GKOLOGY. 325 



how ranch accumulated experience did it not require to bring forth at will bar 

 iron or steel! Chance, if chance there be, may have played a part in it. But 

 as chance only favors those privileged mortals who combine a keen spirit of 

 observation with serious meditation and with practical sense, the discovery 

 was not less difficult or meritorious. We need not then be surprised if man 

 arrived but tardily at the manufacture of iron and steel, which is still daily 

 improving. 



In Carinthia traces of a most primitive method of producing iron have 

 been noticed. The process seems to have been as follows : on the declivity 

 of a hill was dug an excavation, in which was lighted a large fire; \vhcn 

 this began to subside, fragments of very pure ore (hydrous-oxide) were 

 thrown into it and covered by a new heap of wood. When all the fuel had 

 been consumed, small lumps of iron would then be found among the ashes. 

 All blowing apparatus was in this manner dispensed with; an important fact 

 when we come to consider how much the use of a blast complicates metal- 

 lurgical operations, because it implies the application of mechanics. Thus 

 certain tribes in Southern Africa, although manufacturing iron and working 

 it tolerably well, have not achieved the construction of our common kitchen 

 bellows, apparently so simple; they blow laboriously through a tube, or by 

 means of a bladder affixed to it. 



The Romans produced iron by the so-called Catalonian process, and the 

 remains of Roman works of that description have been discovered and 

 investigated in Upper Carniola in Austria. The Catalonian forge is still 

 used in the Pyrenees, where it yields tolerable results, but it consumes a 

 large quantity of charcoal, requires much wind, and is only to be applied to 

 pure ore, containing but a very small proportion of earthy matter producing 

 scoriae: for the process consists in a mere reduction, with a soldering and 

 welding together of the reduced particles, without the metal properly melt- 

 ing. According to the manner in which the operation is conducted, bar 

 iron or steel are obtained at will. This direct method dispenses with the 

 intermediate production of cast iron, which was unknown to the ancients, 

 and which is now the only means of producing iron on a great scale. 



Silver accompanies the introduction of iron into Europe, at least in the 

 northern parts, while gold was already known during the bronze-age. This 

 is natural, for gold is generally found as a pure metal, while silver has 

 usually to be extracted from different kinds of ore by more or less compli- 

 cated metallurgical operations, for example, by cupellation. 



With iron appear also, for the first time in Europe, glass, coined money, 

 that powerful agent of commerce, and finally the alphabet, which, as the 

 money of intelligence, vastly increases the activity and circulation of thought, 

 and is sufficient of itself to characterize a new and wonderful era of progress. 

 From thence can we date the dawn of history and of science, in particular of 

 astronomy. 



The fine arts also reveal, with the introduction of iron in Europe, a new 

 and important element, indicating a striking advance. Already in the 

 stone-age, but more in the bronze-age, the natural taste for art reveals itself 

 in the ornaments bestowed upon pottery and metallic objects. These orna- 

 ments consist in dots, circles, and zigzag, spiral, and S-shaped lines, the style 

 bearing a geometrical character, but showing pure taste and real beauty of 

 its kind, although devoid of all delineations of animated objects, either in 

 the shape of plants or animals. It is only with the iron-age that art, taking 

 a higher range, rose to the representation of plants, animals, and even of the 



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