man's creation infused into him, for his preservation and direction; and this is lex eterna, and may not be changed; and no laws shall be made or kept, that are expressly against the law of God, written in his scripture; as to forbid what he commandeth.

All laws derive their force a lege naturæ ; and those which do not, are accounted as no laws. No law will make a construction to do wrong; and there are some things which the law favours, and some it dislikes; it favoureth those things that come from the order of nature. Also our law hath much more respect to life, liberty, freehold, inheritance, matters of record, and of substance; than to chattels, things in the personalty, matters not of record, on circumstances.

LAW of nations, is a system of rules deducible by natural reason, from the immu table principles of natural justice, and established by universal consent amongt the civilized inhabitants of the world, in order to decide all disputes, and to insure the observance of justice and good faith, in that intercourse which must frequently occur between them and the individuals belong ing to each; or they may depend upon mutual compacts, treaties, leagues, and agreements between the separate, free, and independent communities. In the construction of these principles, there is no judge to resort to, but the general law of nature and of reason, being the only law with which the contracting parties are all equally conversant, and to which they are all equally amenable. Laws have properly their ef fect only in the country where and for which they have been enacted. However, 1. Those which relate to the state, and to the personal condition of the subjects, are acknowledged in foreign countries. 2. A foreigner, who is plaintiff against a subject, must abide by the decisions of the law of the country in which he pleads. S. When the validity of an act done in a foreign country is in question, it ought to be decided by the laws of that foreign country. 4. Sometimes the parties agree to the question being determined by particular laws of a foreign country. 5. A foreign law may have been received as a subsidiary law. 6. Foreigners sometimes obtain the privilege of having their disputes with each other settled by the laws of their own country.

LAWSONIA, in botany, so named from Isaac Lawson, M. D. a genus of the Octan

dria Monogynia class and order. Natural order of Salicaria, Jussieu. Essential character: calyx four-cleft; petals four; stamens in four pairs; capsule four-celled, many-seeded. There are four species; natives of warm countries.

LAXMANNIA, in botany, so called from Ericus Laxman, a Swede, a genus of the Hexandria Monogynia class and order. Essential character: calyx one-leafed, fourtoothed, inferior; corolla four-petalled ; berry four-celled; seeds solitary.

LAYERS, in gardening, are tender shoots, or twigs of trees, laid or buried in the ground; till having struck root, they are separated from the parent tree, and become distinct plants.

LAZULITE, in mineralogy, is of a deep smalt blue: it occurs disseminated in fine grains, or masses of the size of a hazel nut. The latter often present the appearance of short tetrahedral prisms. Its fracture is uneven, with a glimmering lustre. It is brittle, and easily frangible: at a red heat it loses its colour, and becomes grey. Without addition it is infusible before the blowpipe, but with borax it runs into a clear yellow glass. It has been analyzed by Klaproth, and is found to contain silex, alumina, and oxide of iron.

LAZURSTEIN, in mineralogy, called also azure-stone, a species of the flint genus, is of a perfect azure blue colour, in some varieties it passes into sky blue: it is found massive, disseminated, and in rolled pieces: hard, brittle, and not heavy: specific gravity is from 2.7 to 2.95. It melts into a white enamel before the blow-pipe. When previously calcined and powdered, it forms a jelly with acids: it is composed of

which it yields.

LEAD, is a white metal, of a considerably blue tinge, very soft and flexible, not very tenacious, and consequently incapable of being drawn into fine wire, though it is easily extended into thin plates under the hammer. Its weight is very considerable, being rather greater than that of silver. Long before ignition, namely, at about the 540th degree of Fahrenheit's thermometer, it melts; and then begins to be oxyded if respirable air be present. In a strong heat it boils, and emits fames; during which time, if exposed to the air, its oxydation proceeds with considerable rapidity. If melted lead be poured into a box previously rubbed with chalk, to prevent its action on the wood, and be continually agitated, it will concrete into separate grains, of considerable use in various mechanical operations, particularly that of weighing. Lead is brittle at the time of congelation. In this state it may be broken to pieces with a hammer, and the crystallization of its internal parts will exhibit an arrangement in parallel lines.

This metal, during the progress of heat, first becomes converted into a dusky powder, which by a continuation of the heat becomes white, yellow, and afterwards of a bright red, inclining to orange colour, called minium, or red lead. The process requires considerable management with regard to the heat and access of air, in the making of red lead. Many days are required for this purpose. If the heat be too great or rapid, the lead becomes converted into a flaky substance, called litharge; and a still greater heat converts it into a clear, transparent, yellow glass, which powerfully dissolves and corrodes metallic oxides or earths; and on this account it usually finds its way through the crucibles in a short time. It acts more difficultly on argillaceous than on siliceous earths; whence it is found that vessels made of clay mixed with broken pottery are preferable to those that are composed of clay and sand. The oxide of lead is a principal ingredient in most of the modern fine white glasses. It is more particularly calculated to form the dense glass used to correct the aberration arising from colour in those telescopes which are known by the name of achromatic, because it communicates the property of separating the coloured rays from each other in greater angles than obtain in alkaline glasses at equal angles of mean refraction. The imperfec

kind of glass is, that its density is seldom uniform throughout. The irregularities show themselves in the forms of veins, which greatly disturb the regular refraction.

Lead is not much altered by exposure to air or water, though the brightness of its surface when cut or scraped very soon goes off. It is probable that a thin stratum of oxide is formed on the surface, which defends the rest of the metal from corrosion.

All the oxides of lead are very easily reduced. Minium, when exposed to a strong heat, gives out part of the oxygen it absorbed during its oxidation; but, like the other oxides of this metal, it requires the addition of some combustible substance for its complete revival: a familiar instance of this revival is seen by exposing the common wafers to the flame of a candle. The wafers are coloured with minium, which is revived by the heat and inflammable substance of the wafer, so that it falls down in metallic globules.

Lead is found native, though seldom ; and also in the form of an oxide, called native ceruse, or lead ochre, or lead spar of various colours, red, brown, yellow, green, blueish, and black, These ores, when freed as much as possible from earthy matter, may be dissolved in diluted nitrous acid. Oxide of iron is usually thrown down from the solution by boiling. If the lead be then precipitated by the carbonate of soda, and weighed, 132 grains of the dry precipitate will correspond with 100 grains of lead in the metallic state. If the precipitate be suspected to contain copper, it may be separated by digesting in ammonia. If it be supposed to contain silver and copper, the precipitate may again be dissolved in nitric acid, and separated by the addition of muriatic acid; which combining with the metal, produces the muriates of silver, and of lead; the latter of which being soluble in thirty times its weight of boiling water, may be washed off, while the silver remains undissolved; or the silver, if alone in the precipitate, may be taken up by ammonia, which will leave the oxide of lead of the same value with regard to weight as the foregoing.

Lead is also found mineralized by the sulphuric and the phosphoric acids; this last is of a greenish colour, arising from a mixture of iron. The sulphate of lead is soluble in about eighteen times its weight of water. One hundred and forty-three grains of the dried salt represent 100 grains of lead. The phosphate of lead ore may be

dissolved in nitric acid by means of heat, except a few particles of iron, which remain at the bottom. By the addition of sulphuric acid, the lead is thrown down in the form of white flakes of sulphate; which, when washed and dried, discover the quantity of lead they contain, by the same allowance of 143 grains of the salt to 100 grains of metallic lead. The remaining solution being evaporated to dryness, affords phosphoric acid. Lead is abundantly found in combination with sulphur, in the form of heavy, shining, black, or bluish, lead-coloured cubical masses, whose corners are usually truncated; its texture is laminated, and its hardness variable. This is called galena, or potter's lead ore. Most lead ores contain more or less of silver. When antimony enters into its composition, the texture is radiated or filamentous. There are also lead pyrites, which contain a considerable proportion of iron and sulphur; and red lead spar, which consists of lead mineralized by sulphur and arsenic: this is very scarce.

If sulphuretted lead be boiled in nitric or muriatic acid of a moderate strength, the sulphur may be obtained pure, and collect ed on a filter. When iron or story particles are contained among the undissolved part, the sulphur may be separated by digestion in a solution of pure fixed alkali, which converts it into sulphuret, and leaves the other insoluble matters behind. If the first solution be made with nitric acid, it may contain silver and lead, which after precipitation by carbonate of soda, may be separated by ammonia, as mentioned in the humid analysis of the calciform ores; when the muriatic acid is used for the solution of the ore, a large quantity of muriate of lead separates, for want of a sufficient quantity of water to dissolve it. This requisite quantity of water must be added to dissolve the salt, before the precipitate is made by the 'fixed alkali.

All the ores of lead, except the phosphonic, are reducible to the metallic state by dissipating their volatile contents by the blow-pipe on a piece of charcoal. In the large way, they are reduced by fusion with charcoal.

The ores of this metal are abundantly found in the mine counties of England, and in various other parts of the globe. Its uses are numerous, and scarcely need be mentioned. Its oxides are of great use as a pigment, and in the manufacture of glass. Lead is cast into thin sheets for covering

buildings, making water-pipes, and various other uses; and this is rolled between two cylinders of iron, to give it the requisite uniformity and thinness. Lead is thought, and with some reason, to be not perfectly innocent, even for water pipes, and much less so for any other kind of vessels. The workmen in any of the preparations of lead are generally subject to a peculiar colic, and paralytic disorders, which most probably arise from the internal use of the metal; for it is a fact, that these workmen are not sufficiently cautious in washing their hands, or removing such particles of lead, or its preparations, as may casually intermix with their food.

Most of the acids attack lead. The sulphuric acid scarcely acts upon it, unless it be concentrated and boiling. Sulphurous acid escapes during the process, the acid being decomposed. When the distillation is carried on to dryness, a saline white mass remains, a small portion of which is soluble in water, and is the sulphate of lead: it affords crystals. The residue of the white mass is an oxide of lead.

Nitric acid acts strongly on lead, and converts it into a white oxide if the acid be concentrated; but if it be more diluted, the oxide is dissolved, and forms nitrate of lead which is crystallizable, and does not afford a precipitate by cooling. It detonates on ignited coals. Lime and alkalies decompose the nitrous solution of lead. The sulphuric acid added to this solution combines with the metallic oxide, and falls down. The muriatic acid in the same manner carries down the lead, and forms a combination which is more soluble in water than the muriate of silver.

Muriatic acid acts directly, but sparingly, on lead by heat, which it oxides, and dissolves in part. The muriate of lead is crys tallizable.

The acetic acid dissolves lead and its oxides; though the access of air or oxygen seems necessary for the solution of the metal itself in this acid. White lead, or ceruse, is made by rolling leaden plates spirally up, so as to leave the space of about an inch between each coil, and placing them vertically in earthen pots, at the bottom of which is some good vinegar. The pots are to be covered, and exposed for a length of time to a gentle heat in a sand bath, or by bedding them in dung. The vapour of the vinegar, as'sisted by the tendency of the lead, to combine with the oxygen of the air which is present, corrodes the lead, and converts the external

portion into a white oxide, which comes off in flakes when the lead is uncoiled. The plates are thus treated repeatedly, until they are corroded through. Ceruse is the only white substance used in oil paintings. It may be dissolved without difficulty in the acetous acid, and affords a crystallizable salt, called sugar of lead, from its sweet taste. This, like all the preparations of lead, is poisonous.

The sulphurets precipitate lead from its solutions, the sulphur falling down in combination with the lead. Pure alkaline solutions dissolve a small portion of lead, and corrode a considerable quantity: the solution is said to give a black colour to the hair.

Oils dissolve the oxides of lead, and become thick and consistent; in which state they are used as the basis of plasters, cements for water-works, paints, &c.

In the dry way, lead alone is oxided and vitrified. When fused with fixed alkaline salts, it is converted into a dark coloured scoria, partly soluble in water. The neutral salts in general are not acted upon by lead. Nitre oxides this metal when heated with it, though scarcely any commotion or apparent flame is produced by its action. Sulphur readily dissolves it in the dry way, and produces a brittle compound, of a deep grey colour, and brilliant appearance, which is much less fusible than lead itself; a property which is common to all the combinations of sulphur with the more fusible metals.

The phosphoric acid, exposed to heat together with charcoal and lead, becomes converted into phosphorus, which combines with the metal. This combination does not greatly differ in appearance from ordinary lead: it is malleable, and easily cut with a knife; but it loses its brilliancy more speedily than pure lead; and, when fused upon charcoal with the blow-pipe, the phosphorus burns, and leaves the lead behind.

Lead decomposes sal ammoniac, or muriate of ammonia, by the assistance of heat: its oxides unite with the muriatic acid of that salt in the cold, and disengage its volatile alkali. When the volatile alkali is obtained by distilling sal ammoniac with the oxides of lead, the residue consists of the muriate of lead.

Litharge fused with common salt decomposes it; the lead unites with muriatic acid, and forms a yellow compound, at present used in this country as a pigment. The

alkali either floats at top, or is volatilized by the heat if strongly urged. The same decomposition takes place in the humid way, if common salt be macerated with litharge, and the solution will contain the pure alkali.

Lead unites with most of the metals. Gold and silver are dissolved by it in a slight red heat. Both these metals are said to be rendered brittle by a small admixture of lead, though lead itself is rendered more ductile by a small quantity of them. Platina forms a brittle compound with lead; mercury amalgamates with it; but the lead is separated from the mercury by agitation, in the form of an impalpable black powder, if oxygen be present, which is at the same time absorbed. Copper and lead do not unite but with a strong heat. If lead be heated so as to boil and smoke, it soon dissolves pieces of copper thrown into it: the mixture when cold is brittle. The union of these two metals is remarkably slight; for, upon exposing the mass to a heat no greater than that in which lead melts, the lead almost entirely runs off by itself. This process, which is peculiar to lead with copper, is called eliquation. The coarser sorts of lead, which owe their brittleness and granulated texture to an admixture of copper; throw it up to the surface on being melted to a small heat. Iron does not unite with lead, as long as both substances retain their metallic form. Tin unites very easily with this metal, and forms a compound which is much more fusible than lead by itself, and is for that reason used as a solder for lead. Two parts of lead and one of tin, form an alloy more fusible than either metz! alone; this is the solder of the plumbers. Bismuth combines readily with lead, and affords a metal of a fine close grain, but very brittle. A mixture of eight parts bismuth, five lead, and three tin, will melt in a heat which is not sufficient to cause water to boil. Antimony forms a brittle alloy with lead. Nickel, cobalt, manganese, and zinc, do not unite with lead by fusion.

It will appear from the foregoing observations, that the uses of lead are very extensive. It is easily reduced to thin sheets, adapted to the covering of buildings; to be formed into pipes of all sizes, and fitted for divers purposes. Its oxides are used as paints; in the manufacture of glass; and in the glazing of earthen-ware, &c.

LEAD, black. See the article IRON.

LEAD, sugar of. A salt, denominated from its composition, by modern chemists,