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possession a ponderous metallic body, reckoned heavier thangold, supposed to be a mixture of gold and platina, said tohave been brought by the Dutch East-India ships fromChina, and to have been there fold at a high price.Dr. Brownrigg however informs me, that having latelymade enquiries about this substance in Holland, he learntfrom professor Allamand, that it is indeed a mixture ofplatina and gold, but that there was a mistake in regard tothe place it had come from,which was not the east but thewest Indies.

That the platina brought into England is the produceof the Spanish west Indies, appears unquestionable ; but inwhat particular places or in what form it is met with, isfar from being clear. Some speak of its being found ingreat abundance, like sand, in certain rivers in the pro-vince of Quito. A person who had been upon the spot in-formed me, that it came from the mountains near Quito,or between Quito and the South sea; that great part of theland at the bottom of those mountains is covered with it,the floods, which come after heavy rains, washing the mi-neral down with them. Another person, concerned alsoin the importation of it, affirmed that it was found in Peru,in a gold mine, which had been formerly destroyed by aninundation and lately drained; whether originally con-tained in die mine, or brought by the flood, was notknown.

It has been reported, and without contradiction, eversince the platina became known here, that in order to pre-vent the frauds which might be practised with a substanceof such qualities, the king of Spain had ordered the minesthat afford it to be stopt up ; an account which, if literallyunderstood, seems to imply that platina is not plentifulon the surface of the earth. Whatever may be in this,whether the prohibition was made against the working of

mines