Subtle. No, sir, of red.'
No doubt, too, water is here used in the sense of the Lat. aqua, to denote any substance that is in a liquid state.
808. Cered pokets. Tyrwhitt reads Sered pokettes, and includes this phrase in his short 'List of Phrases not understood'; and indeed, it has never been explained. But there is little difficulty about it. Poket is the diminutive of poke, a bag, and means a little bag. Cered (Lat. ceratus) means waxed. Thus Cotgrave has—'Ciré, m. -ée, f. waxed, seared; dressed, covered, closed, or mingled, with wax.' In many MSS. the word is spelt sered, but this makes no difference, since Cotgrave has 'seared' in this very place. So we find both 'cere-cloth' and 'sear-cloth.' It is obvious that bags or cases prepared or closed with wax would be useful for many of the alchemist's purposes; see Theat. Chem. iii. 13.
sal peter, Lat. sal petrae, or rock-salt, also called nitre, is nitrate of potassa. A recipe for preparing it is given in Theat. Chem. iii. 195.
vitriole, i. e. sulphuric acid. See 'vitrioli praeparatio'; Theat. Chem. iii. 95.
810. Sal tartre, salt of tartar, i. e. carbonate of potash; so called from its having been formerly prepared from cream of tartar.
sal preparat, common salt prepared in a certain manner. See the
section—'quod ualeat sal commune, et quomodo praeparetur'; Theat. Chem. ii. 433, 435.
812. maad, i. e. prepared, mixed. oile of tartre, oil of tartar, cream of tartar; see Prol. 630. See the section—'quomodo praeparatur tartarum, ut oleum fiat ex illo, quo calces soluuntur'; Theat. Chem. ii. 436; and again—'ad faciendum oleum de Tartaro'; id. iii. 303. To scan l. 813, remember to pronounce tartre as in French, and to accent alum on the latter syllable.
Of tártr' | alúm | glas bérm | wort ánd | argoíle ||