CHAP. XXVI.

MANUFACTURERS.

273

descriptions of workshops in which the divisionsand subdivisions of the trade in gold and silver arecarried on. These sweepings, as they are termed,are first by stamping crushed into a minute dust.The mass is then amalgamated with mercury, whichtakes up the precious metals. This composition after-wards undergoes a kind of distillation, in the courseof which the mercury is evaporated by heat, is thencondensed and preserved, and the precious metalparted for future application to the purposes forwhich it is needed.

In pursuing our inquiry, the first step appearedto be to ascertain the quantity of gold which isannually produced by the whole of the refiners andsweep-washers. Whatever that quantity might befound to be, as the whole is applied to manufac-turing purposes, it would be a guide to the know-ledge of the remainder. There are certain branchesof trade in which refined or pure gold alone is used.The gold-beaters, the water-gilders, the gold lacemakers, the china-gilders, the gilders of buttons,and of toys, and trinkets, use only fine gold, orgold with such minute particles of alloy in it asare necessary to make it adhesive.

The jewellers, too, who are the great consumersof gold, use partly refined gold, or at least a con-siderable number of the trade do so. The case,however, of that business will be presently con-sidered more at large.

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