The Glassmaker's Salamander

From Michael Maier's 1617 book of emblems.

The salamander was thought to be born of fire.

If one can say that hot-glass workers have a mascot, it is without any doubt the salamander. Since ancient times, this lizard-like, poisonous skinned amphibian was ascribed to exist within fire, even to be born out of the flames. According to legend, its cold body allowed it to survive the heat. To see one in the flames of a furnace was considered good luck, but glassblowers who suddenly disappeared (to work elsewhere) were said to have been "eaten by the salamander." 

Glass work has always been a hot, sweaty, exhausting affair. It is not surprising that after a long day's labor one might honestly think they saw small animals scampering around in the fire. The legend, however, is an ancient one; Aristotle, in his History of Animals reported that salamanders were thought to possess the ability to put out fire with their bodies. They became part of the lore among glassmakers in Venice on Murano and were even spotted in Antonio Neri's Florence. In his autobiography (1558-1567), Florentine artist Benvenuto Cellini offers this recollection:

When I was about five years old my father happened to be in a basement-chamber of our house, where they had been washing, and where a good fire of oak-logs was still burning; he had a viol in his hand, and was playing and singing alone beside the fire. The weather was very cold. Happening to look into the fire, he spied in the middle of those most burning flames a little creature like a lizard, which was sporting in the core of the intensest coals. Becoming instantly aware of what the thing was, he had my sister and me called, and pointing it out to us children, gave me a great box on the ears, which caused me to howl and weep with all my might. Then he pacified me good-humouredly, and spoke as follows: 'My dear little boy, I am not striking you for any wrong that you have done, but only to make you remember that that lizard which you see in the fire is a salamander, a creature which has never been seen before by anyone of whom we have credible information.' So saying he kissed me and gave me some pieces of money.

Incidentally, at the end of Cellini's life, family friend and Church canon  Piero della Stufa was appointed to settle his estate. Among other items, he was entrusted with the manuscript for Cellini's autobiography, from which the above quote is taken. Della Stufa was also the godfather to Antonio Neri's younger brother Vincenzio.
  

(Quotation from: J. Addington Symonds "Benvenuto Cellini's Autobiography" in Harvard Classics v. 31, Charles W. Elliot, ed. (New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1910), p. 11 (book I, ch. V.))
* This post first appeared here, in a somewhat different form on 19 August 2013.

Rosichiero Glass

Sunset over Venice
(click image to enlarge)

The most famous glass recipe in Antonio Neri’s 1612 book, L'Arte Vetraria, is “#129 Transparent Red.” The reason for its notoriety is, of course, the pure gold used as a pigment. Gold-ruby, or “rubino” is a devilishly difficult color to produce in glass and was not reliably duplicated until many years after Neri’s death, although pieces made in ancient times have been unearthed.  

Even though gold rubino is Neri's most well known recipe and certainly his most famous red glass, this recipe does not exist in isolation. In fact, it fits in the middle of a group of eleven recipes (120–130) devoted to transparent, or at least translucent red glass, enamel and related preparations. 

120 Transparent Red in Glass.
121 Red Like Blood.
122 Balas Color.
123 To extract the Spirit of Saturn, Which Serves Many Uses in Enamels and Glasses.
124 Rosichiero to Enamel Gold.
125 Rosichiero for Gold by Another Method.
126 How to Fix Sulfur for the Above Described Work.
127 A Glass as Red as Blood, Which Can Serve as Rosichiero.
128 A Proven Way to Make Rosichiero.
129 Transparent Red.
130 The Way to Fix Sulfur for Rosichiero to Enamel Gold.

A particular shade that was popular at the time was known in Italian as "rosichiero." Our glassmaker presents four different recipes and two more on “fixing” sulfur, which some of the preparations require. Most dictionaries cite Neri as the first to use of the word 'rosichiero' in print, but we know it was a common term of art among glassmakers much earlier. The French equivalent is "rouge clair." The Spanish edition of L'Arte Vetraria notes that in that language the term is “rosicler,” which is still used today to describe the intense rosy twilight color of a nice sunset.

The red glasses of this group all call for the addition of copper as a colorant and copper has remained a popular pigment up to the present. For instance, red traffic lights that are made of glass are typically tinted with copper. But that is not the entire story; some of Neri's rosichieros also include the addition of sulfur and some require hematite or iron oxide, red lead oxide, manganese oxide, or wine tartar. In his recipe #125 for rosichiero, he starts with four pounds of high quality cristallo glass. To this adds equal parts of tin and lead oxides, mixed together: 

[A]dd this calx little by little, ½ oz at a time, let it incorporate, and watch for when the glass becomes an ash gray color, at which point it will be good. Do not add too much calx because if you overload it, the glass will become white in color, which is not good.When it turns the said gray color, do not add more calx but leave it to clarify. Then have 2 oz fine minium [red lead oxide], add this to the glass, and let it incorporate well, and clarify. When it clarifies well, throw into water, return it to the crucible and leave it for 8 hours [in the furnace]. 

Have ½ oz of calcined copper, that is to say red copper and ½ oz of raw white [wine] tartar. Throw these materials in, and stir them well. Now add a dram of hematite, which the sword makers use for burnishing, and 1 dram of fixed sulfur. Stir and incorporate these powders, and watch. If it is over-colored, give it a little manganese to dilute it. If it is clear of color, add more of the fixed sulfur, hematite, a little red copper and a little white wine tartar at your discretion so it becomes the desired color.

None of these ingredients excepting copper is common in color glass production today; in fact, sulfur is usually considered an undesirable contaminant. Hematite is a naturally occurring mineral form of iron oxide. It is so named because if abraded in water it tints the water red, appearing to bleed. Hematite is not currently used as a red pigment in glass, but it is commonly used in some pottery glazes. 

From a chemistry standpoint, a good guess is that sulfur added to the glass would react with the copper and iron to produce various sulfide compounds. How those compounds affect the color and texture of the glass is an open question. Here is where we get into uncharted territory; four hundred years after Neri’s book was first published, predicting colors based on chemistry is no easier for us than it was for him. The science of color in general remains a difficult nut to crack. However, the fact that there is still much that we do not understand does not prevent us from enjoying the brilliant reds inspired by a good sunset.

* For the technically minded, the University of Oslo has a wonderful presentation on the state of color physics. For the non-technical, take a look – a series of fascinating images that spans the sense of sight and beyond. There is a link address in the "picture credits" for this post.

** This post first appeared here on 24 April 2014.

Laughing in the Ferm

Allain Manesson Mallet  1719,

"Der Mont. – Lune"

In Chapter 5 of L'Arte Vetraria, Antonio Neri shows how to extract salt for glass from fern plants in an evocative recipe. Fern was and still is widely abundant in Tuscany. It presented a ready source material for glassmakers of the region. Neri directs that harvesting of the plants be done in the spring:

Cut this herb from the ground when it is green, between the end of the month of May and mid June. The moon should be waxing and close to its opposition with the sun, because at this point the plant is in its perfection and gives a lot of salt, more than it would at other times and of better nature, strength and whiteness.

At first, it is tempting to dismiss this lunar influence as the product of a fertile imagination, but let us take a closer look. Even today, grandmothers throughout Italy remember the advice to pick vegetables from the garden and bring them into the kitchen at a half-moon. Can nona be completely off-track? The fact is that tidal forces of the moon do subtly affect plants, fish and animals in ways that can be measured. A closer look at Neri’s advice reveals reasoning that is hard to dismiss as mere astrological superstition. When the moon is waxing, tides rise and so do water tables. According to folklore, this is when sap rises from the roots of plants into stems and leaves. Sap carries the dissolved mineral salts required for glass. Neri also stipulates that harvesting should take place during lunar opposition. When the moon is 'opposed' to the sun, it is on the opposite side of the earth from the sun. In opposition, the moon is near full and rises as the sun sets. Plants see more light at night, leading to increased photosynthesis and growth.

In contrast, violin makers from Cremona valued high alpine spruce called moon wood. Trees were felled in the wintertime, when lunar tides were low. This minimized the amount of vibration deadening sap in the wood. In his Natural History, Pliny relates Cato’s advice on felling trees in accordance with the lunar cycle. In fact, centuries-old tradition specified lunar conditions for a host of needs from construction timbers to cheese boxes. In this case the advice relates to picking ferns for use in glass.

Fern ash is high in potassium carbonates. If carefully purified it can make an exceedingly clear glass, rivaling or even surpassing Venetian cristallo. It has the additional advantage of being physically tough, making it ideal for engraving or diamond-point work. On the other hand, once out of the furnace it stiffens quickly, giving it a short 'working life' for the hot glass artisan. This limits designs to simple basic forms. While soda-based glass was the norm for the Mediterranean region, throughout the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, northern Europeans were more likely to be making potash-based glass. They utilized the potassium rich local trees and plants of the northern forests. In France, fern glass is called verre de fougère. In the considered opinion of some connoisseurs, wine tasted better when sipped from verre de fougère cups, hence the delightful expression 'le vin rit dans la fougère' [wine laughs (sparkles) in the fern].

Since the middle ages, fern glass became part of everyday life in northern Europe. It was familiar enough to find its way into literary verse on matters of the heart. There is a nice reference to fern glass by Geoffrey Chaucer, in The Squires Tale:

But notwithstanding, some said that it was

Wondrous to make fern-ashes into glass,

Since glass is nothing like the ash of fern;

But since long since of this thing men did learn,

Chaucer, in turn, borrowed this reference from an epic twenty-two thousand line French poem from the late thirteenth century, when the technique of making glass from ferns was already ancient.

* This post is a mashup of material that first appeared here on 5-7 August 2013.

Dyed in the Grain

Dyeing wool cloth, from "Des Proprietez des Choses"

Bartholomaeus Anglicus, 1482

British Library Royal MS 15.E.iii, folio 269

In his book on glassmaking, L'Arte Vetraria, Antonio Neri presents a number of recipes for paint pigments used to decorate finished glassware. One recipe (#119) is for crimson red, from kermes [kur-meez], prepared by a method of his own invention, which he developed while working in Pisa in 1602–1603.

Since antiquity, throughout Europe and the Near East, kermes was a highly valued red colorant because it formed a pigment that resisted sunlight, humidity and temperature. Kermes red can be found in prehistoric cave paintings, Egyptian scrolls and the robes of cardinals and kings. Words in many languages used to describe bright red, "crimson" and "carmine" among them, are derived from the name "kermes." The pigment is produced from the bodies and eggs of a small type of insect that feeds on the sap of evergreen oak trees throughout the Mediterranean region. In the spring, the female kermes insects and their eggs were harvested. The small eggs surrounding the edges of the insect body resemble kernels of grain, hence the expression "dyed in the grain." For medicinal purposes, kermes pastes were used to disinfect wounds and served as an effective contraceptive. 

To extract the color, Neri starts with a flask of "the very best grappa," which is a potent kind of liquor made by distilling the skins, seeds, stems and pulp of grapes, leftover from wine making. To this, he adds a pound of alum and one ounce of the dried kermes insects, ground finely and sifted. He agitates the mixture, at which point the grappa will "color beautifully" and then lets it sit. After four days, he adds four ounces of alum dissolved in water and pours the mixture into a stocking that has been sewn into the shape of a cone. The stocking hold most of the color, while letting the grappa pass through. 

Alum is another material used since antiquity. It was widely available in Neri's time as a mined mineral, which could actually be several different chemical species with similar properties. Today, chemists know it as a "flocculant"; it neutralizes the electrical charge of finely suspended particles in a liquid, allowing them to stick together and fall to the bottom. This is the secret to Neri's method, although he was not thinking in modern chemical terms, he did know that the alum precipitated the pigment from the liquid allowing it to be collected and dried.

Finally, he scoops the pigment onto pieces of linen stretched over newly fired terracotta tiles and lets it dry. He advises:

Do not spread it too thickly, because then it will not dry quickly. When there is too much moisture it will mildew, and make an ugly color. When a tile has absorbed a lot of moisture, take another new tile. In this manner, it will dry more quickly. When it is dry, remove the coating from the linens. This will be a good lake for painters, as I have made many times in Pisa. Take note that if the color is too strong you should use more roche alum and if it is too weak use less alum so that the color is according to your taste, and desire.

Through the fifteenth century, kermes was among the most sought after pigments, but by Antonio Neri's lifetime, its use was declining in favor of a new insect-based red called cochineal that Portuguese traders brought back from Mexico. Cochineal bugs inhabit the prickly pear cactus. They give a more intense color and eventually replaced kermes throughout Europe.

*This post first appeared here on 26 February 2014.

The Duke's Mouthwash

Ferdinando de’ Medici (1549-1609),

Scipione Pulzone (1544 - 1598), Private collection.

Antonio Neri's father, Neri Neri, was royal physician to the family of Grand Duke Ferdinando de' Medici. As such, he regularly interacted with other members of court, ranging from the archbishop of Florence, to his colleagues in medicine, including the royal apothecary (speziale), Stefano Rosselli. Rosselli shared more than a professional relationship with Neri Neri. They both admired the work of an ancient Greek physician named Dioscorides; Rosselli was something of an authority on his methods. In addition, he ran the 'Speziale al Giglio' shop, once owned by Tommaso del Giglio, who's chapel Neri Neri took over at Cestello church. Rosselli's son, Francesco, and Neri Neri were among the four chosen to revise and update the famed Ricettario Fiorentino,[1] the official reference for medicinal cures in Tuscany. 

On 21 September 1589, Rosselli started to compile his own book of recipes to pass down to his two sons, Francesco and Vincenzo, who would go on to continue the pharmacy.[2] The book begins with a poison remedy credited to none other than Cosimo de' Medici. Recipe no. 9 is the grand duke’s antispasmodic oil, presented by Niccolò Sisti, with whom Antonio Neri would later work at the glass house in Pisa. No. 20 is the duke's oil for deafness, also presented by Sisti. No. 41 is a poison antidote revealed to Francesco de' Medici by the Archduke of Austria. It was tested on a prisoner at the Bargello prison, a "volunteer" who was intentionally poisoned as part of the experiment, then revived with the antidote in the presence of Stefano Rosselli and Baccio Baldini, the long time physician to Cosimo I. Supposedly, the prisoner's reward for surviving was early release.

Recipe No. 30 carries perhaps a bit less risk; it is titled "Acqua da gengie di messer Nerj Nerj" (Mouth wash of Neri Neri):

Take a quarter of a bushel of mastic buds,a quarter of a bushel of myrtle buds, a quarter of a bushel of red roses, three ounces of alum, a half ounce of salt and a quarter ounce of hard rose honey. Mash the herbs with a mortar and pestle and put them in nine pounds of Greek wine for twenty-four hours, then boil in a bain-marie and reduce to two-thirds. In this, we bathe the gums: it makes them dry and firm.

Mastic: Pistacia lentiscus. Native to the Mediterranean, its resin used for millennia to settle upset stomachs.
Myrtle: Myrtus communis. An Aromatic herb used by the ancients, effective treatment for sinusitis.
Alum: Used by the ancients as a treatment for canker sores.
Rose Honey: Miele rosato. Honey infused with rose petals, an astringent still used to sooth children’s teething pains. It is produced both as a solid and a liquid. 
Greek Wine: Vino Greco. Italian wine made in the style of sweet Greek wines. In 1673, English botanist John Ray describes it as being made from grapes grown on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius.

The date that Stefano Rosselli started his book of secrets is interesting because it is the same day that Neri Neri, with the grand duke's two other physicians, Cini and Da Barga, were busy making medicinal wine based on Dioscorides' ancient recipes. Perhaps they all met that day at Rosselli's shop, for his advice. 

[1] Neri, Benadù, Rosselli, Galletti 1597.
[2] Rosselli 1996; an Italian transcription and French translation of Rosselli's recipes, with a very entertaining introduction.

* This post first appeared here on 4 November 2013 in a shorter form.

Isaac Hollandus

J. Hollandus,
Chymische Schriften, (Vienna: 1773)

In early 1603, Glassmaker Antonio Neri traveled from Italy to Flanders, to visit his friend Emmanuel Ximenes. Neri would stay for seven years and in that time he worked on a number of glass related projects including the manufacture of artificial gems using lead crystal glass. An enduring mystery is that in his glass book L'Arte Vetraria, he gives credit to alchemist Isaac Hollandus for a "new chemical method never before used," yet no such recipe for artificial gems has ever been found in the writings of Hollandus.

Neri’s host Emmanuel Ximenes owned several titles by this somewhat obscure figure. Historians conjecture that there were actually two alchemists in the Hollandus family, Isaac and Johannes Isaac. Their relationship is not clear, although they are often assumed to be father and son. We know little about them; some authors date them as early as the fourteenth century. However, a preponderance of evidence point to about the time Neri lived. In his glass book, in the fifth part devoted to artificial gems, Neri writes:

Above all is this wonderful invention. A new way practiced by me, with the doctrine taken from Isaac Hollandus, in which paste jewels of so much grace, beauty and perfection are made, that they seem nearly impossible to describe and hard to believe.

In the 1679 German edition of L'Arte Vetraria, Johannes Kunckel implies that Isaac was dead before Neri came to Antwerp, writing "This is the manner to imitate precious stones, of Isaac Hollandus, (namely, from his posthumous writings) that I [Neri] learned in Flanders" (emphasis added). Yet, coinciding with Neri's visit, playwright Ben Jonson who had just returned to London from the war in Flanders, referenced the pair in his satirical work The Alchemist (1610). There he implies that the elder Hollandus was then dead but survived by "living Isaac." In 1644, the famous Flemish chemist Van Helmont identified Isaac Hollandus as a recent contemporary. In a 1716 treatise, Kunckel paid Hollandus a great compliment and at the same time took a swipe at Helmont saying "and the incomparable Hollandus had more of the fire-art in his little finger as Helmont in his whole body." In another reference, Sir Francis Bacon mentions Hollandus as "by far the greater part of the crowd of chemists."

One Hollandus title in Ximenes' Antwerp library was Opera Mineralia, first published in 1600. The subject of this volume is the philosopher's stone and its production. While there are no artificial gem recipes here per se, there are some intriguing connections between artificial gems and the philosopher's stone, both philosophical and practical. It was thought that the colors of metallic based glass pigments were an indication that the metals were "opened" and became susceptible to alchemical transmutation. Of special interest was the deep red ruby color made by adding gold to the glass melt. In the introduction to a 1797 French translation of Neri's book, artificial ruby or "vitrified gold," is equated to the bible's Electrum of Ezekiel —a red glow seen by the prophet in a vision.

By the mid-eighteenth century, Isaac Hollandus was lauded in industrial arts books as a genius of artificial gems. He may well have been, but the evidence does not support it. All of the specific recipes attributed to Hollandus seem to lead back to Neri's L'Arte Vetraria or its translations. A case can be made that Hollandus' reputation for artificial gems stems from a 1697 plagiarized version of Neri's book. A volume published in France by Haudicquer Blancourt that gives no credit to the priest. Blancourt used Christopher Merrett's English edition as his base and added to the recipes with his own embellishments. The chapter on artificial gems still lauds Hollandus, but its length was now doubled from the seventeen original recipes to thirty-five. The size of this one section jumped from thirteen to nearly two hundred pages, an increase in page-count larger than Neri's entire book. In 1699, Blancourt's version was then translated back into English, again without reference to Neri. There is no doubt that these two editions, with their expanded chapters on paste gems exerted a strong influence on later craftsmen. They may also be the source of the credit given to Hollandus' for paste gems in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

A number of intriguing questions remain unanswered. Chief among them is the nature of Neri’s association with the Dutch alchemist(s). Was Hollandus or his son alive in the first decade of the seventeenth century and did Neri meet with either of them in person? We can only guess. The Hollandus men are notable, if not enigmatic, characters in the transition from alchemy to modern chemistry. Historians would very much like to know them better. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt of the strong impact Hollandus made on Neri. Isaac holds a singular honor as the one person named in Neri's book to whom he gives specific credit. As research on early modern science has progressed, the importance of communication between practitioners has emerged as a central theme. A meeting of the minds between Neri and Hollandus, if it ever occurred, would rank as a prime example of technology transfer with a definite impact.

For a comprehensive look at Hollandus see: Annelies van Gijsen, "Isaac Hollandus Revisited" in Chymia: science and nature in Medieval and early modern Europe, Miguel Lòpez-Pèrez, Dider Kahn; Mar Rey Bueno, eds., (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars, 2010), pp. 310–324.
*This post first appeared here 2 April 2014.

Glass in Early America

Note: This is an abbreviated version of a piece appearing in the Autumn/Winter 2016 issue of the NAGC Bulletin. Many thanks for their permission to share it here. A copy of the complete article is available through inter-library loan from the numerous public and art museum libraries which subscribe to this journal, (including the Rakow Library at The Corning Museum of Glass). The Bulletin can also be obtained directly from its publisher, the National American Glass Club.

Glass: A poem by Henry Schoolcraft

In the final years of the 1700s, a third generation family that was living in New York’s Hudson River Valley welcomed a new son, Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (1793-1864). They welcomed him into a newly formed country, brimming with promise and expectation, the United States of America. His father was the superintendant of a new window glass factory near Albany. The family boasted a long line of military men, but perhaps more importantly, a long line of adaptable, self-motivated, life-long learners and young Henry was no exception.  

With the help of his father and like-minded family friends, Henry parlayed a rural education into private instruction in Latin, a premier collection of scientific books, and a museum quality mineral collection.  In 1809, at the age of 16, he started a hand-written literary magazine called “The Cricket” in which he published short pieces of prose and poetry among a circle of friends. His time at Union College was cut short by the opportunity to manage a glass factory further west on the shores of Seneca Lake, near Geneva, New York.

Along with his father, Henry went on to become one of the most sought after glass factory guru’s in New England. In 1814, he was running the Vermont Glassworks on the shore of Lake Dunmore. He had set up an experimental furnace with Prof. Frederick Hall from the college in nearby Middlebury.  Henry used the facility to research glass composition for a hefty book he was writing on the subject. Managing by day, experimenting by night, he still found time for his literary pursuits. It was here, in the autumn of 1814, that he composed a remarkable poem titled “Glass” in which he compares commonplace personalities of the early 19th century to the vitreous material of which he was so familiar.

Until now the poem has never been published beyond the first few stanzas.  “Glass” runs for 268 lines of rhyming couplets in a lose meter. The handwritten manuscript is archived at the Library of Congress. It begins with an assessment of mankind: [1]

1 Mankind resemble glass; they are, like it, For use or fashion, show or service fit; Some bright and fair, some dull and more obscure, These prized as good, those, estimed poor; 5 To grace a kitchen, or a parlour made, As use is most consulted, or parade; But all as various; and eke they are, As frail, as brittle, and as keen a ware. Their bases differ, as our chemists say, 10 This made of sand, that fashioned out of clay Yet shall we, in both compositions find, Similitude in beauty, use and kind. To man, tis true some small objections lie In point of texture and transparency, 15 But though we grant him, in material blind, Yet lacks he not, transparency of mind And we no surer faults in each detect By rays of light, than rays of intellect. So nice the processes, the art requires, 20 So pure th’ ingredients, so intense the fires, Where tumours grow, where phthysic’s fitful breath, Forbodes the public faith, a sudden death. Felons, freckles, frightful fire warts, Are all disclosed as clear as limpid quartz. 25 His voice and pen are graced with equal skill, To lash, report, or advocate a bill. Speak without nostrums, clear his throat when lost, But ever loudest, when they shuffle most. Alike to him, the subject, time or stage, 30 Fierce to discuss, and ready to engage If finance—there Blaberius is at home If raising troops, he votes with general glum. In peace he’s noisy, but if wars involve’ He blasts the foe by one august “Resolve.” 35 Prate, prate, prate, prate! the error of the land, His voice, by every vulgar breeze is fanned Nor learn from Witherspoon his course to run, The simple cause, “to stop when he has done.” (Read full poem)

NOTES  

(Line numbers are referenced in parenthesis) 

The exact manuscript title as written by Schoolcraft is: GLASS, | A Satire Poem. | Lake Dumnore, 1814.

(4) Estimed: Vernacular loanword from the French, estime; valued.

(7) Eke: also.

(10) “Feet of clay” is an expression referring to a weakness or character flaw. The phrase derives from the interpretation of the dream of Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, by the prophet Daniel as recounted in the “Book of Daniel.” (Daniel 2:31–33, 2:41–43).

(21) Phthisic: a wasting illness of the lungs, such as asthma or tuberculosis; phthisis. Any wasting disease. A person suffering from phthisis.

(23) Felon: a carbuncle or other localized infection of the skin. Fire warts: “The hand that reached farthest down on the shovel is burned forever with calloused fire warts.” William E. Bain, Frisco Folks: Stories and Pictures of the Great Steam Days of the Frisco Road (St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Company) (Denver: Sage Books, 1961), p. 96.

(25) In the ms, “Graced” is struck out and replaced by a word that is smeared and illegible to me.

(27) Nostrum: a medicine, especially one that is not considered effective, prepared by an unqualified person.

(31) Blaberius: possible Latinization for ‘one who blabbers’. Also blaberus: a genus of giant Central American cockroach.

(35) Prate: to talk foolishly or tediously about something.

(37) Witherspoon: John Knox Witherspoon (1723–1794).

Footnotes:

[1] Paul Engle, “Glass, A Poem by Henry Schoolcraft” in Glass Club Bulletin, of The National American Glass Club, No. 230, Autumn/Winter 2016, pp. 5-14.