

On Smelting Copper in Japan. 341 



is melted ; the fire is underneath it, and communicates with the 

 bellows below the surface. The fire is pictured as having gone 

 down, one workman is lading lead into small oblong molds, while 

 a second is cooling them in a tub of water, and a third cording 

 the bars of lead into small fasgots. 



"The ore of lead comes from the hills; it is fused in a cru- 

 cible ; and afterwards poured out into copper molds to form bars 

 of lead/' 



Succeeding these thirteen plates are as many more, representing 

 the implements used in smelting copper and lead and specifying 

 their names and uses. To the professed metallurgist, this would 

 be a very interesting part of the work ; but it will be neither 

 entertaining nor profitable to our readers to be detained with a 

 minute description of them. There are one hundred ^different 

 drawings, representing the iron ladles, rods, forks, skimmers, 

 pincers, &c, with the sieves, brooms, tubs, crucibles, molds, mor- 

 tars, weights, &c, employed in the various stages of the smelting. 

 The last page is occupied with diagrams of the bellows. 



The remainder of the volume is filled with an account of the 

 process connected with extracting copper from the ore, written 

 in Chinese, and corresponding in the main to the Japanese. It is 

 explanatory of the former, and renders the whole account much 

 more complete than it otherwise would be. It is drawn up in 

 excellent Chinese style, and is a good specimen of the capabilities 

 °f that language to describe even the most technical operations. 

 The Japanese writer has added the terminations of the cases, the 

 prepositions and other grammatical marks by which a native of 

 that country is enabled to read Chinese with much more facility 

 and accuracy than he otherwise could do. In the translation, we 

 have introduced the Chinese characters along with the names of 

 places, in order that the means may be afforded for ascertaining 

 their native names by those who have access to educated Japan- 

 ese. These, in many instances, are so different from the sound 

 °f the characters themselves, as to afford no clue whatever to the 

 sanies of the places designated, if the reader does not happen to 

 know the very characters employed to write that name. Thus, 

 the three great cities in the empire, Yedo, Ohosaka, and Kioto 

 (or Miyako), are severally written Kednghoo, Taepan, and King- 

 t0 °; the last is a descriptive term, meaning the imperial city; 

 H is where the dairi or kubo resides. This being their mode of 

 asiog the Chinese character in writing proper names, we have 

 bought it would be best to introduce them ; the same remark 

 applies to names of individuals, officers, and indeed every use of 

 the Chinese. A few sentences occurring in the preceding para- 

 graphs will be met with in these, but being embodied in the 

 original, they could not very well be omitted, and the whole is 

 translated as it stands. 



Second Series, Vol. VIII, Xo. 24.— Nov., 1849. 44 



