The body of this rock is perfectly solid, and the salt,
in many places, pure, colourless, and transparent, breaking with a
sparry cubical structure. But the greatest part is tinged by the
admixture of the marl, and that in various degrees, from the slightest
tinge of red, to the most perfect opacity. Thus, the rock appears as if
it had been a mass of fluid salt, in which had been floating a quantity
of marly substance, not uniformly mixed, but every where separating and
subsiding from the pure saline substance.
There is also to be observed a certain regularity in this separation of
the tinging from the colourless substance, which, at a proper distance,
gives to the perpendicular section of the rock a distinguishable figure
in its structure. When looking at this appearance near the bottom of
the rock, it, at first, presented me with the figure of regular
stratification; but, upon examining the whole mass of rock, I found,
that it was only towards the bottom that this stratified appearance took
place; and that, at the top of the rock, the most beautiful and regular
figure was to be observed; but a figure the most opposite to that of
stratification.
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