Ambergris

“ The same writer estimates that the dragon-fly, which passes and repasses as in instantaneous jerks, is capable of flying at a speed of from eighty to a hundred miles an hour.
Ambergris.—The word ambergris is French for gray amber, which is a misnomer, for ambergris is a very different substance from amber. The latter is fossilized resin, and is therefore of vegetable origin, while the former is a product of some disease in the sperm whale. Ambergris is sometimes found in the intestines of the whale, but most of the supply is picked up in masses which float on the surface of tropical seas. ”

“ Moreover we found in the island abundance of the finest aloes-wood, both Chinese and Comorin; and there also is a spring of crude ambergris, which exudes over the sides, as it were gum, for the great heat of the sun, and runs down to the sea-shore, where the monsters of the deep come up and swallowing it, return into the sea. But it burns in their bellies ”

“ They have in this Island many trees of red sanders, of excellent quality; in fact, all their forests consist of it.{2} They have also a quantity of ambergris, for whales are abundant in that sea, and they catch numbers of them; and so are Oil-heads, which are a huge kind of fish, which also produce ambergris like the whale.{3} There are numbers of leopards, bears, and lions in the country, and other wild beasts in abundance. Many traders, and many ships go thither with cloths of gold and silk, and many other kinds of goods, and drive a profitable trade. ”

“ Red coral was forming immovable groves on the substrata of the Balearic Islands, and on the coasts of Naples and Africa. Ambergris was constantly being found on the steep shores of Sicily. Sponges were growing in the tranquil waters in the shadow of the great rocks of Mallorca and the Isles of Greece. Naked men without any equipment whatever, holding their breath, were still descending to the bottom as in primitive times, in order to snatch these treasures away. ”

“ That which is freest from filth or dross of any kind, and purest in itself, ought to be chosen; of a colour inclining to white, or ash-coloured, or intermixed with ash-coloured veins, and other white veins. When put into water it ought to swim; and though some that is sophisticated will likewise float, it is certain that none which is pure will sink. The greatest quantity of this commodity comes from Mozambique and Sofala.
[Footnote 140: Ambergris is assuredly meant in the text.--E.]
SECTION 9. Of the principal Places of Trade in India, and the Commodities they afford. ”

“ Such as are employed to keep the cattle belonging to the Arabs maintain themselves on milk.
I could not learn of any merchandize produced in this island, except aloes and dragon's blood; and some black ambergris is said to be got on the shores of Abba del Curia. They could make, in my opinion, more aloes than could be used in all Christendom, as the plant from which it is procured grows every where in great abundance, being no other than the semper vivum of Dioscorides, with whose description it agrees in seed, stalk, &c. ”

“ Amber is naturally invested with a Crust, as the Flints and other natural fossile Nodules are; it is found in this State, in digging, in Prussia, Pomerania, and other Places, and is called Rock Amber. When it has been washed out of its native Place by the Sea, and divested of this Crust, it is called Wash'd Amber, or Smocth Amber. We have of both these Kinds in England; the rough is found in digging to considerable Depths in Clay, but is commonly of an ill Colour, and impregnated with the vitriolic Salts, with which almost all our Clay-pits abound ”

“ Amber is the fossilized resinous exudation from several species of extinct coniferous trees, of which one, the Pinites succinifer, is supposed to have produced a greater part. It now appears like coal, in connection with beds of which it is usually found, as a product of the mineral kingdom. It formerly had a high reputation as a medicine, but the virtues ascribed to it were almost entirely imaginary. It is usually of a pale yellow color, sometimes reddish or brownish, sometimes transparent, sometimes almost opaque. ”

“ A. We know of none but such as drop from Trees, and come from diverse Places in Siam, Cambodia, Pegu, &c.
Q. 23.⁠If the best Ambergrease be found in the Islands Socotora and Aniana, near Java? To endeavour the getting of more certain Knowledge, what it is; being reported to be bred in the Bottom of the Sea like to a thick Mud?
A. The best that is in the World comes from the Island Mauritius: and is commonly found, after a Storm. The Hogs can smell it at a great Distance; who run like mad to it, and devour it commonly before the People come to it. ”

“ If the liquor traffic is not speedily suppressed, the population is doomed.
Ambrym offers quite a different aspect from the coral islands, as its sloping sides are seamed by streams of lava, the course of which may be traced by the breaks in the forest, as the glowing mass flows slowly down to the coast, congealing in the water to peculiarly shaped jagged rocks. Every few hundred yards we find one of these black walls on the shore in which the sea foams, and the sand that covers the beaches is black too. ”

“ We must not confound the yellow amber of the Baltic with the red amber found in Italy, in the mountains of Lebanon, and even in some lignites in the south of France. Sadowski: “Le Commerce de l’Ambre chez les Anciens.”
8 Nephrite is found in Turkestan, in Siberia, and in New Zealand. Deposits of jadeite are known in Burmah, Jeannetay, and Michel—“Note stir la Néphrite ou jade de Sibérie” (Bul. Soc. Minéralogique de France, 1881) . Meyer: “Die Nephritfrage kein ethnologische Problem,” Berlin, 1882. ”

“ The territories where amber is found extend over Pomerania and East and West Prussia, as far as Lithuania and Poland, but chiefly in the former provinces, where it is found almost uniformly in separate nodules in the sand, clay, or fragments of lignite of the upper tertiary and alluvial formations. It also occurs in the beds of streams, and in the sand-banks of rivers. How far its seat may extend under the Baltic is of course unknown. Amber is likewise met with on the coast of Denmark and Sweden, in Gallicia and Moravia, near Christiania in Norway, and in Switzerland, near Basle. ”

“ The Burmese amber is yellow or reddish, some being of ruby tint, and like the Sicilian amber it is fluorescent. Burmite and simetite agree also in being destitute of succinic acid. Most of the Burmese amber is worked at Mandalay into rosary-beads and ear-cylinders.
Many other fossil resins more or less allied to amber have been described. Schraufite is a reddish resin from the Carpathian sandstone, and it occurs with jet in the cretaceous rocks of the Lebanon; ambrite is a resin found in many of the coals of New Zealand ”

“ That Amber is a Stone, or native Fossile, the best of the modern Writers seem as certain, as that Gems, Rocks, or Minerals are so. It has, however, for many Ages, been judged by some, to be of a vegetable, and by others an animal, nature. And a thousand idle and incoherent Systems have been received as to its Formation: Dioscorides thought it an Exsudation of the black Poplar; and Pliny, of the Pine; and others, the Fat or Semen of Whales. And it is but of late, that the World has been again brought into the Opinion, that it is, as this Author esteemed it, a mere native Fossile. ”

“ It has already been mentioned that insects are occasionally found in amber. These are generally in a very perfect state, and consist of flies, small moths, &c. Grains of sand, pieces of iron pyrites, and the leaves of plants, are also sometimes found in it. Insects, sand, and other substances, are likewise remarked in a species of gum, called gum animè, which, in colour, appearance, and qualities, so nearly resembles amber, that it is almost impossible to distinguish the two substances from each other. ”

“ The occurrence of amber on our coasts does not appear to have been observed in ancient times, unless possibly by Sotacus. [80] As already observed, it is occasionally found at the present day on our Eastern coast.
Beads formed of selected pebbles of quartz or other material are rarely found accompanying interments of the Stone Age in Britain. In France [81] they seem to be more common. Some neatly-pierced pebbles of rose-quartz, bored in the same manner as the perforated stone hammers, were found in the Allée couverte of Argenteuil ”

“ On the towering Andes, fifteen thousand feet above the tide-marks of the Pacific, the geologist finds sea-shells imbedded in the rock, and high above the snow-line the chamois-hunter of the Alps wonders at the sight of spirally-wound Ammonites that once enjoyed life at the bottom of the Liassic Sea. In strata of a more modern date, we find, on the banks of the river Senegal, far inland, large deposits of the Arca senilis, a mollusc still living on the neighbouring coast. ”

“ In more than one instance an amber bead was found attached to, or lying near, a skeleton. I am inclined to put the amber beads in a special class because of the virtues formerly assigned to this substance. Amber shielded the living from evil, and it sped the departed on their long journey. Decoration, therefore, was not the sole reason for the selection. Elton quotes an ancient Welsh poem, in which is described, with “Homeric minuteness,” the amber ornaments of the British chief Gododin ”

“ The geographical distribution of Ammonites in the ancient world, seems to have partaken of that universality, we find so common in the animals and vegetables of a former condition of our globe, and which differs so remarkably from the varied distribution that prevails among existing forms of organic life. We find, the same genera, and, in a few cases, the same species of Ammonites, in strata, apparently of the same age, not only throughout Europe, but also in distant regions of Asia, and of North and South America. ”

“ At all events, the amber-rings of rude workmanship which have been found at a considerable depth below the surface of the earth, along with rough pieces, sufficiently prove that man must have been a very old inhabitant of the Baltic regions, for those remarkable specimens of his unskilled industry have evidently preceded the catastrophe which buried the rough amber under the earth, and must have been exposed for the same lapse of time to the influences of the soil, as they are all found covered with the same dull and damaged crust. ”

“ From the mangrove swamps at the mouths of turbid, sluggish rivers, where numberless alligators dwell in congenial slime, the State gradually rises inland, passing through all the imaginable wealth of tropical vegetation and produce till it becomes hilly, if not mountainous. Sparkling streams dash through limestone fissures, the air is clear, and the nights are fresh and cool. Its mineral wealth lies in its tin mines, which have been worked mainly by Chinamen for a great number of years. ”

“ Leaving the American Continent and adjacent islands and archipelagos, the next great land-mass to receive attention will be the Continent of Africa. In giving a census of the species and genera of earthworms which inhabit this quarter of the globe it must be premised that the facts relate only to Africa south of the Sahara. ”

“ That portion of Africa below the tropics, and known in general as South Africa, has resources of animal, forest, soil, climate, water and mineral which have proved inviting to Europeans, though there is nothing to render them any more acceptable than similar features as found in other sub-tropical or temperate latitudes, excepting, perhaps, the peculiar mineral deposits in the Kimberly section, which yield diamonds of great value, and a richness of animal life which formerly proved fascinating to the hunter and adventurer. ”

“ Pieces of amber are sometimes found on the beach and are carried as amulets or (rarely) made into beads. Amber is called aúmɐ, a word that in other Eskimo dialects, and probably in this also, means “a live coal.” Its application to a lump of amber is quite a striking figure of speech.
CULTURE. MEANS OF SUBSISTENCE. FOOD. Substances used for food.—
The food of these people consists almost entirely of animal substances. The staple article of food is the flesh of the rough seal, of which they obtain more than of any other meat. ”

“ Leffler wandered away, to speak to others who inspected the amber blocks.
"Superstition is curious, isn't it?" said Marable. "How can anyone think that a fossil creature, penned in such a cell for thousands and thousands of years, could do any harm?"
Professor Young shrugged. "It is just as you say. Superstition is not reasonable. These amber blocks were mined in the Manchurian lignite deposits by Chinese coolies under Japanese masters. They believe anything, the coolies. ”

“ Why, then, should there not be a species in Africa—perhaps more than one—though civilised people are yet unacquainted with it?”
“But you say we are not going to Africa?”
“No; our instructions relate only to every variety of bear known to naturalists; and the African bear does not come under this category—since it has not yet been described by any naturalist. For that reason we shall have no errand into Africa.”
“Then, surely North America is our next stage?” ”

“ Of the plants of the coal period we find not a single one existing in the Amber Forest; the vegetation is much more complicated and various in its aspect; and the numerous coniferæ indicate a climate similar to that of the present northern regions. But arboreal growth was by no means confined to the coniferæ, for evergreen oaks and poplars flourished along with them. ”