they vary
according to the nature of the soil, the different admixture of clods and
humours, having respect to the nature of the region and to their subsidence
in this last-formed crust of the earth, resulting from the confluence of
many causes, and the perpetual alternations of growth and decline, and the
mutations of bodies. Nor is this stone of such potency rare; and there is
no region wherein it is not to be found in some sort. But if men were to
search for it more diligently and at greater outlay, or were able, where
difficulties are present, to mine it, it would come to hand everywhere, as
we shall hereafter prove. In many countries have been found and opened
mines of efficacious loadstones unknown to the ancient writers, as for
instance in Germany, where none of them has ever asserted that loadstones
were mined. Yet since the time when, within the memory of our fathers,
metallurgy began to flourish there, loadstones strong and efficacious in
power have been dug out in numerous places; as in the Black Forest beyond
Helceburg; in Mount Misena not far from Schwartzenberg[50]; a fairly strong
kind between Schneeberg and Annaberg in Joachimsthal, as was noticed by
Cordus: also near the village of Pela in Franconia. In Bohemia it occurs in
iron mines in the Lessa district and other places, as Georgious Agricola
and several other men learned in metallurgy {11} witness. In like manner in
other countries in our time it is brought to light; for as the stone
remarkable for its virtues is now famous throughout the whole world, so
also everywhere every land produces it, and it is, so to speak, indigenous
in all lands. In East India, in China, in Bengal near the river Indus it is
common, and in certain maritime rocks: in Persia, Arabia, and the islands
of the Red Sea; in many places in Aethiopia, as was formerly Zimiri, of
which Pliny makes mention. In Asia Minor around Alexandria and the Troad;
in Macedonia, Boeotia, in Italy, the island of Elba, Barbary; in Spain
still in many mines as aforetime. In England quite lately a huge power of
it was discovered in a mine belonging to Adrian Gilbert, gentleman[51];
also in Devonshire and the Forest of Dean; in Ireland, too, Norway,
Denmark, Sweden, Lapland, Livonia, Prussia, Poland, Hungary. For although
the terrestrial globe, owing to the varied humours and natures of the soil
arising from the continual succession of growth and decay, is in the lapse
of time efflorescing through all i