1400 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO I669. 



through the wooden gutters from the pump, that stands in the pit ;) then they 

 put into the pan two quarts of the mixture following : They take a quart of 

 white of eggs, beat them with as much brine, till they are well broken ; then 

 mix them with 20 gallons of brine, as before was done with the blood ; and 

 thus that which they call the whites is made. As soon as this is in, they boil 

 sharply till the second scum arise ; then scum it off as before, and boil very 

 gently till it corne ; to procure which, when part of the brine is wasted, they 

 put into each pan of the size aforesaid, about a quarter of a pint of the best and 

 strongest ale they can get : this makes a momentary ebullition, which is soon 

 over, and then they abate their fires, yet not so but that they keep it boiling all 

 over, though gently ; for the workmen say that if they boil fast here, it wastes 

 their salt. After all their leach brine is in, they boil gently, till a kind of scum 

 come on it like a thin ice ; which is the first appearance of the salt : then that 

 sinks and the brine every where gathers into cornes at the bottom to it, which 

 they gently rake together with their loots: this they continue, till there is but 

 very little brine left in the pan ; then with their loots they take it up, the brine 

 dropping from it, and throw it into their barrows, which are cases made with 

 flat cleft wickers, in the shape almost of a sugar-loaf, the bottom uppermost. 

 When the barrow is full, they let it stand so for an hour and a half in the 

 trough, where it drains out all the leach brine, then they remove it into their 

 hot-house behind their works, made there by two tunnels under their pans, 

 carried back for that purpose. The leach brine that runs from the barrows 

 they put into the next boiling, for it is to their advantage, being salt melted, 

 and wanting only hardening. 



This work is performed in two hours in the smaller pans, which are shal- 

 lower, and generally boil their brine more away ; wherefore their salt will last 

 better, though it does not granulate so well, because when the brine is wasted, 

 the fire and stirring breaks the cornes. But this salt weighs heavier and melts 

 not so soon ; and therefore is bought for many sales^ to a distance. But in the 

 greater pans, which are usually deeper, they are above half an hour longer in 

 boiling ; but, because they take their salt out of their brine, and only harden 

 it in their hot-house, it is apter to melt away in a moist air : yet of this sort of 

 salt the larger the g;rain is, the longer it endures ; and generally this is the bet- 

 ter granulated and the clearer, though the other be the whiter. And I think 

 it is rather the taking of the salt out of the brine before it be wasted, that 

 causes the granulating of it, than the ale, to which the workmen impute it. 



They never cover their pans at all, during the whole time of boiling. They 

 have their houses like barns open up to the thatch with a cover-hole or two 

 to vent the steam of the pans. Possibly tiles may do better, but nobody is 



