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Updated: June 19, 2025
Here were sea-shells, and glittering pebbles, and tufts of moss for his crown; and here were sea-gulls to make music for him, and the spray from the wild waves to keep him cool; and a thousand rock-bound islands, lying outspread to the north, with grottoes in them for his ships; and piles upon piles of rocky palaces all around, covered with golden roofs of moss; and every thing, in short, that could make glad the heart of a grim old viking residing on the edge of the arctic circle.
The tuff contains fragments of lava and pebbles of Apennine limestone, and was deposited under the waters of an extensive lake at a time when volcanic action was rife amidst the Alban Hills. This lacustrine formation rests in turn on deposits of marine origin, containing oysters, patellæ, and other sea-shells, of which the chain of hills on the right bank of the Tiber is chiefly formed.
To account for its weight you must know something about the motion of the whole planetary system and the law of gravity that controls that system; to account for the weather-stains upon it, you must know something about chemical reaction; to account for its being chalk and not flint, you must know something of the geological ages of the earth, and how it comes to be built up of little sea-shells; to account for its hardness, you must know something of the intricacies of molecular physics.
The garden was fenced with the same wood that I had noted in the boat; there were chairs in the kitchen covered with strange brocade; curtains of brocade hung from the window; a clock stood silent on the dresser; a lamp of brass was swinging from the roof; the table was set for dinner with the finest of linen and silver; and all these new riches were displayed in the plain old kitchen that I knew so well, with the high-backed settle, and the stools, and the closet bed for Rorie; with the wide chimney the sun shone into, and the clear-smouldering peats; with the pipes on the mantelshelf and the three-cornered spittoons, filled with sea-shells instead of sand, on the floor; with the bare stone walls and the bare wooden floor, and the three patchwork rugs that were of yore its sole adornment poor man's patchwork, the like of it unknown in cities, woven with homespun, and Sunday black, and sea-cloth polished on the bench of rowing.
Then all at once he became a corsair, investing himself with the terrible poetry that Lara has given to the part: the thought came at the sight of the mother-of-pearl tints of a myriad sea-shells, and grew as he saw madrepores redolent of the sea-weeds and the storms of the Atlantic.
We may doubt whether they have thus changed: if the Megatherium, Mylodon, Macrauchenia, and Toxodon had been brought to Europe from La Plata, without any information in regard to their geological position, no one would have suspected that they had co-existed with still living sea-shells; but as these anomalous monsters co-existed with the Mastodon and Horse, it might at least have been inferred that they had lived during one of the later tertiary stages.
Their packing boxes were converted into dressing tables, a little muslin curtain pinned around it, a looking glass in the centre, and a few ornaments, sea-shells or East Indian curiosities gave the whole a nice appearance.
It is clear that the Ohio mound-builders had commercial intercourse with the natives of distant regions, for among the buried articles some are made of native copper from Lake Superior, and there are also found mica from the Alleghenies, sea-shells from the Gulf of Mexico, and obsidian from the Mexican mountains.
"Can you say 'She sells sea-shells' twenty times running, as fast as lightning?" asked Grizzel. "Not running as fast as lightning," Mollie answered, "but I could say it if I were walking rather slowly." "I couldn't," said Grizzel, taking no notice of Mollie's flippancy, "if I were to crawl at the rate of half an inch a year I should be saying 'She shells sea-shells' the whole time."
Not far away, in a corner, on the top of the walnut whatnot, is a curious vase filled with pampas plumes; there are sea-shells and a piece of coral on the shelf below. And right in the midst of the room are three very large black rocking-chairs with cushions in every conceivable and available place including cushions on the arms.
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