Volume 3 - Electric Scotland

416 STRATH.
lar, this is also an evident advantage ; because the crys-
talline texture, whenever it is visible, always interferes
with the contour, and with that softness of surface which
is so estimable in that class of statuary which pretends
to follow nature, instead of repeating the iron features
and stony skins of Jupiters, and Demigods, and other
beings beyond the bounds of humanity. How utterly
impossible it is to produce surface in Parian marble,
where the crystalline texture is large, I need not say.
You must not despise this said science of rocks too much.
While it often assists the arts, it may sometimes also
throw light on their antiquities. It has done so in the
case of Myron's Discobulus. Greece had told us that
this work was of bronze ;
Mr. Townley's was of marble.
It might therefore be a Roman copy, or even an Italian
one, or, possibly, what would have been better than
either, a Greek one. Thus the value of the work was un-
certain, till Mr. Quidam showed that it was wrought from
Pentelic marble; a fact sufficient to prove that it was
neither a Roman nor a modern work, and that it was
executed at Athens ; probably in the very time of Myron,
possibly even by himself.
Strath contains many other varieties of marble, chiefly
grey, and well adapted for architecture. But as it pre-
sents more valuable geological information than all the
marble else in the world, 1 followed the route of the
horses, and, after much bogging and scrambling, found
myself near a house that was built and another that was
building ; seeing-, like Don Quixote, the adventure of the
deal boards to an end.
As I vainly thought; for there was neither an end to
the adventure, nor to the chapter of expedients. The
house had three stories, and was fair, and large, and
new, and clean ; that is, outside. Cuchullin, who emp-
tied rain on it day and night, not by pailfuls, but rivers,