Sentence Examples:
Leonard Everard had his faults, plenty of them, and he was in truth composed of an amalgam of far baser metals than Stephen thought; but he had been born of gentle blood and reared amongst gentlefolk.
She dwelt on the cosmopolitan aura that clung to Claude, his subtle atmosphere of wealth, breeding and high social origin, the amalgam of gorgeous qualities that offered so much more than Robert's radical connections and straitened financial circumstances.
This is sufficient to cause the mercury containing the dissolved sodium to flow alternately into the middle compartment, and there the sodium amalgam comes into contact with water; the sodium is dissolved out of the mercury and caustic soda is formed.
Gold cornices, and embellishments, of every conceivable shape and form, are commonly used for outside decorations; the very conduits to carry off water being often of gold or an amalgam consisting largely of that metal, and wrought into elaborate designs.
It supplied in a great measure the redeeming and ennobling element in that strange amalgam of religious, licentious, and military feeling which was formed around women in the age of chivalry, and which no succeeding change of habit or belief has wholly destroyed.
They were practically flat-bottomed, to ensure light draft, and were built in sections, to provide the maximum of portability, which quality was further ensured by the fact that the material of which they were constructed was an amalgam largely composed of aluminum.
Sponge-gold (i.e., gold from which the quicksilver has been evaporated), quartz, or gold amalgam, if found in the possession of any person, renders the individual liable to prosecution, if the possession of gold in any of these forms cannot be satisfactorily accounted for.
He had been told that this little glass case contained an unparalleled activity, an infinite number of wise laws, and a startling amalgam of mystery, experience, genius, calculation, science, of various industries, of certitude and prescience, of intelligent habits and curious feelings and virtues.
He thought that the nascent elements of the morphia, as liberated by electrical decomposition, might, under such circumstances, effect a similar apparent amalgam of the mercury, and he spoke of the subject as likely to throw some light upon the corresponding ammoniacal combinations.
The barrels into which this rich sand is put together with the quicksilver, are turned by water, and the process of amalgamation is generally completed in the course of forty-eight hours; when taken out, the amalgam is separated from the gold by sublimation.
One part of sodium, scraped free from oxide, is melted under solid paraffin, and gradually added to ten parts of mercury (previously purified by nitric acid) with constant stirring, the paraffin poured off, and the amalgam cleaned by washing with pure dry benzine.
The extraction of small spangles of gold scattered in gold-bearing sands is based on the ready dissolution of gold in quicksilver, and on the formation of an amalgam of solid gold by compression and filtering through a chamois skin, in a state more or less liquid.
In both cases an amalgam of solid gold remains, which is submitted to the action of heat in a crucible or cast-iron retort, communicating with a bent-iron tube, of which the extremity, surrounded with a cloth immersed in water, is arranged above a receiver half full of water.
As the water and powdered rock passed over the tables, the quicksilver, by reason of its chemical attraction for gold, would gather up the fine particles of that metal and, as the two combined, would gradually harden and form an amalgam, somewhat resembling lead.
The action of the amalgamated zinc is not well understood; by some it is considered that amalgamating the zinc prevents local currents by the amalgam mechanically covering up the impurities on the surface of the zinc and preventing their coming into contact with the liquid.
The nebulous theories which identified the soul with breath, and shadow, and reflection, slowly condensed into theories of semi-substantiality still charged with ethereal conceptions, resulting in the curious amalgam which, in the minds of cultivated persons, whenever they strive to envisage the idea, represents the disembodied soul.
Yet in the amalgam of the two heterogeneous elements a certain competitive antithesis had survived, and manifested itself, in the individual as in the national life at large, in a number of unreconciled temperamental contrasts, and in the fundamental unlikeness exhibited in the material and the spiritual activities.
Less care is required in retorting the mercury than in treating the amalgam, as the object in the one case is more to cleanse the metal of impurities than to save gold, which will for the most part have been extracted by squeezing through the chamois leather or calico.
He found also that certain substances, such as glass and amber, were electrified positively when taken out of mercury, and this led to his important discovery that an amalgam of mercury and tin, when used on the surface of the rubber, was very effective in exciting glass.
It has been observed that the partitions which separate the halls sometimes look like one block set up on end; the joints and the courses of the brickwork cannot be detected, to such an extent have the constructing materials been soldered together in a perfect amalgam of beaten clay.
This amalgam is excellently adapted for the production of impressions of various objects of nature, direct impressions of leaves, and other delicate parts of plants having been made with its aid which, in point of sharpness, are equal to the best plaster casts and have a very pleasing appearance.
Lines of hose lay about in inextricable confusion, half-buried in an amalgam of lake water, litter and mud, while at every corner the engines still sent up showers of sparks, the rhythm of their dull pumping resounding through the city like the labored beatings of some giant heart.
Over this confused and heaving expanse an amalgam of voices rises like the sea breaking on the shore: and above this unending murmur, renewed commands, shouts, the din of a shot load or of one transferred, the crash of steam-hammers redoubling their dull endeavors, and the roaring of boilers.
Then came the laborious work of gilding by the mercury process, smearing every piece very carefully with an amalgam of mercury and gold, and putting it into a gentle, steady fire, until the mercury had evaporated, tearing only the dull gold in an even deposit on the surfaces.
Next the face is scraped with a hand-scraping tool, then rubbed down with a whetstone, then polished over with a piece of magnolia-charcoal; and lastly, when quite smooth, the amalgam of tin and mercury is rubbed in with a stiff straw brush, and polished off with soft paper.
It may here be stated that the first to use a leather cushion as a substitute for the hand in the frictional machine, was Winkler, of Leipzig ; the efficiency of the rubber was increased by Canton, of London, who covered it with an amalgam of tin and mercury.
Now, as he stood by the sluice-boxes looking their length, he allowed himself to dream for a moment of the days when the mercury, turned to amalgam, should be lying thick with gold behind the riffles; to anticipate the unspeakable happiness of telegraphing his success to Helen Dunbar.
It must be remembered, however, that an excessive use of nitric acid will result in waste of mercury, which will be carried off in a milky stream with the water; and also that it will cause the amalgam to become very hard, and less active in attracting other particles of gold.
This is eminently adapted to toxicological investigations: in order to generate a supply of very pure hydrogen, it is only necessary to place the amalgam in water kept slightly acid by the addition of a few drops of sulfuric acid, by means of which the disengagement of gas is rendered more energetic.
Another hindrance which to a considerable extent precludes the study of what one may truthfully designate every-day subjects, is the restless furor for artful counterfeits of science, which are nothing else than the emanations of vain and visionary minds mixing together, as it were, an amalgam of truth and error.
That some tolerable land can be so cultivated, and some industrious unemployed so maintained is true, but it requires the spiritual amalgam of the Salvation Army, or some such body of patient and capable enthusiasts, to solve the difficult problem, for a selected minority of the submerged, on their farm colonies.
The similarity of ammonia to the metallic oxides has led to the conjecture that all its combinations contain a compound metallic body, which has received the name ammonium ; but no one has yet succeeded in its preparation, although by peculiar processes it may be obtained in the form of an amalgam.
A clever, coarse, and vigorous study of the realistic sort, has not a note of poetry in it, but is more coherent, more sensibly conceived and more ably constructed, than the rambling history of Wyatt or the hybrid amalgam of prosaic and romantic elements in the compound comedy of "Westward Ho!"
The amalgam, resembling lead in appearance, being now cut up into cakes, and placed under an immense retort, fire was applied; the mercury, in form of vapor, was driven through a hole in the bottom of the platform into water, where it was condensed, while the silver remained pure in the retort.
Sodium and cyanide of potassium are frequently used in dressing-plates, but the former should be very sparingly employed, as it will often do more harm than good by taking up all sorts of base metals with the amalgam, and so presenting a surface which the gold will pass over without adhering to.
As soon as he was able to work again he attempted to obtain the metals of the alkaline earths by the same methods as he had used for those of the fixed alkalis, but they eluded his efforts and he only succeeded in preparing them as amalgams with mercury, by a process due to Berzelius.
More water is now poured in; the barrel revolves very slowly to let the amalgam all settle to the bottom, the mud runs off through a cock four inches above the bottom, and the mercury and amalgam are then drawn off through a little hole in the bottom of the barrel.
In using amalgam, the first thing we ought to take into consideration is whether that which we are using and calling by that name is such, and I venture to say that in a very large number of cases it is no amalgam at all, but a concrete admixture of solid metals with liquid mercury.
The amalgam was put into a retort and heated over a fire, when the quicksilver would pass off in vapor through a tube into a vessel of water, and then condense, to be again used, while the gold would be left in the retort, to be broken up into small pieces and used as current money.
Salmon, and published in 1855, in which a print which has been exposed to the fumes of iodine is laid down on a plate of polished brass, so that the iodine, absorbed by the printed lines, slightly attacks the brass; mercury being then rubbed over the brass, forms an amalgam with the iodized parts.
Lastly, there is the perennial charm of style, which is never a separate quality, but rather the amalgam and issue of all the mental and moral qualities in a man's possession, and which bears the same relation to these that light bears to the mingled elements that make up the orb of the sun.
Three treatises on chemical subjects from Aquinas's pen have been preserved for us, and it is to him that we are said to owe the origin of the word amalgam, which he first used in describing various chemical methods of metallic combination with mercury that were discovered in the search for the genuine transmutation of metals.
From all which it follows, that the best and surest method of separating it from metals dissolved by it, is to expose the amalgam to a degree of heat sufficient to make all the Quick-silver rise and evaporate; after which the metal remains in the form of a powder, and being fused recovers its malleability.
She followed sympathetically the long slow processes of excavation and root treatment, the delicate shaping and undercutting of the walls of cavities, the adjustment and retention of the many appliances for the exclusion of moisture, the insertions of the amalgams and pastes whose pounding and mixing made a recurrent crisis in her morning.
The ore was then carried and placed in the bottom of large casks, and water and quicksilver were added, and then they were set rolling by machinery for several days, until the silver had formed an amalgam with the mercury, while the baser metals in the ore were disengaged from the silver.
The mercury takes more readily on the zinc when, after the zinc has been cleaned with water sharpened with sulfuric acid, it is moistened with a solution of corrosive sublimate, which is reduced and furnishes a first very thin coat of amalgam, on which the quicksilver is immediately fixed by simple immersion without rubbing.
Such fragments as it will not take up are not gold; but to find that which it has converted into an amalgam, place the mercury in a piece of clean chamois leather, press it carefully, and the mercury will force its way in minute globules through the leather, leaving the gold in a soft mass within.
Or, to take another simile, it is like a painting, which though it has not been executed at a single sitting, yet gives us that impression; and, in spite of the retouching and altering to which it has been subjected, still has the effect of a compact whole, of an indestructible amalgam, from which nothing can be detached.
Every point upon the surface of her clothes and face is reflected back to her eye from the surface of the tin amalgam which has been applied to the back of the mirror by the looking-glass maker, for the purpose of rendering the image of the object more brilliant than if the glass alone were used.
When it was going through the mill, the amalgam piled up so fast on the copper plates and appeared so rich that he at once came up to see me and proposed that we buy, on joint account, the adjoining claim on the same lode, as I knew the owner and had formerly had an option on its purchase.
He returned bluntly that he could attend to the cyanide business himself, when it was really needed; while as to extra men he could not watch a night shift at the plates as well as a day one, and he would have to be pretty sure of the honesty of his new amalgam man before he started in to get one.
Five or six sets of riffle-bars, a distance of thirty or thirty-five feet, are taken up at the head of the sluice, and the dirt between the bars is washed down, while the gold and amalgam lodge above the first remaining set of riffle-bars, whence it is taken out with a scoop or large spoon, and put into a pan.
The attempts made by Davy to decompose the alkaline earths by methods similar to those adopted in the case of potash or soda were not very successful, and it was only when he had received intimation from Berzelius that they might be procured in the form of amalgams by operating in contact with mercury that he obtained any decisive results.
Three treatises on chemical subjects from Aquinas' pen have been preserved for us, and it is to him that we are said to owe the use, in the Western world at least, of the word amalgam, which he first employed in describing various chemical methods of metallic combination with mercury that were discovered in the search for the genuine transmutation of metals.
An amalgam of four parts of silver and two of mercury being dissolved in nitric acid, and water equal to thirty weights of the metals being added, a small piece of soft amalgam of silver suspended in the solution, quickly gathers to itself the particles of the silver of the amalgam, which form upon it a crystallization precisely resembling a shrub.
Take quicksilver and the metal potassium, equal parts by volume, put them together in a tumbler, and if both metals be good there will be a brisk ebullition, which continues until an amalgam of the two is formed, then add as much quicksilver as there is of the amalgam; let it work till thoroughly mixed, and it is ready for use.
I cannot agree that any good is attained by scouring the plates with sand and alkalies, as recommended in some books on the subject; on the contrary, I prefer the opposite mode of treatment, and either face the plates with nitrate of silver and nitrate of mercury, or else with sulfate of zinc and mercury, in the form of what is called zinc amalgam.
Between the stairway cut in the schist rock and the path closed by this old tree, in front of the marsh and beneath the overhanging rock, several granite blocks roughly hewn, and piled one upon the other, formed the four corners of the cottage and held up the planks, cobblestones, and pitch amalgam of which the walls were made.
The process of cleaning up is performed according to the quantity and richness of the material worked upon, at intervals of twenty to forty days, and consists in removing the pavement and blocks from the bed of the sluice, and then gathering all the amalgam of gold and rich dirt collected, and replacing the locks in the same way as at first.
Chronic industrial poisoning occurs principally in the preparation and use of mercury salts, in recovery of the metal itself and of other metals with use of an amalgam, in water gilding, from use of nitrate of mercury in the preparation of rabbit fur for felt hat making, from use of mercury pumps in producing the vacuum in electric filament lamps, and in making barometers and thermometers.
As the action of the battery proceeds, this amalgam forces its way into the pores of the element and keeps up so good an amalgamation of both copper rod and zinc that zincs can be used up to a point when the rising internal resistance makes it economy to throw them away, and absolutely no perceptible local action takes place in the cell upon continued open circuit.
The machine was improved by Sir Isaac Newton and others, and before the close of that century was put into substantially its present form of a round glass plate rotated between insulated leather cushions coated with an amalgam of tin and zinc, the positive or vitreous electricity thus developed being accumulated on two large hollow brass cylinders with globular ends, supported on glass pillars.
When we add to this, the vast and increasing product of our quicksilver mines of California, so indispensable as an amalgam in producing gold and silver, as also the great and progressive improvement in processes and machinery for working the quartz veins, it is now believed that the estimates of our Secretary of the Interior, and Commissioner of the General Land Office, will be exceeded by the result.
Hancock had cleared the spittoon, set a fresh tumbler, filled the kettle and whisked the debris of amalgam and cement from the bracket table before he began the scrubbing and cleansing of his hands, and when the patient came in Miriam was in her corner reluctantly handling the instruments, wet with the solution that crinkled her fingertips and made her skin brittle and dry.
He gives an easy process for obtaining pure silver from the chloride of that metal: his method is to dissolve the pure chloride of silver in a solution of caustic ammonia, and to put into the liquid a sufficient quantity of pure mercury; the silver is speedily reduced and converted into an amalgam, and when this amalgam is exposed to a red heat the mercury is driven off and pure silver remains.
That moral amalgam which we call society, and which recognizes a mutual and perfectly equal condition of dependence, and a common necessity, as the great cementing principles of the human family, had not yet taken place; and it was still too much the custom, in that otherwise lovely region, for the wild man to revenge his own wrong, and the strong man to commit a greater with impunity.
For vulgarity is the natural product of herd-life; an amalgam of second-hand thought, cheap and rapid sensation, defensive and offensive self-consciousness, gradually plastered over the faces, manners, voices, whole beings, of those whose elbows are too tightly squeezed to their sides by the pressure of their fellows, whose natures are cut off from Nature, whose senses are rendered imitative by the too insistent impact of certain sights and sounds.
And then, again, when those unfurnished hours are there, and with them shall have come the infirmities which years and toil shall have brought, his mind will run on once more to that eternal rest in which fees and salary, honors and dignity, wife and children, with all the joys of satisfied success, shall be brought together for him in one perfect amalgam which he will call by the name of Heaven.
Cylinder and plate machines are furnished with proper rubbers, and before using the instrument it is usual to remove them, and after carefully cleaning the glass with a dry silk handkerchief before a fire, the rubbers are scraped with a paper-knife to remove the old amalgam, and fresh applied by first melting the end of a tallow candle slightly, and after passing this over the rubber, the finely powdered amalgam is now dusted on to it.
The solution of double cyanide of gold, silver, and potassium, which has been drained from the leaching vats, is passed over the mercury in the precipitating 'box' when the decomposition of the electrolyte by the electric current is being accomplished, the gold and silver are set free and unite with the mercury, and are also deposited on the plates or discs of copper, forming amalgam, which is collected and made marketable by the well known and tried methods.