidal masses, varying from the size of a pea (Blidworth pearls) to that of a cannon ball. The beds at Bolsover are separated by thin seams of pipe clay. It is sometimes found laminated and flexible at Sunderland.† NEW RED SANDSTONE.-Green, red, and yellow. RED MARL.-Earthy and dull, containing fibrous gypsum beds. SUBORDINATE BEDS-SULPHATES OF LIME-PLASTER OF PARIS. PURE WHITE Do.-Derbyshire alabaster: Chellaston and Tutbury. FIBROUS DO.-Beautifully silky and glistening: Red-hill, Notts. These are worked into every kind of ornament, from the elegant necklace to the huge vase or column. Selenite in large flat octahedral crystals occurs in these beds. CALCAREOUS TUFA.-A recent formation (see p. 11, where the mode of formation is described) occurs generally of a loose porous nature, composed entirely of vegetable matter encrusted with lime. Sometimes it is coated with stalactite and takes a polish, and often encloses shells--the common helix. CALCAREOUS TUFA.-Ramose white and brown. Do. Do.-Compact and yellowish, polished. Do. Do.-Enclosing shells or recent fossils. The Coal of Bull-bridge is of the former class, and the Swanwick hard of the latter. The coal field of Derbyshire is amazingly productive, as the Ironworks at Butterley and Codnor Park evince. + Some years ago a slight vein of lead ore was found in the Magnesian Limestone, near Chesterfield; but it proved, as might be expected, not worth working. These beds form the common plaster of commerce used for castings, mouldings, &c. &c. The most perfect varieties are admirably carved into the figures of animals, &c. at Hall's Spar-works, Derby. BOTANY OF THE HIGH AND LOW PEAK. The Botany of the Peak is a matter of such deep interest to all, or most visitors, who love to scale its mountain heights or explore its beautiful vales, that the author has been induced to add the following list of the more peculiar plants, which he trusts will be found of advantage to them. The objects of this study are so attractive and numerous, that "its pleasures spring up under our feet, and as we pursue them reward us with health and serene satisfaction."-Here, as it is well expressed by an amiable writer, "all is elegance and delight." The sweet fragrance, lovely pencillings and delicate forms of these objects forcibly impress well regulated minds with the goodness and wisdom of God, and while they admire, they cannot fail but to adore the hand who made them, and with the poet they will sing "Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fruits, and flowers, Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil paints." The following list has been carefully prepared by the assistance of a friend, and some important additions have since been kindly made to it by J. Gisborne, Esq., than whom, there is none more competent to write on the flora of this county, and to whom the author begs to express his best acknowledgments. It should be observed, that wherever “M. B.” occurs it means Matlock Bath. DIANDRIA. Ligustrum vulgare; Privet. May to June; white. Circæa alpina-a variety of Alpine enchanters; Nightshade. Lover's walk, Matlock Bath; July to August. Veronica alpina; Alpine Speedwell. July to Aug.; blue; Masson, M. B. TRIANDRIA. Eriophorum angustifolium; Many-headed cotton grass. Dovedale and near Wirksworth; March. vaginatum; Hare's tail rush, Moss crops, or Single-headed cotton grass. April; Dovedale. polystachion; Moss crops or Cotton grass. April; Dovedale. TETRANDRIA. Scabiosa columbaria ; Fine leaved scabious. Heights of Dovedale; June ot August. Asperula odorata; Sweet Woodruff. Dovedale, Matlock, &c.; May. Galium pusillum least mount; Goose grass. Matlock Bath and Middleton Dale; May to August. Plentiful. PENTANDRIA. Lethospermum officinale; Corn grow well. Matlock; June. Cynoglossum officinale; Hound's tongue. M. B. and Ashover; June. Polemonium cœruleum; Greek Valerian or Jacob's Ladder. Lover's Leap, Buxton, &c.; June. Campanula rotundifolia; Round leaved bell flower. Matlock Bath, Dale Abbey, and Chee Tor; August to September. latifolia; Giant, or broad leaved bell flower. Dovedale, Matlock and Rowsley; August. Trachelium; Canterbury bells. glomerata; Clustered bell flower. Matlock Bath, &c.; July. Haddon Hall; July. |