Thus have I produced
them with Bubbles of _Pitch_, _Rosin_, _Colophony_, _Turpentine_,
_Solutions_ of several _Gums_, as _Gum-Arabick_ in water; any _glutinous_
Liquor, as _Wort_, _Wine_, _Spirit of Wine_, _Oyl of Turpentine_, _Glare of
Snails,_ &c.
It would be needless to enumerate the several Instances, these being enough
to shew the generality or universality of this propriety. Only I must not
omit, that we have instances also of this kind even in metalline Bodies and
animal; for those several Colours which are observed to follow each other
upon the polisht surface of hardned Steel, when it is by a sufficient
degree of heat gradually tempered or softened, are produced, from nothing
else but a certain thin _Lamina_ of a _vitrum_ or _vitrified_ part of the
Metal, which by that degree of heat, and the concurring action of the
ambient Air, is driven out and fixed on the surface of the Steel.
And this hints to me a very probable (at least, if not the true) cause of
the hardning and tempering of Steel, which has not, I think, been yet
given, nor, that I know of been so much as thought of by any. And that is
this, that the hardness of it arises from a greater proportion of a
vitrified Substance interspersed through the pores of the Steel. And that
the tempering or softning of it arises from the proportionate or smaller
parcels of it left within those pores.
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