GOLD, AND ITS USES.
Reading edition
If the average reader or thinker will devote a few minutes to the subject of gold and its uses, and how much of it annually disappears by wear, leaving no possible trace, he will find himself involved in some extremely interesting calculations. If some genius would only invent a power strong enough to attract to it the millions of invisible particles that have, and are constantly being worn off the various articles composed of that metal, what an immense amount would be recovered!
Where do these particles go? Here, there, everywhere: in your house, on the streets, in the banks, business houses, stores, and wherever man goes. As an instance of this the following is cited: There is at present a veritable gold-mine being worked in an old watch-case factory in Brooklyn. It occurred to the new purchasers of this property that during the long years of manufacturing of gold watch-cases that took place there, a large quantity of gold particles must have been absorbed by the flooring, walls, furnace chimney, etc. So they went carefully to work and tore the old building down bit by bit, and burnt and crushed the material, afterwards assaying the ashes. So far something like $50,000 has been recovered. Say an ounce of this lost gold were recovered. If we melted it down and gilded a fine silver wire, it would extend more than thirteen hundred miles; or if nineteen ounces were recovered (which in the form of a cube would be about one inch and a quarter square), it would gild a wire long enough to compass the whole earth like a hoop.
If you pick up a gold-leaf, such as is used for gilding purposes, it becomes a curiosity in your eyes when you realize that seventy-five square inches of it weigh only one grain. Now the thousandth part of a line, or inch, is easily visible through a common pocket-glass. Hence it follows that when gold is reduced to the thinness of gold-leaf 1/50700000 of a grain of gold may be distinguished by the eye. But it is claimed that 1/1400000000 of a grain of gold may be rendered visible.
Large quantities of gold are used in gilding portions of exteriors of public and private buildings. For instance, if we take the Church of St. Isaac at St. Petersburg, we find that it required the use of two hundred and forty-seven pounds of gold to gild its five crosses. They can be seen glittering at a distance of twenty-seven miles.