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BOOK VIII.

lordship of all the dumps ejected from the mines in Meissen to the nobleand wise Sigismund Maltitz, father of John, Bishop of Meissen. Reject-ing the dry stamps, the large sieve, and the stone mills of Dippolds-walde and Altenberg, in which places are dug the small black stonesfrom which tin is smelted, he invented a machine which could crush the orewet under iron-shod stamps. That is called “ wet ore ” which is softened bywater which flows into the mortar box, and they are sometimes called “wetstamps ’ ’ because they are drenched by the same water; and on the other hand, theother kinds are called “dry stamps” or “dry ore,” because no water is usedto soften the ore when the stamps are crushing. But to return to our subject.This machine is not dissimilar to the one which crushes the ore with dryiron-shod stamps, but the heads of the wet stamps are larger by half than theheads of the others. The mortar-box, which is made of oak or beech timber, isset up in the space between the upright posts ; it does not open in front, butat one end, and it is three feet long, three-quarters of a foot wide, and one footand six digits deep. If it has no bottom, it is set up in the same way over aslab of hard, smooth rock placed in the ground, which has been dug down alittle. The joints are stopped up all round with moss or cloth rags. Ifthe mortar has a bottom, then an iron sole-plate, three feet long, three-quarters of a foot wide, and a palm thick, is placed in it. In the openingin the end of the mortar there is fixed an iron plate full of holes, in such away that there is a space of two digits between it and the shoe of the neareststamp, and the same distance between this screen and the upright post, inan opening through which runs a small but fairly long launder. The crushedparticles of silver ore flow through this launder with the water into a settling-pit, while the material which settles in the launder is removed with an ironshovel to the nearest planked floor ; that material which has settled in thepit is removed with an iron shovel on to another floor. Most people maketwo launders, in order that while the workman empties one of them of theaccumulation which has settled in it, a fresh deposit may be settling in theother. The water flows in through a small launder at the other end of themortar that is near the water-wheel which turns the machine. The workmanthrows the ore to be crushed into the mortar in such a way that the pieces,when they are thrown in among the stamps, do not impede the work. Bythis method a silver or gold ore is crushed very fine by the stamps.

When tin ore is crushed by this kind of iron-shod stamps, as soon ascrushing begins, the launder which extends from the screen discharges thewater carrying the fine tin-stone and fine sand into a transverse trough,from which the water flows down through the spouts, which pierce the side ofthe trough, into the one or other of the large buddies set underneath. Thereason why there are two is that, while the washer empties the one which isfilled with fine tin-stone and sand, the material may flow into the other.Each buddle is twelve feet long, one cubit deep, and a foot and a half broad.The tin-stone which settles in the upper part of the buddies is called thelarge size ; these are frequently stirred with a shovel, in order that themedium sized particles of tin-stone, and the mud mixed with the very fine