222 CERAMIC WARE. 



good deal to state about each of them in connexion with 

 Ceramic Ware by and by. 



Thus, having given heed to the elements of our own earth, 

 closely, narrowly, let us now speed away to the imaginary 

 world, whence looking down, we may value as we ought cer- 

 tain materials that are too common to be valued whilst among 

 them. Gazing from this second stand-point of our own choice, 

 let us imagine the metals, uncombined as the chemist can 

 yet obtain them, and as perhaps they once might have been. 

 Down yonder we see them glowing : gold resplendent in its 

 yellow beauty; copper and titanium red; iron, zinc, tin, bis- 

 muth, antimony, silver, platinum, and many others, white ; 

 aluminium white too : let us not forget this. 



Oxygen now, as we may fancy, comes upon the scene ! 

 Immediately this element begins its work of combination and 

 change. With every metal perhaps, save gold and platinum, 

 oxygen would unite ; and uniting, yield bodies, termed by the 

 chemist ' oxides,' but what we may popularly denominate 

 6 rusts.' Still looking down, this world of ours, glittering like 

 a jewel a while ago, seems less resplendent now. All its 

 metals, save^gold and platinum, continue to rust ; each rust or 

 oxide having its own distinctive colour and character, but 110 

 longer metallic in appearance. All its erst brilliant iron oxi- 

 dising would change either to black oxide (a material some- 

 thing resembling the scales of a smith's forge) or red com- 

 mon iron rust, in point of fact. Copper, glittering red just 

 now, would gradually oxidise, changing to compounds of red 

 and black; which, combining again, would yield other co- 

 lours, green being prominent. Potassium would change to 

 rust of potassium, or, simply speaking, ' potash ;' sodium to 

 soda ; and aluminium (mark this well) to alumina. 



Having tarried long enough in our second or ideal world 

 to acquire a just conception of the grandeur of the scene; 

 having impressed the mind with an adequate respect for alu- 

 mina, proportionate to the enormous amount of it just revealed, 



