The Magician's Own Book, or, the Whole Art of Conjuring / Being a complete hand-book of parlor magic, and containing over one thousand optical, chemical, mechanical, magnetical, and magical experiments, amusing transmutations, astonishing sleights and subtleties, celebrated card deceptions, ingenious tricks with numbers, curious and entertaining puzzles, together with all the most noted tricks of modern performers.

by George Arnold; Frank Cahill

Nearly all the colors used in the arts, are produced by metals and their combinations; indeed, one is named chromium, from a Greek word signifying color, on account of the beautiful tints obtained from its various combinations with oxygen and the other metals. All the various tints of green, orange, yellow, and red, are obtained from this metal.

Solutions of most of the metallic salts give precipitates with solutions of alkalies and their salts, as well as with many other substances, such as what are usually called prussiate of potash, hydro-sulphuret of ammonia, &c.; and the colors differ according to the metal employed; and so small a quantity is required to produce the color, that the solutions before mixing may be nearly colorless.

EXPERIMENTS.

1. To a solution of sulphate of iron, add a drop or two of a solution of prussiate of potash, and a blue color will be produced.

2. Substitute sulphate of copper for iron, and the color will be a rich brown.

3. Another blue, of quite a different tint, may be produced by letting a few drops of a solution of ammonia fall into one of sulphate of copper, when a precipitate of a light blue falls down, which is dissolved by an additional quantity of the ammonia, and forms a transparent solution of the most splendid rich blue color.

4. Into a solution of sulphate of iron, drop a few drops of a strong infusion of galls, and the color will become a bluish-black—in fact, ink. A little tea will answer as well as the infusion of galls. This is the reason why certain stuffs formerly in general use for dressing gowns for gentlemen were so objectionable; for as they were indebted to a salt of iron for their color, buff, as it was called, a drop of tea accidentally spilled, produced all the effect of a drop of ink.

5. Put into a largish test tube, two or three small pieces of granulated zinc, fill it about one third full of water, put in a few grains of iodine, and boil the water, which will at first acquire a dark purple color, gradually fading as the iodine combines with the zinc. Add a little more iodine from time to time, until the zinc is nearly all dissolved. If a few drops of this solution be added to an equally colorless solution of corrosive sublimate (a salt of mercury), a precipitate will take place of a splendid scarlet color, brighter, if possible, than vermilion, which is also a preparation of mercury.

CRYSTALLIZATION OF METALS.

Some of the metals assume certain definite forms in return from the fluid to the solid state. Bismuth shows this property more readily than most others.