Viii PREFACE. 



into which the art of Electro-Metallurgy has ramified, that he has 

 been induced to throw them into the form of the following Treatise. 



While, however, he can state, that what is collected here is 

 derived from extensive personal experience, he by no means 

 ventures to assume that the work is free from deficiencies. He 

 has too frequently had to deplore the effects of his processes, and 

 to point out the desirableness of others of greater certainty and 

 economy. 



Neither can the Author presume that this work will be a 

 standard on the subject to which it relates. Arts and Sciences, 

 like Kingdoms and Nations, have their several periods of rise, 

 prevalence, and decadence, and nothing can be more unstable than 

 descriptions of an Art like Electro-Metallurgy an Art that must 

 fluctuate with the course of experimental discovery, that has 

 rapidly attained a distinguished eminence, and that promises to 

 extend its utility still farther over regions now unthought of. 

 The superb specimens of its products, which were displayed to 

 the admiration of the world, at the GREAT EXHIBITION OF THE 

 INDUSTRY OF ALL NATIONS, prove at once the immense import- 

 ance of Electro-Metallurgy, and how much may yet be expected 

 from one of the most ingenious of those modern applications of 

 Science, which subject the powers of Nature to the use and pleasure 

 of civilized Man. 



GLASGOW, May, 1851. 



