)- MAPLE. The useful purposes to which f the Maple-tree is applied are noticed under Acan.
a MARBLE. A limestone which will admit e of being worked equally in all directions, and y is capable of taking EC good polish, deserves 1 the title of marble; when it is granular and - of a white colour, it may be useful in sta tuary.
a The varieties of marble are exceedingly numerous. Taking them in respect to colour, we f find the following among others :—Black Mar 3 bles. Most of these contain bitumen, and are 1 fcetid when bruised. They include the Namur , marble, the marble of Ashford in Derbyshire, Dent in Yorkshire, near Crickhowell, Tenby, Kilkenny, &c.; the marble anciently called Marmor Luculleum, and now Nero Antico. ; White Marbles comprise the marble of Pares ; ; the Carrara marble, of finer grain, much used • in modern sculpture ; the Skye marble, that • of Inverary, Assynt, Blair-Athol, &c. Ash ; and Gray Marbles include a beautiful marble, • of compact oolitic texture, at Orletcn, near ; the Glee Hills in Shropshire. Brown and Red Marbles comprise the Rosso Antico; ; marble on the estate of the Duke of Devon , shire, near Buxton. The mottled brown marble of Betham Fell, near Milnthorp, is of good quality. Among Yellow Marbles are the Giallo Antico ; Siena marble. That used in ancient Rome is said to have been from Numi dia. Blue Marbles. Of these there is one ex ample near St. Pons in Languedoc. Green
Marbles present as an example the Marmor Lacedeemonicum of Pliny, dug near Verona. Black Marbles variegated with other colours ; White Marbles variegated with other colours ; Ash and Gray Marbles variegated with other colours ; and similar variegated varieties of Brown, Red, Yellow and Green Marbles, are abundant. The British Islands contain nume rous examples of marbles containing shells and corals. Some of the Plymouth, Ashbur ton, and other Devonian limestones are ex tremely beautiful, from the abundance of fine corals exquisitely preserved in them ; the crinoidal marbles of Flintshire, Derbyshire, and Garsdale in Yorkshire, are elegant ex amples of the carboniferous limestone ; the shell marbles of Buckingham, Whichwood Forest, Stamford, Yeovil, may be noticed, from the oolitic rocks. That of Petworth and Pur beck, from the Wealden strata, has been ex tensively used by the architects of the middle ages.
The mechanical worldng of Marble does not lion, the eye is supposed to be at an infinite sphere in parallel lines ; the representation the eye is supposed to be placed at the surface of the sphere, and to view the concave of the differ much from that of stone. [SetaxrunE ; STONE MASONRY.] Beautiful specimens of English and Irish marble have been sent to the great Exhibition.