Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 46.djvu/92

82 of dressed mineral was grayish brown, but many lumps were observed of chocolate and ferruginous shades, and many more mottled and streaked with all three; the light-colored variety sometimes shaded to milk-white. The appearance was generally earthy, except with the white variety, which was translucent and resembled flint or opal. The structure was partially oölitic, with many minute cavities, which were usually lined with a white coating. The grayish-brown and chocolate varieties were also frequently amygdaloidal, and the latter kind yielded a few specimens which were beautifully inlaid with ovoidal forms as large as coffee grains, of a lighter brown than the surrounding mass. Most of the phosphate was amorphous; but occasionally the surfaces of hollows or cavities in the pockets and of crevices or seams in the gangue would be covered with the opal-like variety in botryoidal forms of varying sizes, from that of a mustard seed to that of a currant.

The composition of the mineral is that of a hydrated phosphate of aluminum and iron, with a variable amount of silica and other insoluble matter. The commercial article was guaranteed to contain thirty-five per cent of phosphoric anhydride, while the purest specimens yielded about forty-two per cent. Scarcely more than a trace of lime has been found in any specimen.

By the time at which we had concluded our examination of the mine the sun had become very hot, and we returned to the house, where we spent the middle of the day in the shade of the veranda. Perched up there, six hundred feet above the sea, with the water almost beneath us, we enjoyed a view as novel as it was interesting. The air seemed cool, although out on the rocks the heat was scorching in its intensity. The sea, so far below us, looked like a lake just rippled by the breeze. To the east could be seen the low, cloudlike outline of Antigua. Directly in front of us, to the south, lay Montserrat, its nearest headland seeming but a few miles away, and having a white ledge near the sea which resembled the sail of a sloop rounding the point. Once a cloud spun down from the sky in the form of a funnel, and, touching the sea, formed for an instant a waterspout, but there was not enough volume to last. A steamship plowed its way toward Montserrat, and to us, in our rocky eyrie, appeared like a toy. The sea was the same, and yet different every minute.

On the rocks about the house were also objects to attract the attention. Lizards, both brown and green, ran over the ledges and among the cactus, which grew in large masses on the slope below the veranda, while above them might almost always be seen a tiny hawk hovering in the air, looking very much like a martin with its dark-blue back and white belly, but betraying its identity by its movements. Bright green humming birds poised