OF ST. ANGELO AT THE TIME OF THE SACK OF ROME.
These kinds of furnaces are the best of all. It was dire necessity
that taught me how to make them, because I had absolutely no means
at hand for doing my work. Being in a confined place, where I had to
set about using my wits, I made a virtue of necessity. I broke the
bricks out of a room, & with these bricks I set to work to construct
a furnace in the form of a bake-oven.[125] The bricks were arranged
alternately, so that between every brick was an opening of about
two fingers wide, & as I went on I narrowed them in upwards.[126]
When I had raised it about a cubit’s height from the ground, I
constructed[127] a grating of shovel handles and spears which I
broke. And from this point I continued building the furnace up and
round to about one-and-a-quarter cubit’s height, narrowing it in
towards the top. Then I found an iron ladle which they were by chance
using in the kitchen, & as it was pretty big I caked it round with
a paste of ash & pounded clay,[128] and filled it with as much gold
as it would contain, and gave it the full fire straight off as there
was no danger of the crucible cracking. When the first lot was cast
I filled it up again, and so on, till I had melted up about 100 lbs.
of gold. The whole thing went very easily, and ’tis about the best
and simplest method you can employ. Perhaps you think that I ought
to go and give you a diagram of it all here in my book, but I fancy
that anyone who knows anything at all about the craft of founding
will perfectly well understand by description. So that’s enough for
furnaces.
FOOTNOTES:
[125] _Fornello a foggia di una meta._
[126] _E cosi lo andai ristringendo._
[127] _Io lo avevo congegnato drento di modo che._
[128] _Terra mescolata._