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COMMON COMPACT LIMESTONE. Joo if it contains petrifactions mineralised, it is named shell or lumachella, and coral or zoophytic marble, according as the organic remains are testaceous or coralline *. In one particular variety of lumachella or shell marble, found at Bleiberg in Carinthia, the shells and fragments of shells, which belong to the nautilus tribe, are set in a brown-coloured basis, and reflect many beautiful and biil- liant pearly inclining to metallic colours, principally the fire-red, green, and blue tints. It is named opalescent or Jirc marble. Another lumachella marble from Astracan, contains, in a reddish-brown basis, pearly shells of nautili, that rellect a very brilliant gold-yellow colour. In some compact marbles, the surface presents a beautiful arbores cent appearance, and tbese are named arborescent or den dritic marbles. In different parts of Scotland, compact limestone is cut and polished as marble: this was the case in the parish of Cummertrees in Dumfriesshire,—in Cambus- lang parish, in Lanarkshire,—in Fifeshire, &c. In Lng- land, many compact limestones arc cut and polished as marbles; such are the limestones of Derbyshire, of York shire, Devonshire, Somersetshire, and Dorsetshire. It is .sometimes used as a building stone; and, in want *>f better materials, for paving streets, and making highways. ^Vhen, by exposure to a high temperature, it is deprived °f its carbonic acid, and converted into quicklime, it is used for mortar; also by the soap-maker, tor rendering Ins alkalies caustic ; by the tanner, for cleansing hides, °r freeing them from hair, muscular substance, and fat, fiy the farmer, in the improvement of particular kinds of s °'d; and by the metallurgist, in the smelting of such j 3 ores * The name marmor, is derived from Ihe Greek to shioe, or g'lHrr, and was by the ancients applied, not only to limestone, but also to »'<>noa possessing agreeable colours, and receiving a good polish, such as tsriwum, jasper, serpentine, and even granite and porphyry.
