from ἀμμος, sand, and χρυσος, gold, a name given by authors to a stone very common in Germany, and seeming to be composed of a golden sand. It is of a yellow gold-like colour, and its particles are very glistening, being all fragments of a coloured talc. It is usually so soft as to be easily rubbed to a powder in the hand; sometimes it requires grinding to powder in a mortar, or otherwise. It is used only as sand to strew over writing. The Germans call it katzenzöld. There is another kind of it less common, but much more beautiful, consisting of the same sort of glossy spangles, but those not of a gold colour, but of a bright red, like vermilion.