STATER OF PHILIP OF MACEDOX* 



Earthy re- 

 siduum. 



Evaporation of 

 the soda. 



Philip used 

 xntive gold. 



Doubts re- 

 specting the 

 rineiie^s of 

 native gold : 



grs. The gold was above it, and increased in weight an 

 eighth of a grain, being perceptibly whitened by the fusion 

 of some very small particles of silver, separated from the 

 remains of the little slip of that metal, which was found stick- 

 ing upon the gold in the form of an agglutinated dust pos- 

 sessing very little adhesion. These remains were pure silver, 

 and weighed 6 grs and an eighth. The gold, which was 

 silvered only on its surface, was boiled some time in pure 

 nitric acid; when it lost entirely its silvery hue, and was 

 found, on assaying it, to be of 24 carats. 



The little earthy residuum was then examined. In it 

 were found no saline particles but a few atoms of muriate 

 of soda, and barely a trace of muriate of copper. The 

 muriate of silver, which from the loss of the metal must 

 have weighed 45*5 grs, had certainly evaporated with the 

 other elastic vapours. In the formation of this muriate 

 only 11*5 grs of muriatic acid had been employed. The, 

 324 grs of acid beside, contained in the salt employed, were 

 dissipated (leaving the small portion of copper out of the 

 question) by a decomposition effected through the means of 

 the vegetable matter mixed with it. But what is difficult to 

 account for, and is foreign to our purpose, is the entire 

 evaporation of 240 grs of soda, which the common salt con- 

 tained, and which should have remained fixed at the bottom 

 of the crucible. This, must have been rendered volatile 

 eithe/ by decomposition, or by forming a new compound, 

 and escaped through the opening in the apparatus. 



It is not probable therefore, that Philip employed similar 

 methods of refining, either by fusion or by . cementation, 

 because, I must repeat, he would have reduced the gold to 

 a state of perfect purity, as Darius thought proper to do 

 subsequently ; or he would not have confined himself to so 

 small a portion of alloy, or perhaps that alloy would not 

 have been silver. And if he employed the gold as he found 

 it, we must necessarily infer, that nature yields gold at 23 

 carats and half, or 0*979 (7)* 



Many perhaps will doubt, whether gold, be found in 

 nature so near to perfect purity ; though Strabo says, that 

 gold was found pure in the Noric Alps ; while Pliny is 

 quoted for the assertion, that none is found free from silver. 



But 



