GIL 
tural order of Personataj. Vitices, Jussieu. 
Essential character: calyx five-toothed, 
teeth acuminate ; corolla two-lipped ; sta- 
mina four, wifh two barren anthers at the 
end of the shorter filaments ; pericarpium a 
drupe containing four or five celled nut, 
with a seed in each cell. There are two 
species. 
GIANT’s causeway, a vast collection of 
a black kind of marie, called basaltes, in 
the county of Antrim, in Ireland. See 
Basaltes, and Staffa. 
GIBBOUS, in astronomy, a term used 
in reference to the enlightened parts of the 
moon, whilst she is moving from the first 
quarter to the full, and from the full to the 
last quarter : for all that time the dark 
part appears horned, or falcated ; and the 
light one hunched out, convex or gibbous. 
GIFT, in law, a transferring the pro- 
perty in a thing from one to another with- 
out a valuable consideration ; for to trans- 
fer any thing upon a valuable consideration, 
is a contract or sale. He who gives any 
thing is called the donor, ahd he to whom 
is given is called the donee. By the com- 
mon law all chattels, real or personal, may 
be granted or given without deed, except 
in some special cases, and a free gift is good 
without a consideration, if not to defraud 
creditors. But no leases, estates, or inter- 
ests, either of freehold or term of years, on 
any uncertain interest, not being copyhold 
or customary interest of, in, to, or out of 
any messuages, manors, lands, tenements, 
or hereditaments, shall at any time be, 
assigned, granted, or surrendered, unless it 
be by deed or note in writing, signed by the 
party so assigning, granting, or surrender- 
ing the same, or their agents thereunto law- 
fully authorized by writing, or by act and 
operation of law. 29 Car. II. c. 3. A gift 
of any thing, without a consideration, is 
good, but it is revocable before delivery to 
the donee, of the thing given. 
GILBEIITIA, in botany, a genus of the 
Decandria Monogynia class and order. Ca- 
lyx five-toothed ; corolla deeply five-part- 
ed ; nectary deeply ten-parted, with lanceo- 
late segments ; antheraa sessile, in the seg- 
ments of the nectary ; fruit six-celled. 
Only one species, G. racemosa, found in 
Peru ; branches reddish and downy ; leaves 
alternate, elliptic, acute, entire, reddish, 
downy underneath ; racemes axillary. 
GILD, or Guild. See Guild. „ 
GILDIN G, art of. The art of gilding or 
of laying a thin superficial coating of metal 
on wood, metal, and other substances, has 
VOL. III. 
GIL 
been long practised and highly esteemed, 
both for its utility and the splendid effect 
which it produces. Gold, from the extreme 
beauty of its colour, and from the length of 
time during which it may be exposed to the 
action of the air without tarnishing, is per- 
haps the most valuable of all substances for 
the purpose of decoration ; but on account 
of its dearness and weight, it can very sel- 
dom be employed in substance, and its or- 
namental use would be limited, indeed, if it 
were not at the same time the most exten- 
sible of all substances ; so that a given 
weight of gold, notwithstanding its high spe- 
cific gravity, may, by beating, be made to 
cover a larger surface than an equal quanti- 
ty of any other body. Among the ancients, 
the Romans, and among the moderns, the 
French have been remarkable for their 
large and profuse consumption of gold ; not 
only the temples, theatres, and other pub- 
lic buildings, being adorned with gilding, 
but even the private houses of the wealthier 
classes. 
The materials for gilding, or rather the 
different states in which gold is used for the 
purpose, are the following : leaf-gold of dif- 
ferent thicknesses, and formed either of the 
pure metal, or of an alloy of this with silver, 
amalgam of gold, and gold-powder. The 
leaf-gold is procured by the gilder from the 
gold-beater, for an account of which we 
shall refer th£ reader to the article Gold ; 
but the other two substances being pre- 
pared by the gilder himself, may be with 
propriety described here. The amalgam of 
gold is made, by heating in a crucible some 
pure quicksilver; and when it is nearly boil- 
ing, adding to it about a sixth of its weight 
of fine gold in thin plates, heated red hot ; 
the mixture, after being kept hot for a few 
minutes, becomes of a perfectly homoge- 
neous consistence, and may then be allowed 
to cool : when cold, it is to be put in a piece 
of soft leather, and by gradual pressure, the 
fluid part of the amalgam, consisting almost 
wholly of mercury, may be forced through 
the pores of the leather, while the gold 
combined with about twice its weight of 
mercury will remain behind, forming a yel- 
lowish silvery mass of about the consistency 
of soft butter. This, after being bruised 
in a mortar, or shaken in a strong phial, with 
repeated portions of salt and water, till the 
water ceases to be fouled by it, is fit for use,- 
and may be kept for any length of time 
without injury in a corked phial. It is of 
essential importance that the materials of 
this amalgam, and especially the mercury,. 
y 
