Cobblestone

“ In most rocks, however compact to the eye, there exist interstices, cavities, and other spaces in which water may enter and be stored. This is especially true of all sedimentary rocks, which comprise ninety-nine per cent of the earth's crust. A fine sandstone whose grains and intervening spaces are indistinguishable to the eye, when placed under the microscope resembles a mass of cobblestones in which the spaces occupy as much of the aggregate area as the solid particles. ”

“ What evidence is there that that most primitive of mankind, who left such abundant traces of his presence in the valley of many a European river, and also in Asia and Africa, was ever likewise here in eastern North America? It is precisely the same evidence—rude stone implements of the simplest type, often but slightly modified cobbles merely, that were found to be more effective by having a chipped and jagged edge, rather than the smooth and tapering one that water-wearing produces. ”

“ Codrington says [34] “a good stone breaker will break 2 cubic yards of hard limestone to the ordinary gauge in a day, and some men will break more. Hard silicious stones and igneous rocks can only be broken at the rate of 11⁄2 or of 1 cube yard per day; of some of the toughest, such as Guernsey granite, a man can only break on an average half a cube yard per day. River gravel, field stones, or flints, which are already of a small size, can be broken at the rate of 3 or 4 cube yards per day.” ”

“ The art of building with cob is nearly extinct. Clay is kneaded up with straw by the feet, and then put on the rising walls that are enclosed in a framework [80] of boards, but this latter is not always necessary as the clay is consistent enough to hold together, and all that is required is to shave it down as the wall rises in height. Such cob walls for garden fruit are incomparable. They retain the warmth of the sun and give it out through the night, and when protected on top by slates or thatch will last for centuries. ”

“ While the pebbles and cobble-stones may be somewhat similar at all points of the road consisting of rounded fragments of sandstone, shale, limestone, and various crystalline rocks like gneiss, granite, syenyte, and the like, — the larger boulders will be found to vary in character as we pass from north to south. ”

“ This estuary found its source at the edge of the ice, where now lies the terminal moraine (just below Belvidere) ; and at what is now the head of tide at Trenton it embouched into a broad, shallow bay. At the ice-front it gathered a harvest of cobble-stones which were washed down-stream and deposited in a series of terraces more than one hundred feet in height and two miles or more in width, extending ten miles down the river; the cobbles growing finer and finer and finally passing into beds of gravel and sand. ”

“ It may, however, be of assistance if I quote particulars of the relative cost of cob and stone building in Devon in the year 1808 when cob was in common use. The stonework referred to was rough rubble, and not with square or dressed blocks. It must be borne in mind that up to that date practically all material, stone, lime, etc., was carried on horses’ backs. Wheeled carts which began to creep in about the beginning of 1800, were not in general use until twenty or thirty years later. As a boy I knew a farmer who remembered the first wheeled cart coming to Dunsford. ”

“ In the same manner, a lamina of coprolitic matter would be coiled up spirally into a series of successive cones, in the act of passing from a small spiral vessel into the adjacent large intestine. Coprolites thus formed fell into, soft mud, whilst it was accumulating at the bottom of the sea, and together with this mud, (which has subsequently been indurated into shale and stone,) they have undergone so complete a process of petrifaction, that in hardness, and beauty of the polish of which they are susceptible, they rival the qualities of ornamental marble. ”

“ It was twelve o’clock when he rose and put the boots into his green bag, and gathering up his measure and some tools, set out once more. The streets were full and the cobbler made his way slowly through the throng. One or two spoke to him, others noticed him less than the mule that stood waiting for a reverend father outside the Garden of the Récollets. Le Bossu took little heed of it all; his face was drawn and haggard, and the hump seemed larger than ever. He walked on until he passed in front of the inn of the Golden Cup and came to a house a few yards beyond it. ”

“ The name cobalt is given at present to that metal and its ores, the oxides of which are largely employed in the manufactures of glass, porcelain and pottery, for the production of a blue colour. The cobalt ores are first roasted and freed from foreign mineral bodies, particularly sulphur, iron, nickel, bismuth, and arsenic, with which they are united, and then well calcined, and sold, either mixed or unmixed with fine sand, under the name of zaffer (zaffera) ”

“ Copperas. - Thunder-stones, as the vulgar call them, are a pyrites; their fibres doe all tend to the centre. They are found at Broad Chalke frequently, and particularly in the earth pitts belonging to the parsonage shares, below Bury Hill, next Knighton hedge; but wee are too fare from a navigable river to make profit by them; but at the Isle of Wight they are gathered .from the chalkie rocks, and carried by boates to Deptford, to make copperas; where they doe first expose them to the aire
and raine, which makes them slake, and fall to pieces from the centre, and shoot out a pale blewish salt ”

“ An office, boarding house, stables, corrals, etc., had been built for the accommodation of men and animals. In addition to this I found a complete assay office and chemical laboratory, and here Dr. Endlich was experimenting with the rich cobalt and nickel ores. As a result of his labors in this direction he exhibited several bars of cobalt speiss containing a very high value in silver. The assorted ore contains from 7 to 15 per cent in cobalt, 2 to 3 per cent nickel, and from 1,000 to 1,400 ounces silver per ton. ”

“ Walls of mud, or of compressed earth, are still more 49 economical than those of timber, and if they were raised on brick or stone foundations, the height of a foot or 18 in. above the ground, or above the highest point at which dung or moist straw was ever likely to be placed against them, their durability would be equal to that of marble, if properly constructed and kept perfectly dry. The cob walls of Devonshire, which are formed of clay and straw trodden together by oxen, have been known to last above a century without requiring the slightest repair ”

“ Material out of which cog stones have been made is of some interest. The Tank Site specimens range through volcanic tuff, siliceous sinter, escoriated basalt, to a fine-grained basalt. From other areas the same materials are present plus sandstone, granite, and granodiorite. Steatite, one of the most easily worked stones, appears to be absent. Obviously the hardness and type of stone were of little importance. The appearance of the finished product likewise varied. Some specimens are a product of perfection, others of the roughest sort. ”

“ And this is Cobbett's description, in the Rural Rides:—"At the place, of which I am now speaking, that is to say, by the side of this pleasant road to Brighton, and between Turner's Hill and Lindfield, there is a rock, which they call 'Big upon Little,' that is to say, a rock upon another, having nothing else to rest upon, and the top one being longer and wider than the top of the one it lies on. This big rock is no trifling concern, being as big, perhaps, as a not very small house. How, then, came this big upon little? What lifted up the big? It balances itself naturally enough ”

“ It is to be understood that small quantities of columbium are replaced by tantalum.
The mineral is massive, with some indication of crystalline structure. It is dark brown to black, transparent in flakes, and under the microscope is seen to be isotropic, with doubly-refracting inclusions, undoubtedly of a secondary nature. Hardness 5 to 51⁄2; sp. gr. 4·80 to 4·81. Unlike samarskite, it does not glow on ignition.
It occurs with mica and pitchblende in pegmatite veins in granite, at Morogoro, in the Uluguru Mountains, German East Africa. ”

“ In contrast to the selection of materials for axes, we find that the large hammers or bone crushers, etc., were made of a greater diversity of materials, in which quartz-bearing rocks are not infrequent. The aim seemed to be to select a cobble as near to the desired shape as 302possible without much reference to material. Comparatively little work needed to be done upon these types beyond pecking a groove. On the other hand, in pestles and mortars, we find that tough, fine-grained, quartzless rocks of igneous origin are employed, as a rule, though the use of fine limestones is not unusual. ”

“ Then the cobbler sprang nimbly down, seized the tree with both hands, as if he had carried it all the way, and called to the giant, "Think of a big fellow like you not being able to carry a tree!"
"Well," said the giant, "I will admit that you are the stronger. Come and spend the night in my cave."
The cobbler followed the giant into the cave. There, sitting around a fire, were a number of giants. They were laughing and talking in a noisy manner, and they scarcely noticed the little man.
The cobbler spread the bear's skin upon the floor near the fire. ”

“ Localities.—Found in slate and limestone rocks. Centreville, Coulterville, New Idria and New Almaden, and Lake and San Luis Obispo Counties, California; Idaho.
22.—Cobalt Pyrites.
Occurs crystallized and massive; does not scratch glass easily; metallic lustre; tarnish, copper-red; powder, blackish-gray; brittle; heated on charcoal gives off sulphur fumes; heated with borax gives a blue glass; gravity 5.
Value.—An ore of cobalt, yielding twenty per cent.
Localities.—Usually found in slate or granite rocks with Copper Pyrites. Mineral Hill, Md. ”

“ Cobbler's Wax
“The upper and lower jaws mutually assist each other,” it says in the Tso Chuan. “If the lips shrivel, then must the teeth catch cold,” a quotation which leads directly, if you be a yellow man, indirectly, if a white, to the fall and rise of P’i Hsiao.
They called him P’i Hsiao, or Cobbler’s Wax, in Pell Street, because, to quote Nag Hop Fat, the soothsayer, “he is soft, being helpless; hard, being proud; and his skin is dark.” ”

“ In the barrow at Cowlam, already mentioned, besides the grinding-stones of grit, there was a piece of flint roughly chipped into a cubical form, and having one face partly ground smooth. It may have been used for polishing the surfaces of other stone implements, or possibly merely as a muller. It is shown in Fig. 184. The striæ run diagonally of the square face.
In the collection formed by Canon Greenwell, is also a sandstone pebble, 21/2 inches in diameter, which has been "picked" into shape, and has one face smooth as if used for grinding. ”

“ The Coblynau or Knockers were supposed to be a species of Fairies who had their abode in the rocks, and whose province it was to indicate by knocks, and other sounds, the presence of ore in mines.
It would seem that many people had dim traditions of a small race who had their dwellings in the rocks. This wide-spread belief in the existence of cave men has, in our days, been shown to have had a foundation in fact, and many vestiges of this people have been revealed by intelligent cave hunters. ”

“ Then a large number of smooth cobble-stones are thrown into a fire until they are thoroughly heated, when they are picked up with sticks fashioned for the purpose and deposited in the water, which boils up at once. After a few minutes these stones must be removed and replaced by fresh ones, this laborious process being continued until all oil has been boiled out of the blubber and floats on the surface, when it is removed with flat pieces of bone or roughly fashioned ladles, and decanted into bladders or whole seal-skins, then cached on pole-frames until sold or used by the makers. ”

“ VI.—In good moist earth 5 feet or 6 feet deep we simply run the copper tape out from the building some 20 feet, and then rivet a copper earth plate on to same, or sometimes employ a large gridiron made of copper tape, using as much as 200 lineal feet in its construction. Wherever we make earth terminations in rocky, dry, or gravelly soil, we always fill in with a load of small coke, charcoal, or other carbonaceous matter, and also divert the rain fall-pipe system over the termination so formed ”

“ The pre-Cambrian copper mines of the Lake Superior region are among the richest on the globe. In the igneous rocks copper, next to iron, is the most common of all the useful metals, and it was especially abundant in the Keweenawan lavas. After the Keweenawan was uplifted to form land, percolating waters leached out much of the copper diffused in the lava sheets and deposited it within steam blebs as amygdules of native copper, in cracks and fissures, and especially as a cement, or matrix, in the interbedded gravels which formed the chief aquifers of the region. ”

“ Practically the entire Canadian output, most of which is smelted at plants in southern Ontario, is exported to England and the United States.
The cobalt can be plainly seen in the ore when the rock is exposed to the weather. It is of a steel-gray colour tinged with rose-pink, and where it occurs in the form of a powder it looks exactly like rouge. When heated it turns a beautiful blue. Arsenic and other elements are often found mixed with the cobalt-silver ore, and the region has deposits of nickel, copper, and lead. ”