Copper is a metal of great tenacity, and considerable hardness ; so that it furnishes a material not unfit for the fabrication of workmen's tools, and cutting instru ments. The swords, hatchets, and daggers of many an cient nations were of copper, either pure, or mixed with tin, by which its hardness is considerably increased. The arms of the Egyptians were commonly of this me tal, (Diod. 1. i.) Job speaks of bows of brass or copper, (c. xx. v. 24.) Herodotus assures us, that the Massa gem had their axes, pikes, quivers, hatchets, and the very trappings of their horses, of this metal. In Eng land, Switzerland, and Germany, but more especially in the northern parts of the continent, arms, rings, and other instruments of copper, have been frequently found in ancient tombs. It was the same in America ; the arms and tools of that part of the world were of copper, (4costa.) In Japan, even at this day, those implements which in other countries are made of iron, are there made of copper or brass. Kcempfer, t. i.
But copper is very interior, as a material for sharp edged instruments, to iron, which may be made, by cer tain processes, to cut the hardest substances, and to re tain its edge for a long time, Iron, however, is by no means easily disengaged from its ore ; and is hardly ever found naturally in a metallic state. To convert the ore of iron into metal, it must be pounded and washed, and smelted by intense heat more than once, and in eon taet with charcoal, or some substance capable of reviving it from the state .of dross ; and to form it into steel, still more complicated processes are necessary. Yet iron seems to have been in use in very remote ages. Moses makes frequent mention of it. He celebrates its great hardness, (Lev. xxvi. 19.); takes notice, that the bed stead of Og, king of Bastian, was formed of it, (Deut. 11.); speaks of mines of iron, (Id. viii. 9.); and com pares the severity of the servitude of the Israelites in Egypt, to the heat of a furnace for melting that metal, (Id. iv. 20.) By the same authority we find, that swords, knives, axes, and tools for cutting stones, were made of iron in those ancient ages ; so that we may conclude, that the art of tempering it, and converting it into steel, was known at that period.
Various suppositions may be made concerning the cir cumstances which first suggested to men the art of con verting the more refractory ores into metal. Volcanoes might have originally given them some ideas of metal lurgy, by the streams of melted minerals and metals which they sometimes throw up. Most writers, how
ever, agree in ascribing this discovery to the burning of forests, where the soil was rich in metals, which would thus be melted and diffused around on the surface of the earth. It was in this manner, according to the tradi tions of Greece, that iron was first discovered on mount Ida, (Lucret. I. v.) It was to a similar accident that the discovery of the silver mines of the Pyrenees was at tributed. These mountains, it is said, were formerly co vered with thick woods. Being accidentally set on fire by some shepherds, the conflagration continued to rage for many days, till at length streams of pure silver began to flow from the sides of the mountains down into the plain, (Died. 1. v.) It is related, that the leader of a new colony in Paraguay, observing a stone of uncommon hardness, and spotted with black, took and threw it into a very hot fire ; soon after which a quantity of iron was observed running from the fire. (Lett. Edif. t. 11.) The captain of a Spanish ship, it is said, being obliged to put in at a desert island, there repaired his ship's furnace. In making the hearth, he used several layers of earth. When he arrived at Acapulca, the whole crew were greatly surprised to find, under the ash-pan of the fur nace, a solid mass of gold, which the violence of the fire had melted and separated from the earth. Gemelli, t. v.
It is not improbable, that in some such way as this the idea of extracting metals from their ores, by means of fire, was first suggested. If a person should by ac cident have observed a liquid matter flowing from a melt ed ore, and assuming various shapes as it cooled, his curiosity would be excited ; he would naturally repeat the experiment ; and thus by degrees the art of smelt ing metals would be found out. The discovery of mines of metal hid in the bowels of the earth, was probably equally accidental. Torrents of rain, tempests of wind, or thunder, might break off fragments of rocks or moun tains, and thereby betray the metallic treasures which they contained. Sometimes the winds, by tearing up trees by the routs, have discovered metals and minerals. Labuthers in uigging have sometimes hit, by accident, upon very rich mines, (Lett. EdY: t. iv.) This was the way in which, according to Justin, the gold mines that formerly rendered Spain so famous were discovered, (I. xliv. e. 3.) What accident thus laid open, the persever ing industry of man would soon sufficiently explore.