Tough work it was ascending the ladders, and very hot withal. But as I intended to be in Drammen that evening, distant five-and-twenty miles, no time was to be lost. My climbing on the fjeld had been capital practice; and such was the pace at which I ascended, that the superintendent, who joined us, broke down or bolted midway.
We were soon at Kongsberg, it being down hill all the way. People told me I must by no means omit going to see a monument on the hill, between the mines and the town, where the names of ten kings, who had come to see the mine, were recorded, including Bernadotte. But I preferred devoting the rest of my spare time to what I considered much more instructive, viz., a visit to the establishments for reducing and refining the silver ore. As good luck would have it, I had an opportunity of witnessing the process for refining silver. About 2000l. worth of the precious metal was in an oven, with a moveable bottom, undergoing the process of refinement by the intense heat of a pine-wood fire, blown upon it from above.
Schiller’s magnificent “Song of the Bell” rose to my mind—
Nehmet Holz von Fichtenstamme,
Doch recht trocken lasst as seyn,
Dass die eingepresste Flamme
Schlage zu dem Schwalch hinein!
The mynte-mester, a fat man, of grave aspect, illuminated by large spectacles, ordered one of the Cyclopses around to put what looked like a thin, long poker, with a small knob at the end, into the boiling mass. It came out coated with a smooth envelope of dead metal. This the director examined, and shook his head; so away went the blow-pipe as before. Presently the same process was repeated. On the poker-knob being inserted a third time, the director scrutinized it carefully, and then said, “færdig!” On examining it, I found projecting, like a crown of airy thorns, a coating of exceedingly fine spicula of frosted silver. That was the signal that it was sufficiently purified. Never till now had I known so exactly the force of the words of the Psalmist, “Even as silver which from the earth is tried and purified seven times in the fire.”
It was desired to have the silver in small nodules for silversmiths, as more easily workable than in a lump. For this purpose, a vessel of cold water was placed under the furnace-spout. Another Cyclops stationed himself in front of the said spout, holding in his hand the nozzle of some hose connected with a water-engine. With this he took aim at the orifice (reminding me much of a Norskman shooting game sitting, but in this case it was flying, as will be seen). A signal is given, a cock turned, and out rushes the white-hot molten metal; but at the moment of its escape from the trap, the fireman discharges a jet of cold water at it; the consequence is, that, instead of descending in a continuous stream, the blazing jet is squandered, and falls into the vessel below in a shower of silver drops. Danaë could have explained the thing to a nicety, only her shower was one of gold; while the metal most predominant in her own composition would seem to have been brass.