Notes of Experiments

December 10, 1678 to January 15 — Subliming antimony original: "Sb" with sal ammoniac original: "NH4Cl"; ammonium chloride — alloying antimony with lead and other metals — (no definite result of value).

January 16, 1679/80 — Subliming antimonial sublimate a substance purified by being turned into vapor and then solidified again with lead antimoniate, etc.

January 22 — The action of nitric acid original: "HNO3" and sal ammoniac on stibnite original: "Sb2S3"; antimony trisulfide, etc., and further sublimations (most of these experiments are roughly quantitative).

February 16, 1679/80 — Fusing stibnite with vitriol sulfuric acid or a sulfate mineral and other substances — sublimation of various metals with the help of antimony and sal ammoniac, etc. — the action of sulfuric acid original: "H2SO4" on galena original: "PbS"; lead sulfide — the action of nitric acid on the sublimate of antimony — and other such things — (no results of value).

August 1682 — Similar experiments — some on lead ore — others on an alloy of tin and bismuth (which he seems to call Diana original: "Diana"; in alchemy, Diana usually refers to silver, but here the author applies it to a tin-bismuth alloy).

July 10 (no year) — "I saw the [unclear] of the Philosophers" original: "vidi * Philosophorum"; likely a reference to a specific alchemical state or "star" of the philosophers' stone. Sublimations of white calx original: "calx albus"; a metal oxide or powder produced by heating with sal ammoniac — what "white calx" is is not clear; it seems to be a carbonate as it effervesces with nitric acid, but it is not calcium carbonate original: "CaCO3"; chalk or limestone as the quantity turned into vapor in experiment 5 — on July 27 — is too much.

April 28, 1686 — On a volatile salt of Zinc (apparently zinc chloride original: "ZnCl2") and on an alloy derived from the ores of iron, antimony, tin, lead, and bismuth.

May 16 — on "ve. vo." This likely stands for "venenum volatile" (volatile poison) or "ventus volatilis" (volatile wind), archaic terms for certain gases or spirits.

March 5, 1690/91 and March 16 — On some bismuth compound and the action of nitric acid original: "aquafortis" on alloys of tin, bismuth, and zinc.

Experiments and observations, December 1692 and January 1692/3 — the working of yeast original: "barm" — he says "in distilling new wine before fermentation the phlegm original: "flegm"; the watery, non-alcoholic part of a distillate rises first and then the spirit, but after fermentation the spirit rises before the phlegm."

Contains a comparison of the melting points of alloys of lead, tin, and bismuth. — April 1693 and June 1693 — further experiments.

April 1695 — Melting stibnite with ores of iron, copper, and tin; and on April 2, the resulting mass was sublimed with sal ammoniac. Other sublimations.

February 1695/6 — Sublimations of antimony with iron ores.

No date — Action of nitric acid on stibnite, etc. Sublimation of an alloy of antimony and lead with sal ammoniac and similar experiments.

Experiments on lead ore and other things.

" Copper, etc.