Conversations on Chemistry, V. 1-2 / In Which the Elements of that Science Are Familiarly Explained and Illustrated by Experiments

by Mrs. Marcet

Precious stones composed of earth! That seems very difficult to conceive.

EMILY.

Is it more extraordinary than that the most precious of all jewels, diamond, should be composed of carbon? But diamond forms an exception, Mrs. B.; for, though a stone, it is not composed of earth.

MRS. B.

I did not specify the exception, as I knew you were so well acquainted with it. Besides, I would call a diamond a mineral rather than a stone, as the latter term always implies the presence of some earth.

CAROLINE.

I cannot conceive how such coarse materials can be converted into such beautiful productions.

MRS. B.

We are very far from understanding all the secret resources of nature; but I do not think the spontaneous formation of the crystals, which we call precious stones, one of the most difficult phenomena to comprehend.

By the slow and regular work of ages, perhaps of hundreds of ages, these earths may be gradually dissolved by water, and as gradually deposited by their solvent in the undisturbed process of crystallisation. The regular arrangement of their particles, during their reunion in a solid mass, gives them that brilliancy, transparency, and beauty, for which they are so much admired; and renders them in appearance so totally different from their rude and primitive ingredients.