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The metal mercury; -- so called from its resemblance to liquid silver. Quicksilver horizon, a mercurial artificial horizon. See under Horizon. -- Quicksilver water, a solution of mercury nitrate used in artificial silvering; quick water.

The mercury and foil on the back of a looking-glass.

higher level by increase of quantity or bulk; to swell; as, a river rises in its bed; the mercury rises in the thermometer.

uce an abnormal flow of saliva in; to produce salivation or ptyalism in, as by the use of mercury. over.; as, salivate over the prospects of high profits from an enterprise.

A process in which mercury, or some of its salts, is employed to impart the property of felting to certain kinds of furs. Ure.

ery color; as, to silver a pin; to silver a glass mirror plate with an amalgam of tin and mercury.

id will rise by atmospheric pressure; that is, about 33 feet for water, and 30 inches for mercury, near the sea level.

rface of; to brush the surface of; to glide swiftly along the surface of. Homer describes Mercury as flinging himself from the top of Olympus, and skimming the surface of the ocean. Hazlitt.

Natrium). Atomic weight 23. Specific gravity 0.97. Sodium amalgam, an alloy of sodium and mercury, usually produced as a gray metallic crystalline substance, which is used as a reducing agent, and otherwise. -- Sodium bicarbonate, a white crystalline substance, HNaCO3, with a slight alkaline taste resembling that of s…

as, water is the appropriate solvent of most salts, alcohol of resins, ether of fats, and mercury or acids of metal, etc.

red to raise the same weight of water from zero to one degree; thus, the specific heat of mercury is 0.033, that of water being 1.000. -- Specific inductive capacity (Physics), the effect of a dielectric body in producing static electric induction as compared with that of some other body or bodies referred to as a sta…

A form of air pump in which exhaustion is produced by a stream of mercury running down a narrow tube, in the manner of an aspirator; -- named from the inventor.

of standing; also, attitude or pose in standing; posture. [R.] A station like the herald, Mercury. Shak. Their manner was to stand at prayer, whereupon their meetings unto that purpose . . . had the names of stations given them. Hooker.

or winged shoes represented as fastened to the ankles, -- chiefly used as an attribute of Mercury.

but usually combined with metals, as with gold and silver in the mineral sylvanite, with mercury in Coloradoite, etc. Symbol Te. Atomic weight 125.2. Graphic tellurium. (Min.) See Sylvanite. -- Tellurium glance (Min.), nagyagite; -- called also black tellurium.

A kind of musical instrument. a species of lyre; -- so called in allusion to the lyre of Mercury, fabled to have been made of the shell of a tortoise.

ptians, and supposed to be the inventor of writing and philosophy. He corresponded to the Mercury of the Romans, and was usually represented as a human figure with the head of an ibis or a lamb.

and is used chiefly to coat iron to protect it from rusting, in the form of tin foil with mercury to form the reflective surface of mirrors, and in solder, bronze, speculum metal, and other alloys. Its compounds are designated as stannous, or stannic. Symbol Sn (Stannum). Atomic weight 117.4.

rometer. -- Torricellian vacuum (Physics), a vacuum produced by filling with a fluid, as mercury, a tube hermetically closed at one end, and, after immersing the other end in a vessel of the same fluid, allowing the inclosed fluid to descend till it is counterbalanced by the pressure of the atmosphere, as in the barom…

etc., per square inch, square foot, or square yard, etc., or in atmospheres, or inches of mercury or water, or the like.