Fig. 38d. a pierced brass toast sign
Casting and Working Pewter
Since nearly all metals excepting tin and lead have high melting points, it is hard to melt them unless you have a regular furnace.
Something About Pewter.
—But casting metals is a fascinating process and you can do it by melting 25 parts of lead and 75 parts of tin together which forms an alloy called pewter.
This alloy is as old as the hills and for ten or eleven centuries before the golden age of invention—that is to say the beginning of the 19th century—pewter utensils were used in nearly every home in every civilized country.
Then came the invention of cheap processes for making pottery and glass and those good old hard alloys known as britannia metal, which is formed of tin, copper and antimony, and German silver, which is German all right, for it was first made at Hildburghausen, Germany, but it is not silver at all for it is formed of nickel, zinc and copper, went entirely out of use.
But there is a dignity and a beauty about pewter that none of the other common metals have and it may be revived one of these days for efforts are now being made to produce it again in all its former glory.
How to Make Pewter.
—I do not know of any place where you can buy pewter but you can easily make the alloy yourself.