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BOOK VIII.

Seven methods of washing are in common use for the ores of manymetals; for they are washed either in a simple huddle, or in a divided huddle,or in an ordinary strake, or in a large tank, or in a short strake, or in a canvasstrake, or in a jigging sieve. Other methods of washing are either peculiarto some particular metal, or are combined with the method of crushing wetore by stamps.

A simple buddle is made in the following way. In the first place, the headis higher than the rest of the buddle, and is three feet long and a foot and a halfbroad ; this head is made of planks laid upon a timber and fastened, andon both sides, side-boards are set up so as to hold the water, which flows inthrough a pipe or trough, so that it shall fall straight down. The middle ofthe head is somewhat depressed in order that the broken rock and the largermetallic particles may settle into it. The buddle is sunk into the earth to adepth of three-quarters of a foot below the head, and is twelve feet long anda foot and a half wide and deep ; the bottom and each side are lined withplanks to prevent the earth, when it is softened by the water, from fallingin or from absorbing the metallic particles. The lower end of the buddle isobstructed by a board, which is not as high as the sides. To this straightbuddle there is joined a second transverse buddle, six feet long and a footand a half wide and deep, similarly lined with planks; at the lower

“ silver into a piece of holland and presse it out upon the metall, which goes forth like a dewe,“ alwaies turning and stirring the metall, to the end it may be well incorporate. Before the“ invention of these furnaces of fire, they did often mingle their metall with quicksilver in“ great troughes, letting it settle some daies, and did then mix it and stirre it againe, until“ they thought all the quicksilver were well incorporate with the silver, the which continued“ twentie daies and more, and at least nine daies.” Frequent mention of the differentmethods of silver amalgamation is made by the Spanish writers subsequent to this time, thebest account being that of Alonso Barba, a priest. Barba was a native of Lepe, in Andalusia,and followed his calling at various places in Peru from about 1600 to about 1630, and at onetime held the Curacy of St. Bernard at Potosi. In 1640 he published at Madrid his Arte delos Metales, etc., in five books. The first two books of this work were translated into Englishby the Earl of Sandwich, and published in London in 1674, under the title “ The First Book ofthe Art of Metals.” This translation is equally wretched with those in French and German,as might be expected from the translators’ total lack of technical understanding. Amongthe methods of silver amalgamation described by Barba is one which, upon later “discovery”at Virginia City, is now known as the “ Washoe Process.” None of the Spanish writers,so far as we know, make reference to Biringuccio’s account, and the question ariseswhether the Patio Process was an importation from Europe or whether it was re-inventedin Mexico. While there is no direct evidence on the point, the presumption is in favour ofthe former.

The general introduction of the amalgamation of silver ores into Central Europeseems to have been very slow, and over 200 years elapsed after its adoption in Peru and Mexicobefore it received serious attention by the German Metallurgists. Ignaz Elder v. Bornwas the first to establish the process effectually in Europe, he having in 1784 erected a“ quick-mill ” at Glasshutte, near Shemnitz. He published an elaborate account of aprocess which he claimed as his own, under the title Ueber das Anquicken der Goldund Silber-hd.lt igen Erze, Vienna, 1786. The only thing new in his process seems to have been mechanicalagitation. According to Born, a Spaniard named Don Juan de Corduba, in the year 1588,applied to the Court at Vienna offering to extract silver from ores with mercury. Varioustests were carried out under the celebrated Lazarus Erckern, and although it appears thatsome vitriol and salt were used, the trials apparently failed, for Erckern concluded his reportwith the advice : “ That their Lordships should not suffer any more expense to be thrown“ away upon this experiment.” Born’s work was translated into English by R. E. Raspe,under the title—" Baron Inigo Born’s New Process of Amalgamation, etc.,” London, 1791-Some interest attaches to Raspe, in that he was not only the author of “ Baron Munchausen,”but was also the villain in Scott’s “ Antiquary.” Raspe was a German Professor at Cassel, whofled to England to avoid arrest for theft. He worked at various mines in Cornwall, and in1791 involved Sir John Sinclair in a fruitless mine, but disappeared before that was known.The incident was finally used by Sir Walter Scott in this novel.