But their insatisfaction herein begat
that remarkable invention in the funeral pyres of some
princes, by incombustible sheets made with a texture of
asbestos, incremable flax, or salamander's wool, which
preserved their bones and ashes incommixed.
How the bulk of a man should sink into so few pounds
of bones and ashes, may seem strange unto any who
considers not its constitution, and how slender a mass
will remain upon an open and urging fire of the carnal
composition. Even bones themselves, reduced into
ashes, do abate a notable proportion. And consisting
much of a volatile salt, when that is fired out, make a
light kind of cinders. Although their bulk be dis-
proportionable to their weight, when the heavy principle
of salt is fired out, and the earth almost only remaineth;
observable in sallow, which makes more ashes than oak,
and discovers the common fraud of selling ashes by
measure, and not by ponderation.
Some bones make best skeletons, some bodies quick
and speediest ashes.
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