Indurated talc, when reduced to powder, is frequently employed for the purpose of removing stains, occasioned by grease, from silk and cloth. This it does effectually, and, in general, without injuring even the most delicate colour. Like potstone, it is sometimes manufactured into culinary vessels. This mineral is found in several parts of the continent of Europe; and in Cornwall, Scotland, and the Shetland Islands. 136. _ASBESTOS is a greenish or silvery white mineral, of fibrous texture, which is found in many mountainous countries of the Continent, in the island of Anglesea, and in Scotland. It occurs in shapeless masses, and varies much both in weight and hardness._ The name of asbestos is derived from the Greek language, and signifies that which is inconsumable. This mineral, and particularly a silky variety of it, in long slender filaments, called _amianthus_, was well known to the ancients. They made it into an incombustible kind of cloth, in which they burned the bodies of their dead, and, by which means, they were enabled to collect and preserve the ashes without mixture. In the manufacture of this article they were not able to weave the asbestos alone; but, in the loom, were obliged to join with it linen or woollen threads, which were afterwards burned away. Incombustible cloth was purchased by the Romans at an enormous expense. Sir J. E. Smith, when at Rome, saw a winding sheet of amianthus in the Museum of the Vatican. It was coarsely spun, but as soft and pliant as silk. The person who attended him set fire to one corner of it; and the same part burned repeatedly with great rapidity and brightness, without being at all injured. This interesting relic was discovered, in the year 1702, in a funeral urn, and contained burned bones, together with a quantity of ashes. It was nine Roman palms long, and about seven in width, and had been deposited in the library of the Vatican by order of Pope Clement the Eleventh. Cloth made of amianthus, when greased, or otherwise contaminated with dirt, may be cleansed by throwing it into a bright fire. In this process the stains are burned out, and the cloth is restored to a dazzling white colour. Pliny, the Roman naturalist, informs us that he had himself seen table─cloths, towels, and napkins of amianthus taken from the table of a great feast, thrown into the fire, and burned before the company: and by this operation, he says, they became better cleansed than if they had been washed. The inhabitants of some parts of Siberia manufacture gloves, caps, and purses of amianthus; and in the Pyrenees it is wrought into girdles, ribbons, and other articles. The finest girdles are made by weaving the most beautiful and silky filaments with silver wire. These are much prized by the women, not only on account of their beauty, but from certain mysterious properties they are supposed to possess.