SPECTROSCOPY. The Workshop
It is pretty well known tbat gold assaying in connection with the various mints i has been hitherto conducted by a slow and troublesome chemical process. For the purpose of testing how far the spectroscope could be made to supersede, aid, or simplify the present chemical modus operandi of mint assaying, two scientific parties have been conducting experiments simultaneously at the Royal Mint, Lon- j don, and the United States Mint, Philadelphia. The task each of these parties undertook was to exceed the known powers of the spectroscope in telling the presence of certain qualities in any given body and make it tell at a glance the exact quantity , of gold, silver, or copper present in any ingot or coin. While both parties may., be said to have failed in this utilitarian { object, their endeavours have not been altogether unrewarded by success. M they have not succeeded in making the spectroscope report the exact quantity of minute particles of gold in large bodies of alloy, they have at least demonstrated the | fact that the spectroscope possesses a quantities ~as~weU as a-qualitive power which perseverance and future experiments, may indefinitely multiply. »
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/OW18770310.2.5.3
Bibliographic details
Otago Witness, Issue 1319, 10 March 1877, Page 3
Word Count
193SPECTROSCOPY. The Workshop Otago Witness, Issue 1319, 10 March 1877, Page 3
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