

On Smelting Copper in Japan. 339 



Plate V. Smelting the ore to extract the coarse metal — The 

 furnace, in this plate, is represented as sunk in the earth, and (he 

 smelter is standing over it with a long shovel in his hand to man- 

 age the fire. The bellows, which is separated from the furnace 

 by a wall, is made like the Chinese fang sedng or wind box, of 

 which a description is given in the Repository, vol. iv, page 37. 



u The ore being roasted, is put into a furnace, where coal is 

 employed to melt it ; the scoria having -flowed off, the coarse 

 metal is taken out ; it is copper imperfectly purified." 



Plate VI. Taking out the copper when the coarse metal is 

 fused. — This plate is intended, as supplementary to the last, to 

 exhibit the mode of taking out the copper, after a second melting 

 of the coarse metal. The fire having gone down, a workman 

 stands over the furnace with a broom, with which he sprinkles 

 the metal as a second workman takes it out on the end of a 

 hooked pole ; a third is represented as having just thrown a mass 

 of metal into a pool of water. 



11 When the coarse metal is melted in the furnace, and the scoria 

 has flowed off, the copper is taken out." 



Plate VII. Of fusing silver and copper together. — This 

 plate resembles the preceding, but is intended to represent the 

 taking out of metal after a second melting, when the silver is still 

 alloyed with it. In this plate, a bellows is drawn on each side 

 of the furnace, in lieu of the double-handled single one in the 

 preceding plate. While one workman is engaged in sprinkling 



and taking out the copper from the furnace, a second is plunging 

 a large mass into a tub of water. The title of the plate. literally 

 ttieans " together blown," and is rather a second purification of 

 the copper ore than alloying it with silver. 



H The silver which is mixed up with the copper is melted, and 

 the scoria taken out ; it is therefore called mabuki doii, or alloyed 

 copper." 



Plate VIIL Casting the bars —Here we have a large sinewy 

 ttan represented pouring the melted metal out of a large crucible 

 into a wooden pool full of water, white another opposite to him 

 holds a pair of pinchers to take out the bars. The exhibition of 

 muscular tension in the drawing of the gigantic man who holds 

 the crucible is creditable to the artist. 



"The alloyed copper is put into an earthen crucible and fused, 

 and then poured into molds to form the bars of copper. These 

 bars are sold to foreigners, and are as excellent as if for imperial 

 use. That which natives buy is smelted in the same manner, 

 but the mode of casting and the molds are different ; therefore 

 these are in all sorts of shapes ; one is made by pouring the 

 copper into a bamboo stuck in the ground.'' 



Plate IX. Fusing l ea d with the copper.— In this plate, one 

 Workman, his face muffled and his legs guarded from the fire of 

 the furnace by a mat, has just taken out a mass of copper, and 





