OF PYRITES AND GYPSUM. 309
pours out his vials of wrath on the heads of those who are
favoured by fortune, yet waste their leisure and their wealth in
idleness, utterly neglecting to profit by the study of nature.
"Nature herself," he says, "seems to invite us to her school by
the charm with which she surrounds the study of her works."
I will not indulge in quotations from this grand old naturalist,
but with some of his words ringing in our ears, borne to us across
a gap of two centuries, we might fancy that we were listening to
an advocate of Nature-Study in the twentieth century.
In the preface to the Pyritology Henckel says : "A principal
motive to the present undertaking, in which I could wish to be
imitated, is the improvement of natural history." So far, I feel
sure, he has our Club entirely with him. Anything tending to
the improvement of natural history certainly commands our
sympathy. And no doubt Henckel's work did mark, at the time
of its publication, a great advance in our knowledge of that
department of natural history which deals with the world of
minerals. 
Pyrites was regarded by our author as the most important
of all minerals, and on the title-page of the English translation
the work is described as a "History of the Pyrites, the Principal
Body in the Mineral Kingdom." To a substance occupying
this superlative position we can scarcely grudge the thousand
pages, or more, which Henckel, with Teutonic thoroughness,
devotes to its study ; nor shall we even be disposed to quarrel
with him when, in spite of the thousand pages, he apologizes for
his work being so brief ! He is careful to explain that the
magnitude of the work is by no means commensurate with the
labour bestowed upon its production, for in some cases a few
lines represent months of labour in chemical and other
researches.
On the title-page of the original work the Pyritologia is
described as a "Kiess-Historic," and to this day Kies is the
German name for the mineral. Henckel suggests that this word
may be connected with Kiesel, the name of flint, because both
minerals may be used for striking fire. This certainly seems to
be the case. In Pope's Greek-German Lexicon I find purithz
liqoz explained as "Feuerstein, auch Kupfererz." This Feuerstein,
or "fire-stone," is the common word for flint. In Whitney's
"Century Dictionary" purithz is defined as "a flint or