character, then, a metal is a brilliant, opaque, heavy, malleable, ductile, and fusible mineral.

G. I think I can hardly remember all that.

T. The names may slip your memory, but you cannot see metals at all used, without being sensible of the things.

G. But what are ores? I remember seeing a heap of iron ore which men were breaking with hammers, and it looked only like stones.

T. The ore of a metal is the state in which it is generally met with in the earth, when it is so mixed with stony and other matters, as not to show its proper qualities as a metal.

H. How do people know it then?

T. By experience. It was probably accident that in the early ages discovered that certain fossils* by the force of fire might be made to yield a metal. The experiment was repeated on other fossils: so that in length of time all the different metals were found out, and all the different forms in which they lie concealed n the ground. The knowledge of this is called Mineralogy, and a very important science it is.

G. Yes, I suppose so; for metals are very valuable things. Our next neighbour, Mr. Sterling, I have heard, gets a great deal of money every year from his mines in Wales.

T. He does. The mineral riches of some countries are much uperior to that of their products above ground, and the revenues of many kings are in great part derived from their mines. H. I suppose they must be gold and silver mines.

T. Those, to be sure, are the most valuable, if the metals are found in tolerable abundance. But do you know why they are so?

But these metals

H. Because money is made of gold and silver. T. That is a principal reason, no doubt. have intrinsic properties that make them highly valuable, else probably they would not have been chosen in so many countries to make money of. In the first place, gold and silver are both perfect metals, that is, indestructible in the fire. Other metals, if kept a considerable time in the fire, change by degrees into a powdery or scaly matter called a calx. You have melted lead, I

dare say.

G. Yes, often.

T. Have you not, then, perceived a drossy film collect upon its surface after it had been kept melting a while?

*Fossils are substances dug out of the earth or rocks. Coal is a fossil. We speak of fossil shells, bones, wood, &c.

G. Yes.

T. That is a calx; and in time the whole lead would change to such a substance. You may see, too, when you have heated the poker red-hot, some scales separate from it, which are brittle and drossy.

H. Yes the kitchen-poker is almost burnt away by putting it into the fire.

T. Well-all metals undergo these changes, except gold and silver; but these, if kept ever so long in the hottest fire, sustain no loss or change. They are therefore called perfect metals. Gold has several other remarkable properties. It is the heaviest of all metals.

H. What, is it heavier than lead?

T. Yes-about half as heavy again. It is between nineteen and twenty times as heavy as an equal bulk of water. This great weight is a ready means of discovering counterfeit gold coin from genuine; for as gold must be adulterated with something much lighter than itself, a false coin, if of the same weight with the true, will be sensibly bigger. Gold, too, is the most ductile of all metals. You have seen leaf-gold.

G. Yes; I bought a book of it once.

T. Leaf-gold is made by beating a plate of gold placed between pieces of skin, with heavy hammers, till it is spread out to the utmost degree of thinness. And so great is its capacity for being extended, that a single grain of the metal, which would be scarce bigger than a large pin's head, is beaten out to a surface of fifty square inches.

G. That is wonderful indeed! but I know leaf-gold must be very thin, for it will almost float upon the air.

7. By drawing gold out to a wire, it may be still further extended. Gold-wire, as it is called, is made with silver, overlaid with a small proportion of gold, and they are drawn out together. In the wire commonly used for laces, and embroidery, and the like, a grain of gold is made completely to cover a length of three hundred and fifty-two feet: and when it is stretched still further by flatting, it will reach four hundred and one feet.

H. Prodigious! What a vast way a guinea might be drawn out, then!

T. Yes; the gold, of a guinea at that rate would reach above nine miles and a half. This property in gold of being capable of extension to so extraordinary a degree is owing to its great tenacity or cohesion of particles, which is such, that you can scarcely break a piece of gold wire by twisting it; and a wire of

gold will sustain a greater weight than one of any other metal, equally thick.

H. Then it would make very good wire for hanging bells.

T. It would; but such bell-hanging would come rather too dear. Another valuable quality of gold is its fine colour. Scarce anything makes a more splendid appearance than gilding. And a peculiar advantage of it is, that gold is not liable to rust or tarnish as other metals are. It will keep its colour fresh for a great many years in a pure and clear air.

H. I remember the vane of the church steeple was new gilt two years ago, and it looks as well as at first.

T. This property of not rusting would render gold very useful for a variety of purposes, if it were more common. It would make excellent cooking utensils, water-pipes, mathematical instruments, clock-work, and the like.

G. But is not gold soft? I have seen pieces of gold bent double. T. Yes; it is next in softness to lead, and therefore, when it is made into coin, or used for any common purposes, it is mixed with a small proportion of some other metal, in order to harden it. This is called its alloy. Our gold coin has one-twelfth part of alloy, which is a mixture of silver and copper.

G. How beautiful new gold coin is!

T. Yes-scarce any metal takes a stamp or impression better; and it is capable of a very fine polish.

G. What countries yield the most gold?

T. South America, Australia, California, the East Indies, and the coast of Africa. Europe affords but little; yet a moderate quantity is got every year from Hungary.

G. I have read of rivers rolling sands of gold. Is there any truth in that?

T. The poets, as usual, have greatly exaggerated the matter; however, there are various streams in different parts of the world, the sands of which contain particles of gold, and some of them in such quantity as to be worth the search.

H. How does the gold come there?

T. It is washed down along with the soil from mountains by the torrents, which are the sources of rivers. Some persons say that all sands contain gold; but I would not advise you to take the pains to search for it in our common sand; for in more senses than one, gold may be bought too dear.

H. But what a fine thing it would be to find a gold mine on one's estate!

T. Perhaps not so fine as you may imagine, for many a mine

does not pay the cost of working. A coal-pit would probably be a better thing. Who do you think are the greatest gold-finders in Europe?

H. I don't know.

T. The gypsies in Hungary. A number of half-starved, halfnaked wretches of that community employ themselves in washing and picking the sands of some mountain streams in that country which contain gold, from which they obtain just profit enough to keep body and soul together! whereas, had they employed themselves in agriculture or manufactures, they might have got a comfortable subsistence. Gold almost all the world over is first got by slaves, and it makes slaves of those who possess much of it.

G. For my part I will be content with a silver mine.
H. But we have none of those in England, have we?

T. We have no silver mines, properly so called, but silver is procured in some of our lead mines. There are, however, rich silver mines in various parts of Europe; but the richest of all are in Peru, in South America.

G. Are not the famous mines of Potosi there?

T. They are. Shall I tell you some of the properties of silver? G. By all means.

T. It is the other perfect metal. It is also as little liable to rust as gold, though indeed it readily gets tarnished.

H. Yes; I know the footman is often obliged to clean our plate before it is used.

T. Plate, however, is not made of pure silver, any more than silver coin, and silver utensils of all kinds. An alloy is mixed with it, as with gold, to harden it; and that makes it more liable to tarnish.

G. Bright silver, I think, is almost as beautiful as gold.

T. It is the most beautiful of the white metals, and is capable of a very fine polish; and this, together with its rarity, makes it to be used for a great variety of ornamental purposes. Then it is nearly as ductile and malleable as gold.

G. I have had silver-leaf, and it seemed as thin as gold-leaf. T. It is nearly so. That is used for silvering as gold-leaf is for gilding. It is common, too, to cover metals with a thin coating of silver, which is called plating.

H. The child's saucepan is silvered over on the inside. What is that for?

T. To prevent the victuals from getting any taint from the metal of the saucepan; for silver is not capable of being corroded

or dissolved by any of the liquids used for food, as iron and copper are.

H. And that is the reason, I suppose, that fruit-knives are made of silver.

T. It is; but the softness of the metal makes them bear a very poor edge.

G. Does silver melt easily?

T. Silver and gold both melt with more difficulty than lead; not till they are above a common red heat. As to the weight of silver it is nearly one-half less than that of gold, being only eleven times as heavy as water.

H. Is quicksilver a kind of silver?

T. It takes its name from silver, being very like it in colour; but in reality it is a very different thing, and one of the most singular of the metal kind.

G. It is not malleable, I am sure.

T. No; when it is quick or fluid, as it always is in our climate. But a very great degree of cold makes it solid, and then it is malleable like other metals.

G. I have heard of killing quicksilver; pray, what does that mean?

7. It means destroying its property of running about, by mixing it with something else. Thus, if quicksilver be well rubbed with fat, or oil, or gum, it unites with them, losing all its metallic appearance or fluidity. It also unites readily with gold and silver, and several other metals, into the form of a kind of shining paste, which is called an amalgam. This is one of the ways of gilding or silvering a thing. Your buttons are gilt by means of an amalgam.

G. How is that done?

T. The shells of the button, which are made of copper, are shaken in a hat with a lump of amalgam of gold and quicksilver, till they are all covered over with it. They are then put into a sort of frying-pan, and held over the fire. The quicksilver, being very volatile in its nature, flies off in the form of a smoke or vapour when it is heated, leaving the gold behind it spread over the surface of the button. Thus many dozen are gilt at once with the greatest ease.

H. What a clever way! I should like vastly to see it done. T. You may see it any day at Birmingham, if you happen to be there; as well as a great many other curious operations on metals.

G. What a weight quicksilver is; I remember taking up a