Suppose we select the Chesil Beach, the most extensive accumulation of shingle in the British Isles. There is room to breathe under the frowning heights of Portland Bill, and the sea is so grand! If you wish to be impressed with the majesty of Nature, walk on the Chesil Beach after a fresh gale from the south-west, and the grandeur of the sea will be before you in all the magnificence of its strength.

Here we are! What a wonderful sight! The sea on both sides; nine miles of terraced shingle stretching in a great curve right away west to Bridport Harbour. Millions multiplied by millions of rounded pebbles! How can we possibly find the beauties among such an infinite host? The prospect is indeed vast, almost bewildering. But we will at once circumscribe the portion of beach to be searched. The sea fortunately happens to be calm, and the tide is ebbing. We will confine our attention to the narrow strip just out of reach of the waves, which is not yet dried by the sun. It is a great advantage to hunt upon a wet beach, because the colours and characters of the pebbles are more vividly shown when they are wet than when they are dry.

Now, then, keep your eyes open. You need not stoop. Walk upright, shoulders well back, head merely inclined forward, and eyes as sharp as a ferret’s. You must not get round-shouldered by pebble-hunting, or what will the drill-sergeant say? There is no necessity to stoop at all, except to pick up a stone.

See, there lies one almost transparent. You could not help noticing it. Pick it up and hold it to the light. See its pure, delicate, lustrous substance, a pale grey tint. That is chalcedony—pure flint. Look at it carefully. Now you know the kind of ‘stuff’ we are looking for. It is so clear and glassy, such a perfect oval shape, that it seems a shame to pitch it into the sea. Yet we cannot afford to keep it, for if we once began putting the clear chalcedonies into the bag, it would be filled in a hundred yards.

‘But why,’ you ask, ‘if this is a chalcedony, pure and perfect, must we throw it away?’ Because it is too perfect! It would merely resemble dull glass if cut and polished. There is no incidental beauty about it, no variety of colour and texture, no trace of any animal organism in it. It is too pure. We want the same article adulterated, so to speak, by Nature’s handicraft. We want to find the same substance containing some exquisite workmanship. We want to find such a pebble with some ‘fruit’ enclosed; just as a child wants the piece of jelly containing the imprisoned strawberry, and prefers that to any other portion in the dish.

Try now to find a pebble of the same character with traces of colouring and marking. How beautiful the wet pebbles are! All colours—brown, red, yellow, orange, pale blue, pink, purple, black, white; any colour except green; that is the rarest of all.

Now here is a pebble, part of chalcedony, part of baser flint; the chalcedony tinted red and orange. Look closely into it. Notice those ‘feelers’ delicately spread, like those of a sea-anemone in a pool. Notice the central body, like the eye of a daisy. You see at a glance that this is a choanite. When cut and polished this stone is certain to be a pleasing specimen. It is a good shape; the choanite is so well displayed; there are no serious cracks or flaws in the stone. Those are the points in deciding upon the merits of choanites.

We might make either a cross-section or longitudinal section of it, or polish it all over. However we treat it, it is sure to prove an attractive specimen. Notice that portion where the feelers have disappeared, decomposed, it would seem, during the process of ‘silicification,’ or conversion into flint. The débris of the feelers has become ‘moss,’ and the beautiful tints are probably due to the actual colouring of the creature itself. They are too delicate for iron oxides.

Now let us look again. No; that is merely a common flint variegated with stains of iron. No; that one is no use; nothing organic in it. No, nor that either. Oh! you must not be discouraged; Rome was not built in a day. The excitement of hope, the expectation of finding beautiful treasures, should prevent your getting weary of search, and it will when you have found a few really good stones.