Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/420

 SAP

SAPONARIA, in the materia medica, a name given at dif- ferent times to feveral plants, which had in fome fort the properties of foap.

The Jiruthium of the Greek, and hcrba lanaria of the Ro- mans, having fomewhat of this property, and being ufed in the cleaning of wool, feveral authors have explained it by the word fapnaria\ but this is leaving us as much in the dark, as to the plant, as we were before, not at all afcer- taining which, if any of the plants at one time or other fo called, was to be underftood as being the fame with the Jiru- thium.

The Greeks have many times called hyftbp by the name_/fl- ponaria; others have given the fame name to the anagallis, or pimpernel ; and others to feveral different plants, which they fuppofed to have the effects of foap, or of nitre, in cleanfing of things.

None of the plants, however, that we have under the name faponaria, will at all agree with the Jiruthium, or herba la- naria, which was a thiftle; and the very Arabians feem not to have known it, but have erroneoufly fuppofed their can- diii to be it. Saponaria terra, in mineralogy, a name given by fome au- thors to the common fullers earth. Dales Pharm. p. 19. See Fullers earth, Cycl. and Suppl. Saponaria terra alba., in natural hiftory, a name given by fome authors to the common tobaccopipe clay. They call the common fullers earth 2\(o faponaria terra, and diftinguifh it from this by the epithet purpurafcens ; though it has no fuch colour as purple about it. Kentmati's No- mendator, foil p. 1. See the article Cimolia. SAPONARIUM lixivium. See Lixivium faponarium. SAPONEA, a name given by authors to a perioral medicine made of oil of fweet almonds and fugar, mixed with the diftilled water of violets. SAPOTA, in botany, the name by which Plumier calls a ge- nus of plants, fince defcribed by Linnams under the name of achras. See the article Achras. SAPPAN, in the materia medica, a name ufed by fome au- thors for the wood of the arbor Campechiana, or logwood ufed in dying. Breyn. Prodr. Vol. 2. p. 37. SAPPHIRE, (Cycl.) the name given by the moderns to a beautiful pellucid gem of a blue colour : this is however ex- tremely different from the ftone the antients knew under the name of the fapphi 're; for that was no pellucid gem, but an opake Hone of a very deep blue, veined with white, and fpotted with fmall gold coloured fpangles, in form of ftars, and was only a more beautiful kind of their cyanus, which was the ftone we call lapis lazuli.

The defcrlptions of all the authors of an:iquity of the ftone they called the fapph'ire, plainly evince this ; and hence authors of a later date have too haftily concluded, that our fapph'ire was wholly unknown to them: but this feems a very improbable conjecture, and a ftricf. enquiry into their writings will fhew that they have very well defcribed our fapph'ire, under the name of the Jky blue beryl, or beryllus ac'roides ; and as it had among them no peculiar gene- rical name, it could not have been better named than thus; as the beryl is plainly that of all the gems to which the fapph'ire molt approaches, and its colour is in the fineft fpecimens a pure fky blue.

It is in its molt- perfect ftate a very elegant and valuable gem, and is fecond only to the diamond in luftre, hardnefs, and price. It is met with of various fizes, but feldom fo very fmall as many of the other gems, and has been fome- j times found up to three quarters of an inch in diameter. | Its more ufual ftandard is between a feventh and a fixth of an inch. It is various in figure, being fometimes found in the pebble, and fometimes in the cryftal form. Its moll ufual appearance is in fmall irregularly rounded, or oblono- flattifh ftones, covered with no cruft, and looking of a bright blue, but without the luftre and fine polifh of the native ruby. It is fometimes alfo found in beautiful hex- angular cryftals, terminated by hexangular pyramids of a fine blue throughout, and naturally of a high polifh. Some- times alfo thefe fprigs are only coloured at their points, and fometimes they are wholly colourlefs.

The proper and only colour of the gem is blue ; in fome fpecimens this is a fine deep colour, like that of the cleareft Iky ; and in others it varies into palenefs in fhades of all degrees, between that and the pure brightnefs and water of cryftal, without the leaft tinge of colour, but with a fuperior brightnefs, that eafdy diftiiiguifh.es it at fight from cryftal, it more than any ftone approaching to the nature of the diamond ; and in fome it has a dufky white- nefs, like that of milk : this laft colour might be fuppofed owing to a mixture of a fine white earthy matter, but that it has been found that different mixtures of pellucid liquors, folutions of copper, and of different falts, are capable of producing the fame colour.

It feems very clear, from a multitude of experiments, that this gem, in its pureft and fineft ftate, owes its beautiful blue to copper ; and the fame metal being found capable of giving this milky look with a caft of blue, the general opi-

SAP

nion of this laft mentioned milky looking ftone beln"- a true fapph'ire, feems perfectly right.

1 he pebble fapphires are always finer than the cryflnlli- form ones, and raoft of the fine colourlefs fapphires, which our jewellers commonly, but very improperly, call white fapphires, as they have not the leaft tinge of whitenefs in them, but are abfolutely colourlefs, as the pureft waters are of the pebble, not of the fprig kind.

The fapphire is of very different degrees of hardnefs and brightnefs in different parts of the world, and confequently of very different value.

The antients ufed to diftinguifh the fapphire, as they did all the other precious ftones, into the male and female kind, according to the deeper or paler colour; and our jew- ellers, according to their cuftom of dividing the gems into feveral kinds, according to their different accidents of pu- rity, beauty, &c. make four kinds of fapphire.

1. The firft is the fine blue oriental fapphire. This is the name they give the fapphire when in its greateft degree of purity and perfection, as hard as the ruby, and of a fine fky blue.

2. The white fapphire. This is the name they give the fapphire when wholly colourlefs, and refemblino- the dia- mond; and that whether it have been naturally°found fo, or reduced to that ftate by art : for as all fapphires lofe their colour on being put into the fire, it is a common practice with fome jewellers, when they have fapphires of a bad co- lour, to diveft them wholly of it by fire, and brine them to what they call white fapphires; but this, as before obferv- ed, is a very improper name, as the gem in this ftate has not the leaft tinge of white, but is wholly colourlefs, and as there is another white fapphire, which is truly fo, and which they call the milk fapphire.

3. The third kind of fapphire is what they call the water fap- phire. This alfo is a very improper name, not at all express- ing what they mean by it ; for they call by this name all the foft pale blue fapphires which are found in Europe.

4. The laft is the milk fapphire. This is the name they give the fapphire when of a white milky caft, with a faint tinge of blue.

The fineft fapphires in the world are thofe brought from the kingdom of Pegu in the Eaft -Indies, where fome arc found perfectly colourlefs as cryftal, and others of all fhades of blue, up to the violet colour, but never with the leaft tinge of purple, or any o*.her colour but true blue: thefe are all found in the pebble form. We have other very fine fap- phires, both of the pebble and cryftalliform kind, from Bifnagar, Conanor, Calicut, and the jfland of Ceylon : thefe are of all the fhades of colour, and in Ceylon there are fome- times found a fort of baftard gems, part red and part blue, feeming of a mixt nature between the fapphire and the ruby.

The occidental fapphires are from Silefia, Bohemia, and many other parts of Europe, and are often very beautiful ftones; but are greatly inferior, both in luftre and hardnefs, to the oriental. Bill's Hift. of Kofi', p. 594.

Sapphire-<-ojW. To give this elegant and beautiful blue to glafs, the workers in the glafs-houfes ufe the following me- thod. Take an hundred weight of rochetta fritt, and add to it a pound of prepared zaffer, and to this one ounce of man- ganefe ; mix all well together, ^nd put them into the fur- nace to melt and purify, and when it is become perfectly pure and fine, work it into veffels, &V. This fmall quantity of manganefe, with the zaffer, gives a raoft beautiful violet blue. Neri's Art of Glafs, p. 93.

Sapphire-^<t//V. The method of making the counterfeit fapphires in pafte is this. Take of cryftal prepared two ounces, minium, or common red lead, fix ounces, zaffer prepared five grains, manganefe prepared feven grains; mix all the powders perfectly together, and put them into a crucible, cover it with a ftrong lute, and put the whole into a potter's kiln, to ftand in the hotteft place for twenty four hours ; it will be of a raoft beautiful deep fapphire-zolour. Blue paftes of two other degrees of blue are alfo made in the following manner. For a fky blue take cryftal prepared two ounces, red lead fix ounces, prepared zaffer twenty one grains ; mix all well together, and bake them as before. For a deep violet blue take cryftal two ounces, red lead four ounces, and four grains of painters blue final t ; mix all, and bake together in the kiln.

Thefe both make good blues, but much inferior to the firft procefs. Neri's Art of Glafs, p. 132.

SAPPHIRINA aqua, the blue eye water, is thus made. Pour a pint of ftrong and frefh lime water into a copper veflel ; add to it a drachm of crude fal armoniac, and throw in fome filings, or fmall pieces of copper, it foon acquires a beautiful blue colour, and is not only ufed as an eye water, but alfo to deterge old ulcers ; and fometimes is mixed with other things in injections for gonorrhoeas.

SAPPHIRO-RUJilNUS, in natural hiftory, a name given by fome modern writers on gems to a ftone, partly a fapphire, and partly a ruby, or, more properlv fpeaking, a fcpphire- tinged in fome part with the ruby colour, while the reft