I have
had the piece I cut from it smoothed, and polished across the
junction; here it is; and you may now pass your soft little
fingers over the surface, without so much as feeling the place
where a rock which all the hills of England might have been sunk
in the body of, and not a summit seen, was torn asunder through
that whole thickness, as a thin dress is torn when you tread upon
it.
(The audience examine the stone, and touch it timidly, but the
matter remains inconceivable to them.)
MARY (struck by the beauty of the stone). But this is almost
marble?
L. It is quite marble. And another singular point in the business,
to my mind, is that these stones, which men have been cutting into
slabs, for thousands of years, to ornament their principal
buildings with,--and which, under the general name of "marble,"
have been the delight of the eyes, and the wealth of architecture,
among all civilized nations,--are precisely those on which the
signs and brands of these earth agonies have been chiefly struck;
and there is not a purple vein nor flaming zone in them, which is
not the record of their ancient torture. What a boundless capacity
for sleep, and for serene stupidity, there is in the human mind!
Fancy reflective beings, who cut and polish stones for three
thousand years, for the sake of the pretty stains upon them; and
educate themselves to an art at last (such as it is), of imitating
these veins by dexterous painting; and never a curious soul of
them, all that while, asks, "What painted the rocks?"
(The audience look dejected, and ashamed of themselves.
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