4 EDWARD DIVERS. 



coJüiired. It uiight be described as micaceous c;ilomeI, To the touch it 

 is soft and snujoth. Measured in buik, dry, it is four times as 

 voluminous, more or less, as the t'l'ound calomel prepared by the 

 European process, and can be readily scattered by a putf of the breath. 

 Kubbed hard in a porcelain mortar it gives the brown resinous streak 

 characteristic of calomel and the evidence therefore, accordiner to 

 pluirmaceutical authorities, of its freedom from corrosive sublimate. 

 Exposed to bright sun-light it gradually assumes a light brown 

 colour, a. colour, that is, having no ntHnity to grey or black. Moist- 

 ure does not seem to 'favoiu- this chnnge which is certainly not 

 owing to any reduction to metal. European cnlomel suffers a similar 

 change. Keifun. is free from corrosive sidjlijiiate, and from metallic 

 mercury. 



Hanbury found selenite in Chinese caltjmel, and Geertz found 

 calomel of this form generally adulterated with selenite and mica, but 

 whether what he examined was ever Ja])anese and not always import- 

 ed Chinese calomel he does not show. I have found kcifini, as it came 

 direct from Ise, (piite free from adulteration, and ha\e not met with 

 any adulterated. 



Of the material used in maldiuj calomel in Ise, Japan. — The materials 

 I'or making Japanese calomel are — mercury, an arenace(jus red clayey 

 earth, bay-salt, bittern or salt-mothers, :iiid air. The mercury is 

 im]X)rted from Europe, but in old limes is^said to have been found in 

 the neighbourhood of l.^e as cinnabar. 



The eai'th, called mitsuchi (' seed -earth '), is all taken ïvom a 

 neighbouring hill, Shunakayama, and according to ^li-. Ivokubu, 

 many other clays have been tried in place ol it, always \vith Ijad 

 results. It is of a. rather lii»ht bricht red colour, which changes to a 

 duller and somewhat l)rown red on drying and gently heating the 

 earth, and to a light ordinarv bi-ick red bv a strong heat. As mined, 



