Conversations on Chemistry, V. 1-2 / In Which the Elements of that Science Are Familiarly Explained and Illustrated by Experiments

by Mrs. Marcet

CAROLINE.

And is not plating metals something of the same nature?

MRS. B.

In the operation of plating, two metals are united, one being covered with the other, but without the intervention of a third; iron or copper may thus be covered with gold or silver.

EMILY.

Mercury appears to me of a very different nature from the other metals.

MRS. B.

One of its greatest peculiarities is, that it retains a fluid state at the temperature of the atmosphere. All metals are fusible at different degrees of heat, and they have likewise each the property of freezing or becoming solid at a certain fixed temperature. Mercury congeals only at seventy-two degrees below the freezing point.

EMILY.

That is to say, that in order to freeze, it requires a temperature of seventy-two degrees colder than that at which water freezes.