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To Make Feathered Tin

The object of feathering is to bring the tin into a state of minute subdivision, which permits it ash, wash, dry, mix the precipitate with powdered charcoal, and reduce it by heat.

For chemical purposes pure nickel is best obtained by moderately heating its oxalate in a covered crucible, lined with charcoal. Tho salts of nickel in the anhydrous state are for to be much more rapidly dissolved in acids. the most part yellow; when hydrated, green, Procure an iron ladle having a capacity of and furnishing pale green solutions. Nickel about 12 fluid ounces, and a wooden or stone- is found present in meteoric iron, and is ware vessel containing 2 or 3 gallons of cold strongly magnetic, but loses this property water. About 1 pound of pure bar tin, free when heated to 350° Fahr. It is chiefly from lead, is to be cut into pieces of about 2 employed in the manufacture of German si!inches in length, and melted in the ladle. ver. Sulphate of nickel is used medicinally, When melted, pour the tin in a very small with soothing and soporific effects. MERCURY-ALUMINUM. heavy metal, possess- M ercury or Quicksilver. for a few minutes, then open the bottle and blow fresh air into it with a pair of bellows. ing a nearly silver-white color, and a brilliant Repeat this 3 or 4 times, and filter the mixmetallic lustre. The principal sources of this ture through a cone of smooth writing paper motal at the present time are the mines of Idria having its apex pierced with a fine pin. The in Carniola, and Almaden in Spain, where it sugar is left behind in the filter with the exists under the form of cinnabar, from which oxides of any other metals present, and a the pure metal is obtained by distilling that small quantity of mercury in a state of minute division. of mercury in a state of minute ore with lime or iron filings in iron retorts, by division. ers.

Alumin which the sulphur it contains is seized and retained, while the mercury rises in the state of vapor, and is condensed in suitable receivluminum. This is the metallic Its specific gravity, when pure, is base of alumina, which is the plastic 13.5; it solidifies at -39° (39° below zero) Fahr., and when solid is ductile, malleable, principle of certain kinds of clay. The color and tenacious; boils at 662º Fahr., but volof aluminum is white, inclining to blue; it is atilizes slowly at the ordinary temperature very malleable, and ductile. Its specific grav- , and ductile. Its specific gravwith ity is only about 2.60; its melting point not of the atmosphere, and when mixed with water at from 140° to 160°, it is volatilized in less than 10000 Fahr. It is the most sonorous of all metals. It is thus obtained:-Make a considerable quantities. It unites with oxygen, forming two oxides; and with chlorine, thick paste of alumina, powdered charcoal, forming calomel and corrosive sublimate; sugar, and oil, and heat it in a covered crucisublimate; sugar, and oil, and heat it in a covered cruciwith the metals it forms amalgams, combin- ble until all the organic matter is destroyed; ing, however, with difficulty with iron, nickel, then transfer the product to a porcelain tube, platinum, and some other less important and connect the one end with another tube metals. Its oxides form salts with the acids.

The only acids that act on metallic mercury are the sulphuric and nitric; but for this purpose the former must be heated. containing dried chloride of calcium, and the other end with a small tubulated receiver.

Then expose the porcelain tube to the heat of a small oblong furnace, and, having connected the chloride of calcium tube with a vessel disengaging chlorine, pass the gas through the apparatus, at the same time raising the heat of