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Updated: June 24, 2025
In the heat of the day nothing stirred, not even the air, though the distance shimmered and trembled with heat; but towards night jackals padded lithely from one rock shelter to another. The carriage drove through a vast plain, rimmed with far-away mountains, red as porphyry, but fading to purple at the horizon.
Augustine; and a work, upon the same subject, imputed to Porphyry. The schools of the cathedrals and principal monasteries contributed essentially to the increase and diffusion of literature. Among the monasteries, those of Fulda, St. Gall, Corbie and Kershaw, were particularly renowned.
At length we set out again, sometimes climbing up, sometimes climbing down; now stopping to examine different specimens of ores that reflected back the glare of our lights with dazzling brilliancy, and to look at the endless varieties in the appearance of the rock that filled the spaces in the porphyry matrix.
Waiting, usually a hard task for the busy architect, became a pleasure in this spot; for the rays streaming lavishly in all directions from the diadem of the sovereign sun flooded with dazzling radiance the thousands of white marble statues on the temples and colonnades, and were reflected from the surfaces of the polished granite of the obelisks and the equally smooth walls of the white, yellow, and green marble, the syenite, and the brown, speckled porphyry of sanctuaries and palaces.
On Upper Morven Freydis had reared by enchantment a modest home, that was builded of jasper and porphyry and yellow and violet breccia. Inside, the stone walls were everywhere covered with significant traceries in low relief, and were incrusted at intervals with disks and tesserae of turquoise-colored porcelain.
The pillars were of porphyritic conglomerate, which had been disintegrated and worn away by wind and rain; while the great masses resting on them, probably of solid porphyry, had been less affected by these influences. It was the most curious example of the weathering of rocks that we had ever seen.
Farther away, on the right and left, the light was dim, and near the side walls the darkness was as intense as in a real tomb. On the smooth porphyry columns, the glittering black marble and serpentine here, there, and everywhere flickered the wavering reflection of the candlelight.
In spite of the rain, we remained on deck until a late hour, enjoying the bold scenery of the outer fjord here, precipitous woody shores, gashed with sudden ravines; there, jet-black rocky peaks, resembling the porphyry hills of the African deserts; and now and then, encircling the sheltered coves, soft green fields glowing with misty light, and the purple outlines of snow-streaked mountains in the distance.
The beauty of the masonry and sculpture show that the people who erected this monument had made no small progress in the arts. We must remember, too, that they had no iron, but laboriously cut and polished the hardest granite and porphyry with instruments of stone and bronze; we can hardly tell how.
Contemporary with Boule's work, were the richly-mounted tables, having slabs of Egyptian porphyry, or Florentine marble mosaic; and marqueterie cabinets, with beautiful mountings of ormolu, or gilt bronze. Commodes and screens were ornamented with Chinese lacquer, which had been imported by the Dutch and taken to Paris, after the French invasion of the Netherlands. Painted by Watteau.
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