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As he had obtained his dephlogisticated air by heating the calx of mercury, that is the powder produced by calcining mercury in the air, Priestley was forced to suppose that the calcination of mercury in the air must be a more complex occurrence than merely the expulsion of phlogiston from the mercury: for, if the process consisted only in the expulsion of phlogiston, how could heating what remained produce exceedingly pure ordinary air?

Now, it is evident that if Mayow's answer was a true description of the process of calcination, or combustion, it should be possible to separate the calcined substance into two different things, one of which would be the thing which was calcined, and the other would be that constituent of the air which had united with the burning, or calcining, substance.

These congenial companions set to work at first upon hens' eggs, calcining even the shells; till at the end of eight laborious years, devoted to these and other substances, they had acquired the skill of at least preparing in an artistic manner the furnaces used in their operations.

The partial calcining of the bones in vaults and under layers of clay where the evidence shows that the fire was applied to the outside of the vault or above the clay layer, can be accounted for only on the supposition that the flesh had been removed before burial. Other proofs that this custom prevailed among the mound builders in various sections of the country might be adduced.

Ordinarily, brickwork may be divided into brickwork in mortar and in cement; but there are many qualities of mortar and several sorts of cement. Mortar made with what are called fat or rich limes that is to say, nearly pure lime, such as is got by calcining marble or pure chalk sets slowly, with difficulty, and is rarely tenacious.

Any magnesia present in the filtrate of the oxalate of lime is by the addition of a solution of phosphate of soda separated as phosphate of ammonia and magnesia, after having stood twenty-four hours. The precipitate is filtered off, washed with water to which a little chloride of ammonia is added, dried, and after calcining the fiber and adding the filter ash, glow heated in the crucible.

"Nothing particularly new or strange. Something happens every hour, you know; people are born, bartered die and are buried; lives get blackened and hearts bleed and are trampled by human hoofs, until they are crushed beyond recognition. My dear, civilization is a huge cheat, and the Red Law of Savages in primeval night is worth all the tomes of jurisprudence, from the Pandects of Justinian to the Commentaries of Blackstone, and the wisdom of Coke and Story. Oh halcyon days of prehistoric humanity! When instead of bowing and smiling, and chatting gracefully with one's deadliest foe, drinking his Amontillado and eating his truffles, people had the sublime satisfaction of roasting his flesh and calcining his bones, for an antediluvian dejeuner

When the sun is calcining the plains of Castile, and the streets of Madrid are white with the hot light of midsummer, this palace in the clouds is as cool and shadowy as spring twilights.

Locke, Blackett & Co.'s works it is invariably removed by subjecting the lead to a high heat in a calcining furnace. The zinc crusts, rich in silver, are freed as far as possible from the lead by allowing this to sweat out in the small pot, after which the crusts are placed in a covered crucible, where the zinc is distilled off, and a portion of it recovered.

Sentences like that I have just quoted are found here and there in the writings of the earlier and later alchemists; now and again we also find statements which may be interpreted, in the light of the fuller knowledge we now have, as indicating at least suspicions that the atmosphere is a mixture of different kinds of air, and that only some of these take part in calcining and burning operations.