and a certain white schist14. But lead, its ashes, red-lead, ochre, and
litharge, are more efficacious for ores which melt easily ; hearth-lead for
those which melt with difficulty ; and galena for those which melt with
greater difficulty. To the second order belong iron filings, their slag, sal
artificiosus, argol, dried lees of vinegar15, and the lees of the aqua which separates
gold from silver16 ; these lees and sal artificiosus have the power of penetrating
into ore, the argol to a considerable degree, the lees of vinegar to a greater
degree, but most of all those of the aqua which separates gold from silver ;
filings and slags of iron, since they melt more slowly, have the power of heating the ore. To the third order belong pyrites, the cakes which are melted
from them, soda, its slags, salt, iron, iron scales, iron filings, iron slags, vitriol,
the sand which is resolved from stones which easily melt in the fire, and
tophus ; but first of all are pyrites and the cakes which are melted from it, for
they absorb the metals of the ore and guard them from the fire which consumes them. To the fourth order belong lead and copper, and their relations.
And so with regard to fluxes, it is manifest that some are natural, others
fall in the category of slags, and the rest are purged from slag. When we
" buildings, because it is perishable and soft. Still, however, there are some places which
" have no other, as Carthage, in Africa. It is eaten away by the emanations from the
" sea, crumbled to dust by the wind, and washed away by the rain." In fact, tophus was
a wide genus among the older mineralogists, Wallerius (Meditationes Physico—Chemicae De
Origine Mundi, Stockholm, 1776, p. 186), for instance, gives 22 varieties. For the purposes
for which it is used we believe it was always limestone of some form.
liSaxum fissile album. (The Interpretatio gives the German as schifer) Agricola
mentions it in Bermannus (459), in De Natura Fossilium (p. 319), but nothing definite
can be derived from these references. It appears to us from its use to have been either a
quartzite or a fissile limestone.
18Argol (Feces vini siccae,—" Dried lees of wine." Germ, trans, gives die wein heffen,
although the usual German term of the period was Weinstein). The lees of wine were the
crude tartar or argols of commerce and modern assayers. The argols of white wine are white,
while they are red from red wine. The white argol which Agricola so often specifies would
have no special excellence, unless it may be that it is less easily adulterated. Agricola (De Nat.
Fos., p. 344) uses the expression " Fex vini sicca called tartarum"—one of the earliest
appearances of the latter term in this connection. The use of argol is very old, for
Dioscorides (ist Century A.D.) not only describes argol, but also its reduction to impure
potash. He says (v, 90) : " The lees (tryx) are to be selected from old Italian wine ; if not,
" from other similar wine. Lees of vinegar are much stronger. They are carefully dried and
" then burnt. There are some who burn them in a new earthen pot on a large fire until they
" are thoroughly incinerated. Others place a quantity of the lees on live coals and pursue
" the same method. The test as to whether it is completely burned, is that it becomes white
" or blue, and seems to burn the tongue when touched. The method of burning lees of
" vinegar is the same. ... It should be used fresh, as it quickly grows stale ; it should
" be placed in a vessel in a secluded place." Pliny (xxm, 31) says : " Following these, come
" the lees of these various liquids. The lees of wine (vini faecibus) are so powerful as to be
" fatal to persons on descending into the vats. The test for this is to let down a lamp, which,
" if extinguished, indicates the peril. . . . Their virtues are greatly increased by the
" action of fire." Matthioli, commenting on this passage from Dioscorides in 1565, makes
the following remark (p. 1375) : " The precipitate of the wine which settles in the casks of
the winery forms stone-like crusts, and is called by the works-people by the name tartarum."
It will be seen above that these lees were rendered stronger by the action of fire, in which case
the tartar was reduced to potassium carbonate. The Weinstein of the old German metallurgists was often the material lixiviated from the incinerated tartar.
Dried lees of vinegar (siccae feces aceti ; Interpretaltio, die heffe des essigs). This would
also be crude tartar. Pliny (xxm, 32) says : " The lees of vinegar (faex aceti) ; owing to the
" more acrid material are more aggravating in their effects. . . . When combined with
" melanthium it heals the bites of dogs and crocodiles."
16Dried lees of aqua which separates gold and silver. (Siccae feces aquarum quae aurum
ab argento secemunt. German translation, Der scheidwasser heffe). There is no pointed
description in Agricola's works, or in any other that we can find, as to what this material
was. The " separating aqua " was undoubtedly nitric acid (see p. 439, Book X). There
