The New York herald., 1922-01-29
Making Gold From Dro...

Making Gold From Dros..
The recent report Of the production
of synthetic gold in Germany at
tracted more than the usual interest
which attaches to such statements
principally perhaps because Professor
IRVING FISHER Of Yale declared that
If the process was as successful as
he had been creditably informed it
was Germany had found an easy way
Of making her reparations payments
and Increasing enormously the
wealth Of the country. Professor
FISHER said that he had been told
that the inventor of the process had
made gold as long ago as 1917, and
that samples which he asserted were
products Of his laboratory and which
he submitted to the Reichsbank were
pronounced real gold. Professor
FISHER learned that the supposed in
ventor was a fraud and a man with
prison record.
This disclosure emphasizes the opin-
ion that man apparently is not much
nearer to solution of the great
problem of ages, the transmutation
of base metals into noble ones, than
he was centuries ago. He may know
more of chemistry and have more
theories than the Alexandrian Greeks
or the Arabian alchemists, he may
not pin his faith on the philosophers
stone of medieval times or trust to
the red elixir Of life or to black art,
but he has not yet found profitable
way to turn cheap substances into a
wealth of yellow gold.
To the general reader one of the
striking things in the history of the
attempted transmutation of metals Is
the use of mercury. 1t has been the
resort Of the serious Investigator as
well as the charlatan. With the
Greeks philosophers mercury'-that
is, the soul of mercury-was the
prima materia. In the twelfth GEN.
tury mercury was the most impor-
tant Of the spirits, the others being
sulphur, arsenic and sal ammonica.
VAN HELMoyT, who was perhaps the
last distinguished Investigator to pre-
tend to make gold, asserted that he
obtained his metal by his own process
from mercury.
Others said that in their experiments
they mixed mercury with sulphur,
and others that they had a combina-
tion OF salt, sulphur and mercury. An
English physician Of the eighteenth
century said that he changed mer-
curry to gold by the aid of red and
white powders, but when he publicly
applied his formula his experiment
failed and he used the last Of the
mysterious powders to end his life.
The German whose scheme Profess
sor FISHER Investigated said that
he extracted his gold from mercury
in vacuum furnace of his own in
vention by which an extraordinarily
high temperature was obtained.
The recovery of gold from sea water
has been a matter of interest to the
impostor as well as to the scientist.
1t has been asserted that in every
cubic meter Of sea water there is half
a milligram OF gold. Not long ago
an Italian declared that the water OF
the African Gold Coast was four times
as rich as this estimate and offered
to prove this to anybody who would
buy shares in his invention. An
official of the Prussian Ministry OF
Finance made an unsuccessful effo-t
to extract gold from the waters o'
the North Sea in the last years OF the
war, and private German enterprises
had no better luck in seeking gold in
the Eder, Rhine and weser.
The most famous Of all the mod
ern schemes for extracting gold
from sea water was that OF the Rev.
p. +. JERSEGAN, which was fully ex-
posed in July. 1898. by THE New
YoRK HERALD. JERyEGAN's secret
process. in which mercury was the
chief element, was first tried off the
Rhode Island coast. 1t proved such
a great success that 100000 was
paid for shares in the Electrolytic
Marine Salts Company, Of which
JERNEchN was president. and works
were established at Lubec, on the
Maine coast. JERNEoAN disappeared
when the company was apparently at
the height Of its financial success
The sea then refused to give up any
more gold. Five years after his dis
appearance he was reported to be a