Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 27.djvu/543

Rh work. Vermont is at present the chief marble-producing State of the Union, excelling in this industry all the other States combined, having an invested capital of $3,886,000, and producing annually $1,340,050 worth of material. Of this the larger part is ordinary white, veined, or blue marble from Sutherland Falls, Rutland, East Dorset, and Pittsford. Dark gray, almost black fossiliferous marbles are, however, quarried at Isle La Motte, while red, mottled, and variegated varieties, used for tilings and wainscotings, are found at Mallett's Bay, in the northern part of Lake Champlain. The only statuary marble at present quarried in this country is found at West Rutland and Pittsford, in this State. The rock is of fine and even texture, and without specks or flaws, but differs from its Italian prototype in being of a dead-white color, lacking entirely the peculiar waxy luster so characteristic of the Italian marble. White and bluish marbles are also quarried at Lee, Massachusetts; Sing Sing, Tuckahoe, and Pleasantville, New York; in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania; and in Texas and Cockeysville, Maryland.

The Montgomery County quarries were first opened upward of one hundred years ago, and until as late as 1840 the stone continued to be the general favorite in Philadelphia for all manner of building, although not well suited for the finer grades of ornamental work. Girard College, the United States Custom-House, Mint, and Naval Asylum, are of this stone, while the seemingly endless rows of red-brick houses, with white-marble sills and caps, have come to be as characteristic of Philadelphia as are the brown-stone fronts of New York.

The colored marbles now in the market are brought principally from Tennessee. The ordinary red and white variegated varieties, so commonly seen in table-tops, mantels, soda-fountains, and panelings, are from Rogersville and Knoxville in this State. A fine grade of pink marble is also found at Cleaveland and Knoxville, while a fossil-bearing olive-green variety is brought from Calhoun. A peculiar brecciated stone, which I have not yet seen in the market, is also found here. It consists of yellowish, rounded, and angular fragments of varying sizes, imbedded in a fine, grayish ground-mass. So far as I have yet observed, this stone is entirely distinct from any produced elsewhere. Two fine varieties of gray fossiliferous marbles are produced at Chazy and Plattsburg, in Clinton County, New York, and are known commercially as "Lepanto" and "French gray." The first-named is gray with pink spots, while the last-named is more uniformly gray in color. With the exception of the Tennessee marbles, the Plattsburg stone is more extensively used for furniture and inside decorative work than any other now in the market. The only first-quality black marble now produced in this country is also from New York State quarries at Glens Falls, furnishing a fine grade of this material.

Other than in the States above mentioned no marbles of