REVIEWS 
METALLURGY* 
HE extraction of metals from their ores, and their manufacture for the 
various purposes for which they are peculiarly adapted, has neces- 
sarily been studied from the very earliest ages of antiquity, and has always 
awakened the energy and zeal of even the rudest and most unlettered tribes. 
The savage soon learned that, to practise the art of war successfully, he mu -t 
obtain a substance harder and more durable than wood from the forest or 
stone from the quarry ; a substance which could be forged, hammered into 
shape, tempered, and refined — processes which could not be employed in the 
workmanship of wood or stone. He learned, from experience, that his 
enemy, when fortified with metallic implements, although perhaps inferior in 
physical strength, had a power of endurance and defence superior to his own. 
Besides the warlike arts, the genial pursuit of agriculture and the comforts 
of domestic life were soon found to be dependant upon the application of 
substances, at once hard, durable, and comparatively pliable, and these 
acquisitions were only to be obtained in the metals. It would be curious 
and interesting, did our space admit, to speculate upon the rude metallurgy 
of those early days when Tubal Cam smote the anvil with his hammer and 
welded iron for the first time. 
The ancients, as far as we can learn, were only cognizant of seven metals — 
gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, tin, and mercury — to each of which a symbol 
was assigned, in honour of some great object in Nature or a popular deity. 
Hence gold, the source of luxury and wealth, was called the sun ; silver, the 
moon ; copper (probably owing to its beautiful colour), Venus ; iron (from its 
strength and employment in battle), Mars ; lead, Saturn ; tin, Jupiter ; and 
Mercury, from the god of the winged heel. Zinc, although of no modern 
discovery, was only first mentioned by Agricola ; the other metals being of 
more recent date. 
Our forefathers, doubtless, were familiar with many of the earths, 
salts, &c., with which we are acquainted, but from want of analytical skill 
they were ignorant that these substances were metallic compounds. They 
knew not that the salt with which they preserved their food was merely the 
chloride of a metal — white and lustrous as silver, — that the chalky cliff and 
marble steep, the branching coral and glistening shell, were the carbonate of 
a metallic oxide, — that the ashes of their forests and the granite of their rocks 
contained a metal, which, in future ages, the genius of Davy would disclose. 
* Metallurgy. The Art of extracting Metals from their Ores, and adapting 
them to various purposes of Manufacture. By John Percy, M.D., F.R.S. 
