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Take of Tartar calcined with Nitre, and of Sal Armoniack, each lb iij. and when you * 1.1 have pulverized them severally, mingle them and put them into a large Cucurbit,, pour∣ing to them of Spring water vj. or viij. Pints, and distil them in an Oven of Sand. The Spirit will arise with the gentlest beat, pure, and very penctrating, without any burning: which if you rectifie it in a deep Cucurbit, a most pure volatile Salt will ascend into the Alembick.
The reason of this procedure is this: The Sal Armoniack consists of a volatile salt * 1.2 made out of Soot, Piss, and Sea-Salt; all which uniting, whilest they are sublimated, the salinovolatile particles being totally freed from the sulphureous ones, that used to stick to them, are so fixed and setled by the Sea-salt ones, that they cannot fly away. But as soon as ever this Bond is dissolved; that is to say, when this compound Salt, be∣ing dissolved in water, is intimately mixed with the salt of Tartar, the particles of Sea∣salt stick close to the saline-fixed ones of the Tartar; and consequently the volatile ones being dismissed from their embraces, and ready to fly away, do very easily arise; but whereas the spirit distilled from Sal Armoniack hath no offensive smell, as liquors * 1.3 drawn from Soot or Urin have, the reason is, because in that composition the volatile Salt, by the intervening of the Sea-salt, is altogether deprived of any sulphureous parti∣cles; which, when Soot or Piss are distilled by themselves, stick fast to the volatile Salt (as appears very plainly from the ill odour of them both) and likewise because the liquors distilled from those bodies, being first clear and limpid, grow afterward of an yellow colour, and become at last red, and black, and opacous or dark; to wit, in as much as the sulphureous particles being first subdued and hid by the saline ones, get by degrees their liberty, shew themselves and predominate over all the rest.
But in that composition of Sal Armoniack, that the particles of Sea-salt, of Piss and * 1.4 of Soot drive away the sulphureous part and fix the volatile Salt, is very manifest even from this Experiment also, which the famous Zwelferus found out for the fixing of volatile Salt. For Example:
Take of the volatile Salt of Vipers, Piss, or Harts horn, as much as you think good; which when you have put into a Cucurbit with a streight, and saving one little hole, a close orifice, pour into it drop by drop the spirit of Sea-salt to the height of two or three fingers, till all the Salt be dissolved: then filtrate the dissolution, and draw it off in a cucurbit, till it be dry. There will remain in the bottom a Salt of a good smell, some∣what acid, and of a salt taste; the use whereof is very much cried up in several Di∣stempers.
In this case I have tried and found yet farther, that if you would recover your vola∣tile Salt, you must put Salt of Tartar to it, and sublimate it in a Glass; from whence there will arise a most pure volatile Salt. In this manner you may so rectifie Spirit of Soot, of Harts horn and Bloud, that when their sulphur is quite driven away, they may become more grateful and less corruptible Remedies.
The Spirit of Sal Armoniack may also be distilled many other ways, to wit, if you * 1.5 mingle the dissolution of that Salt with a Lie of fixed Salt, or of slacked Lime in an equal proportion; for by this and perhaps some other means, whilest the particles of Sea-salt contract new confederacies, the former associates fly away. So it is also in the distilling of Piss, as is shewn in its proper place.