“Surprised at all I heard, ‘And would you persuade me,’ said I, ‘that all who possessed the philosophers’ stone have lived a thousand years?’ He replied gravely:--‘Without doubt every one might; it depends entirely on themselves.’ At last I took the liberty of naming the celebrated Flamel, who, it was said, possessed the philosophers’ stone, yet was certainly dead. He smiled at my simplicity, and asked with an air of mirth:--‘Do you really believe this? No, no, my friend, Flamel is still living; neither he nor his wife are dead. It is not above three years since I left both the one and the other in the Indies; he is one of my best friends.’ Whereupon he told me the history of Flamel, as he heard it from himself, the same as I had read in his book, until at last when Charles VI., who was then upon the throne, sent M. Cramoisi, a magistrate, and his master of requests, to enquire from Flamel the origin of his riches, when the latter at once saw the danger he was in. Having sent her into Switzerland to await his coming, he spread a report of his wife’s death, had her funeral celebrated, and in a few years ordered his own coffin to be interred. Since that time they have both lived a philosophic life, sometimes in one country, sometimes in another. This is the true history, and not that which is believed at Paris, where there are very few who ever had the least glimpse of true wisdom.’” * * * * * According to the “Treasure of Philosophy,” alchemy as a science consists in the knowledge of the four elements of philosophers, which are not to be identified with the vulgar so-called elements, and which are convertible one into another. The true _prima materia_ is mercury, prepared and congealed in the bowels of the earth by the mediation of the heat of sulphur. This is the sperm and semen of all metals, which, like other created things, are capable of a growth and multiplication that may be continued even to infinity. The first step in transmutation is the reduction of the metals worked upon into their first mercurial matter, and this reduction is the subject of the whole treatise. It does not appear that the alchemical works attributed to Nicholas Flamel have added anything to our knowledge of chemistry. On the other hand, it is perfectly clear from his history that the physical object of Alchemy was the end which he kept in view, and that also which he is supposed to have attained. FOOTNOTES: [Q] According to Louis Figuier, there were two minor persecutions of the Jews, one in 1346, when Flamel was merely a boy, and the other in 1354, when he was scarcely established in business. PETER BONO.