Aluminum increases very considerably the strength of all metals with which it is alloyed. An alloy of copper and nickel containing a small percentage of aluminum, called Hercules metal, withstood a strain of 105,000 pounds, and broke without elongation. Another grade of this metal broke under a strain of 111,000 pounds, with an elongation equivalent to 33 per cent. It must be remembered that these tests were all made upon castings of the alloys. The strength of common brass is doubled by the addition of 2 or 3 per cent. of aluminum. Alloys of aluminum and iron are obtained without difficulty; one product was analyzed, containing 40 per cent. of aluminum. In the furnace iron does not seem to be absorbed readily by the reduced aluminum when copper is present; but in one experiment a mixture composed of old files, 60 per cent.; nickel, 5 per cent.; and of 10 per cent. aluminum bronze 35 per cent., was melted together, and it gave a malleable product that stood a strain of 69,000 pounds. When the reduction of aluminic oxide by carbon is conducted without the addition of copper, a brittle product is obtained that behaves in many respects like pig iron as it comes from the blast furnace. The same product is formed in considerable quantities, even when copper is present, and frequently the copper alloy is found embedded in it. Graphite is always found associated with it, even when charcoal is the reducing material, and analysis invariably shows a very high percentage of metallic aluminum. This extremely interesting substance is at present under examination. * * * * * THE COWLES ELECTRIC SMELTING PROCESS. The use of electricity in the reduction of metals from their ores is extending so rapidly, and the methods of its generation and application have been so greatly improved within a few years, that the possibility of its becoming the chief agent in the metallurgy of the future may now be admitted, even in cases where the present cost of treatment is too high to be commercially advantageous. The refining of copper and the separation of copper, gold, and silver by electrolysis have thus far attracted the greatest amount of attention, but a commercial success has also been achieved in the dry reduction by electricity of some of the more valuable metals by the Cowles Electric Smelting and Aluminum Company, of Cleveland, Ohio. Both this method of manufacture and the qualities of the products are so interesting and important that it is with pleasure we call attention to them as steps toward that large and cheap production of aluminum that the abundance of its ores and the importance of its physical properties have for several years made the unattained goal of many skillful metallurgists.