BORAX IN AMERICA. 355 



Thus far our way is plain. But whence came the enormous depo- 

 sition of the green crystals of Borax Lake, their isolation and segrega- 

 tion in perfect crystallized integrity, and their continued preservation ; 

 while at the same time, in a solution almost identical in chemical com- 

 position, as we shall see, at Hachinhama, and in which often the pro- 

 portion of borax to a given quantity of water becomes greater, no such 

 crystals exist ? 



In most instances of salts crystallizing from a solution, the crystals 

 attach themselves by a base to whatever material is adjacent, and 

 when numerous they form a crystalline mass, from which the summits 

 only of the crystals project a crystal perfect at both extremities, and 

 the sides not being common. And in Borax Lake itself, whenever the 

 water has evaporated to such a degree in a dry season as to form a 

 deposit from excess of strength, it has been an amorphous crust of 

 carbonate, chloride, and borate, with no perfect crystals of either. 



But the green crystals are isolated, and in thousands of instances 

 are absolutely perfect, ends and sides. The large ones of the blue 

 clay lie, as we have seen, each in its own mold. The smaller ones 

 above lie often in layers, inches in thickness, hundreds of crystals 

 heaped together as distinct from each other and as separate as pebbles 

 on a beach. 



Still, again, comes the strange fact that these crystals have been 

 lying, how long we can not say, but almost certainly for very, very 

 many years (for there is not the slightest evidence to lead us to believe 

 that they are of recent formation), in a solution which makes no ap- 

 proach to saturation, and to whose influence as a solvent they seem 

 totally indifferent. 



The water of Borax Lake, when it has a depth in its main extent of 

 five feet, which it often has for very many months and perhaps years 

 in succession, holds in solution about half an ounce of borax to the 

 gallon. During this interval, for four or five months of the summer 

 season, its temperature is at no time lower than 55 to 60 Fahr. But 

 water at that temperature dissolves a little over eight ounces of borax 

 to the gallon. How, then, can the green crystals remain in such a 

 liquid so long without being destroyed ? 



It may be supposed that the carbonate and chloride, in the com- 

 plex mixture, render the hold of the borax so slight that, because of 

 their presence, it is ready to separate. In reply to this suggestion 

 comes the statement of the fact that when the same water is concen- 

 trated by evaporation to a specific gravity of 12 Beaume, in which 

 state it holds in solution six ounces of borax to the gallon, no tend- 

 ency is manifest to the formation of even a single crystal. 



Again, it has been suggested that, lying in a muddy menstruum, 

 the movement of particles is so far arrested as to prevent diffusion, 

 the stratum of water immediately surrounding each crystal becoming 

 saturated and remaining unchanged. But this does not in the least 



