A True Recipe

mon, or salt of tartar, in a brass pan, it will turn green in less than twenty-four hours, acridity provided the salt is dissolved, and this will happen because of its acidity. Here is an argument that should suffice for you in its entirety; however, to make you understand these things better, I now wish to teach you how to extract salt from all species of trees, herbs, and plants, and I will make you understand this immediately, without having to set your hand to the work. You will easily confess to me that all bucking leys an alkaline solution used for washing linen are suited for lye, and likewise you will confess to me that they can only serve once in the said lye. If you confess that, it is enough: for through this you must understand that the salt which was in the ashes has dissolved and mixed within the lye, and this is for the purpose of removing the dirt and filth from the linens, because of its mordancy. From this it follows that the lye is tinted and oily with the said salt, which is dissolved within it. When the lye has reached its perfection, it has carried away all the salt that was in the said ashes, from which it comes that the ashes remain altered and useless, and the lye, which has carried off the salt of the said ashes, always retains some cleansing virtue. If you do not wish to believe these reasons, take a cauldron of lye, and boil it until the moisture is all evaporated, and then you will find the salt at the bottom of the cauldron. If the above arguments are not sufficient, pay attention to the smoke of wood: for it is thus, that the smoke of every species of wood makes the eyes sting and damages the sight, and this for the cause of a certain falsity meaning caustic or corrosive quality that it draws from the wood when the other humors are exhaled by the vehemence of the fire, which chases out the hateful and humid materials. And that this is so, you will know when you boil water in some cauldron, because the steam from said water will not harm your sight in any way, even though you place your eyes over said steam. And to prove even better to you that there is salt in woods and plants, consider the bark from which tanners cure their hides: if it is dried and pulverized, it hardens and prevents the hides of oxen and other beasts from putrefying. Do you think that the oak barks would have the virtue of preventing the putrefaction of said hides without there being salt in said barks? Not in truth, and if it were the case that the bark