1817.) On Chinese Mercurial Preparations. $45 
In order to prepare a muriate of quicksilver, they were as 
follows :— 
Sulphate of iron, a weight of.............02.2. 920 gr, 
EPL ey Meme eiac cures a's web ds ass a create 
Nitrate of potash (this was very impure) ........ 900 
Sulphuret of quicksilver in the state of levigated 
QE ee Aso bob oe See cece ste LeU 
Another sulphuret * (also levigated) ............ 120 
SPRUCE WI ies oy cameos ace hs oelee decree 920 
ceonernte GF SPU. re ee eee EIN eee BO 
SENET Ua sles o's cree She nie Carre orcs ce (O00 
An apparatus and vessels for his purpose were readily found on 
the spot, his furnace being one of the baked clay portable cooking 
stoves in use amongst the Chinese, of which the furnace part would 
have been filled by two quarts of fluid, and the ash-pit by a fourth 
of that measure; aiso an unglazed earthenware dish, which would 
contain about a pound; one of similar shape, and rather more than 
double capacity, of which he had the bottom beaten out; a common 
flat porcelain plate, and a large earthenware vessel, with some 
water in the bottom. 
- Having mixed all the ingredients except the two sulphurets and 
the quicksilver, without powdering any of them, he put them in 
the ungiazed earthenware dish. He then strewed the two sulphurets 
over them, and set the dish upon the furnace over a few live char- 
coalembers. The whole being fused in about half an hour, except 
the lump of nitre, he added the quicksilver and increased the fire, 
although still the heat was very moderate. After an hour, and after 
the ingredients had fused together and blistered up, he removed the 
vessel (to which the spongy mass adhered) from the fire. This he 
inverted so as to pour out a portion of the quicksilver (which he re- 
turned to the vessel), and placed it upon the fire again. Upon re- 
moving it after ten minutes, and when he found upon trial that no 
quicksilver escaped, he inverted it upon the plate, and heaped up 
common salt all round the sides of the dish, and also upon its bottom. 
Over this he inverted the other dish (with the bottom beat out) so 
that its rims rested upon the edges of the flat plate. Having placed 
another earthenware dish so as to serve for a stand in the water of 
the large vessel, he placed the plate upon it, the water then being 
in contact with all the under part of the plate, but not coming over 
its edges. He then heaped more salt upon the bottom of the dish, 
and covered it with a brick, and filled the interstices between the 
* The exact nature of this Iam not aware of. It contains a very large pro- 
portion of sulphur, coloured yellow I apprehend by iron, Inan incorrect list of 
the Chinese Materia Medica in my possession, the characters expressing it are 
employed to denote calamine, and in another place, with a slight variation, the 
sulphuret of arsenic, It was described to me as being procured in the state 1 saw 
it from the earth, and that it was administered in many diseases, especially cuta- 
Beous ones, both externally and internally, and held to be perfectly innocuous, 
