“Doubtless. I have seen a juggler swallow hot iron, but I have never believed it went down his throttle, although it appeared to have done so. Did you get any share of the transmuted gold? That’s the practical test, my Davie.”
“That is exactly the test your barons applied. I doubt if their nobilities would take much interest in a scientific experiment were there no profit at the end of it. Each man entering the laboratory pays what he pleases to the money taker at the table, but it must not be less than one gold bonnet-piece. When all have entered, the doors are closed and locked. The amount of money collected is weighed against small bars of gold which the alchemist places in the opposite scale until the two are equally balanced. This bar of gold he then throws into the crucible.”
“Oh, he puts gold into the crucible, does he? Where then is the profit? I thought these necromancers made gold from iron.”
“Signor Farini’s method is different, your majesty. He asserts that like attracts like, and that the gold in the crucible will take to itself the minute unseen particles which he believes exists in all soils; the intense heat burning away the dross and leaving the refined gold.”
“I see; and how ends this experiment?”
“The residue is cooled and weighed. Sometimes it is double the amount of gold put in, sometimes treble; and I have known him upon occasion take from the crucible quadruple the gold of the bar, but never have I known a melting fall below double the amount collected by the man at the table. At the final act each noble has returned to him double or treble the gold he relinquished on entering.”
“Where then arises the profit to your Italian? I never knew these foreigners to work for nothing.”
“He says he does it for love of Scotland and hatred of England; an ancient enemy. Were but the Scottish nation rich, he thinks they could the better withstand incursions from the south.”
“Well, Davie, that seems to me a most unsubstantial reason. Scotland’s protection has been her poverty in all except hard knocks. Were she as wealthy as France it would be the greater temptation for Englishers to overrun the country. My grandfather, James the Third, had a black chest full of gold and jewels, yet he was murdered flying from defeat in battle. When does this golden wizard fire his cauldron, Davie?”