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is ſpotted, as it were with Gold.
white, and ſometimes with both thoſe Colours.
The Heliotrope, or common Blood-ſtone, is of this Kind alſo, and very little, if really at all, different from the Oriental Jaſper; the Colour is, like that, of a bluiſh green, and the Variegation red, but in Spots rather than Veins, and of a deeper Colour.
The Sapphire of the Antients, here deſcribed, was a Stone very different from the Gem we now know by that Name, and was of the Cyanus, or Lapis Lazuli Kind; but not as ſome have too haſtily judged, the Lapis Lazuli itſelf[B 1].
We shall find by what this Author ſays hereafter, that theſe were evidently two different Stones; and indeed Pliny, and the reſt of the antient Naturaliſts, if carefully read, will be found to have clearly diftinguiſhed them; and deſcribed them to be what they really were, different Species of the ſame Genus. They were both mixed Maſſes, both blue, variegated with white, and yellow; but they differed in this, that the Cyanus had the yellow Matter, in form of Duſt, irregularly and confuſedly mixed among the other Matter of the Maſs; whereas the Sapphire was beautifully ſpangled with it, in regular, diſtinct, and ſeparate Spots. Theſe were its greateſt Characteriſtic, and obtained the Stone its conſtant Epithets of χρυσόπαστος and χρυσοστιγής. Ineſt (ſays Pliny, ſpeaking of the Cyanus) ei aliguando et aureus pulvis, non qualis in Sapphirinis, Sapphirus enim et aureis punctis collucet; or, according to Salmaſius, in Sapphiris enim aurum punctis collucet; and others of the Ancients deſcribing it, have Σάπφειρος λίθος ἔων σπιλάδας χρυσίȣ ὡς ἐν ϛίγμασι; and λθος ὡρκῖος ἔχων σπιλάδας χρυσίȣ ὡς ἐν ϛίγμασι.
Upon the Whole, what can be collected from a careful Peruſal of the Antients on this Subject is, that the Stone they knew by the Name of the Sapphire, was an opake, or at beſt but imperfectly tranſparent, Gem, of a fine blue, deeper than that of the Lapis Lazuli, and variegated with Veins of a white ſparry Subftance, and diſtinct ſeparate Spots of a gold Colour.
The Sapphire of the Antients was thereforenot only not the ſame with the Gem we now know by that Name; but had not even the leaſt Reſemblance of it: I ſee no Reaſon, however, to conclude from hence, as Woodward
- ↑ Quam Gemmam Plinius Sapphirum vocat Cyanus eſt ſeu Lapis Lazuli. Boet. 183.
The Sapphirus of Pliny is much different from our Sapphire; and his Deſcription anſwers to the Lapis Lazuli. Woodw. Meth Foſſ. 29.
