The Brookhaven leader., 1884-01-24
ANIMALS IN AMBER.

Aces- Lizards, Insects, Plants - What
amber Is and Where IL Comes From
valuable Discoveries-American Amber.
There's an odd mouthpiece." said a
gentleman TO Times man, hold
inr out large piece of amber that had
been cut into an oddly-shapen cigar
holder. The piece was perfectly clear,
Of rich yellow or canary hue, and in
the interior was lizard, as perfect as
4 Il had crawled in q few minutes be-
/ fore
Il got hold of this in Germany" con-
| tinued the speaker, land had it bored
/ 50 that the smoke-tube runs right along
/ side the creature and gives the impress
/ sion that it is passing through him."
"Are such cases rare?" asked the re-
porter.
NO" was the reply. "Thcy are
rarely seen, but almost every collector
has more or less of them. In the earli-
est times it was known that animals
were so entombed. Martial wrote, A.
y. l3:
'Thc bee is iucasel and shines preserved in
a.lar OF tie sisters of Phaeton: so it seems
IN. rinel in its own nectar. II has obtained
aworthy rewa for its great tolls. We may
suppose that the bee itself would have desired
such death.
"In 1910 Thomas May thus translated
this:
"Hcrc shines a bee inclosed in an amber
tomb
Asif iutorrcd in her own hone v comb.
A fit re ard ae TO her aborS gave;
No other dcath would she have wished to
have.
INSECTS THEORETICALLY SEALED,
In all, eight hundred different spe-
ccS of insects have been found hermet-
icaly sealed in this wav and many of
them entirely new. they are, with
hardly an exception, extinct and nearly
ali tropical forms. In the British Mu-
scum there is q remarkable collection
Of them and at Amherst College they
have spider thua preserved. The
pants that are found entombed are
equally interesting, and Prof. Goeppert
has described one hundred and sixty
odd species, all of which are now ex-
tmct. Various other articles are thus
found, such as water pebbles, bark,
fruit-in fact, anything that happened
to fall in the way of the running resin.
"ln olden times amber was much
more esteemed than gold. Its nature
was known then, and two thousand
years ago Pliny told that it was the fos-
S.I resin of an extinct confer SuccjnH1n
pHiteS. 1t is found ia many countries,
but the greatest deposits have been
found on the shores OF the Baltic, where
many thousand years ago a confer for
est extended from Holland over the
German coast, far into the adjacent
countries. 1t was the resin that drop
ped from these trees, just as we see sim
liar deposits of gum on our spruce and
other trees of to-day. AS it ran down
it EN- angled insects, caught lizards in
its sticky embrace, holding them fast
and finally burving them up, hardening
and preserving them intact for unknown
ages. One of the finest deposits is To-
Gated in the Hauptvaterland, where on
tie Pomeranian plains the peasants
take it from the surface clay, and near
Brandenburgh pieces weighing four
pounds have been found. The penin-
sula OF Samland is noted for the rich
ness of its deposits, and formerly all the
amber here was claimed by the Crown,
the finders being carefully watched by
gems d armes and receiving only-one-
tenth o. its value"
RARE AND COSTLY SPECIMENS.
Are large pieces rare?" asked the
reporter. --
Yes" was the reply, "both rare
and costly. There is a piece weighing
eighteen pounds in the Berlin Museum,
ter which 81 COO was paid, and previous
TO this $1,000 was refused for thirteen
pound lump found in Prussia. In the
earliest days amber seems to have ex-
cited the cupidity of man. During the
reign of Nero an expedition was sent to
the Baltic coast which brought back
800 pounds Of it, including one
sec men that weighed thirteen pounds.
lhls.was nearly all obtained from the
fegular vein or belt that lies between
Illlau and GroSz Hubenicken, on the
russian coast. Here are regular mines
1'r the workers of amber. They extend
10 depth of one hundred feet, pene-
uatlng under a stratum of sand and
eiay, then into stratum of bituminous
%' MOOD forty or fifty feet in thickness
these old trunks or remains are more
OF less impregnated with amber The
supply does not diminish and pieces are
washed up after storms, showing that
she ancient forests are now under water
iSr out IN the Baltic, and the gum be-
ing broken off during storms rises and
y washed up. Such great quantities
eame ashore formerly that the peasants
uSeG nets to catch it and dredges were
USED to drag the bottom of the sea.
lhe mines all along the Baltic
eoast yield yearly about 30O,000 pounds,
anu some one has estimated that the
amount still in the amber district is
worth Sl,250,000. The vast amounts
saAen seem incredible, yet probably
sne s.nce the beginning of this century 1000
,onS nave been quarried, and for the
.SSt three thousand years over 60,
i, .ons have been taken from the Baltic
,Oeaity and made up into jewelry and
sstueies OF luxury. As the amber is
tt,Aeh from the mines it is packed in
Uaskets and slowed away in vaults ar
,ansed according to the size and quail
i, In the vaults of Patcher Douglas
ne records can be seen of mining as
early as 1900"
AMBER IN THIS COUNTRY.
.., lis amber found in this country9"
asked the reporter.
H. les. 1t occurs at Gay Head, Mar
Ia vineyard and Camden, N. j. In
ne latter place, some years ago, several
In, were taken from the green sand