68 Alembic for distilling Amalgam of Gold. 
The gold with the crust and other minerals that do lodge on the 
skins, is washed off in a tub, whence it is put into a trough, that con- 
ducts a stream of water to one or more amalgamators (‘T'yrolese or 
Hungarian bowls,) from which is constantly presented another pbe- 
nomenon in hydrostatics, viz: that of quicksilver rising from the 
bottom and floating on the surface of water. 
Owing to the rotary motion of the amalgamators, the friction of 
the sand and water against the quicksilver, it tends to separate into 
minute globes, which rise to the surface, and are floated off; this 
tendency increases as the quicksilver loses its fluidity and becomes 
less yielding, which it does by being more and more heavily charged 
with gold; a considerable portion of which is thus carried off, atom 
by atom, from the amalgamators. 
In the course of twenty four hours, two or three per centum of the 
quicksilver in each amalgamator is lost. About twenty five per 
centum of that put in the still, and all that put in the shovel, is lost 
in the operation of “ blowing off.” There is a loss of gold in the 
same operation; besides the gold which swims off in the state of 
amalgam, that which is carried off by adhering to the sand, and 
that which is floated off into the waste from the skins, and from the 
amalgamators, 
What would be the effect in the amalgamating process, if opposite 
states of electricity could be induced and kept up between the quick- 
silver and the gold, until the two metals unite? Would not the 
tendency to amalgamation be promoted, and in such a case, would 
not the loss by the floating off the quicksilver and gold be prevented ? 
These questions are proposed, because it is believed that ingenuity 
is able to supply a practical answer to them. If the metallurgy of 
gold were better understood, many mines that are now profitless 
might be advantageously worked. 
To save the loss of quicksilver involved in the ordinary process 
of “ blowing off,” and to save the gold which escapes with the 
mercurial vapor, the alembic here deseribed, was invented. 
A, is the cucurbit, made of cast iron; it holds half a gallon. B, 
is the capital, also of cast iron. C, is the beak, made of a gun 
barrel, bent as in Fig. 2. D, is the condenser, made of India rubber 
cloth ; it was a water bag from the caoutchouc manufactory at Rox- 
bury. The edges of the cucurbit and the capital are ground smooth, 
so that the escape of vapor may be more easily prevented by luting. 
The inside of A, is also made smooth, so that the gold may not ad- 
