Carbon, combined with a small quantity of iron, forms a compound called plumbago, or black-lead, of which pencils are made. This substance, agreeably to the nomenclature, is _a carburet of iron_. EMILY. Why, then, is it called black-lead? MRS. B. It is an ancient name given to it by ignorant people, from its shining metallic appearance; but it is certainly a most improper name for it, as there is not a particle of lead in the composition. There is only one mine of this mineral, which is in Cumberland. It is supposed to approach as nearly to pure carbon as the best prepared charcoal does, as it contains only five parts of iron, unadulterated by any other foreign ingredients. There is another carburet of iron, in which the iron, though united only to an extremely small proportion of carbon, acquires very remarkable properties; this is steel. CAROLINE. Really; and yet steel is much harder than iron? MRS. B. But carbon is not ductile like iron, and therefore may render the steel more brittle, and prevent its bending so easily. Whether it is that the carbon, by introducing itself into the pores of the iron, and, by filling them, makes the metal both harder and heavier; or whether this change depends upon some chemical cause, I cannot pretend to decide. But there is a subsequent operation, by which the hardness of steel is very much increased, which simply consists in heating the steel till it is red-hot, and then plunging it into cold water. Carbon, besides the combination just mentioned, enters into the composition of a vast number of natural productions, such, for instance, as all the various kinds of oils, which result from the combination of carbon, hydrogen, and caloric, in various proportions. EMILY. I thought that carbon, hydrogen, and caloric, formed carbonated hydrogen gas? MRS. B. That is the case when a small portion of carbonic acid gas is held in solution by hydrogen gas. Different proportions of the same principles, together with the circumstances of their union, produce very different combinations; of this you will see innumerable examples. Besides, we are not now talking of gases, but of carbon and hydrogen, combined only with a quantity of caloric sufficient to bring them to the consistency of oil or fat. CAROLINE. But oil and fat are not of the same consistence? MRS. B. Fat is only congealed oil; or oil, melted fat. The one requires a little more heat to maintain it in a fluid state than the other. Have you never observed the fat of meat turned to oil by the caloric it has imbibed from the fire? EMILY. Yet oils in general, as salad-oil, and lamp-oil, do not turn to fat when cold? MRS. B. Not at the common temperature of the atmosphere, because they retain too much caloric to congeal at that temperature; but if exposed to a sufficient degree of cold, their latent heat is extricated, and they become solid fat substances. Have you never seen salad oil frozen in winter? EMILY.