Through an expert alchemist’s diligence and skill, gold can also be induced to grow like a tree in a cucurbit, with many marvellous little branches and leaves, a delightful and most astonishing sight. Proceed as follows. Calcine gold through aqua regis so that it becomes a chalklike calx. Place this in a cucurbit and pour in good fresh aqua regis and water of gradation until they stand four transverse fingerbreadths above it. Draw them off again at the third degree of fire until nothing more rises. Pour the distilled water on again and draw it off by distillation as before. Continue until you see Gold rise in the glass and grow in the form of a tree with many branches and leaves. Thus a marvellous and delightful shrub is made from Gold, which alchemists call the golden plant and the philosophers’ tree. Proceed likewise with Silver and other metals, but perform the calcination differently and take a different aqua fortis. I leave this to your experience: if you are skilled in alchemy, you will conduct yourself properly in these matters.

The artificial formation of a stone.

Know also that any flint taken from river water and placed in a cucurbit, with its own river water poured over it to fill the vessel, can be made very large alchemically in a few days—something the Archaeus of waters would scarcely do in many years. Distil the water off while any drop still rises, until the stone is dry; refill the cucurbit with that water and draw it off again. Continue until the cucurbit is full of that stone. If you then break the glass against a rock, you will have flint in the shape of the cucurbit, as though it had been poured into the glass. Although this benefits you nothing, nevertheless regard it as a marvel.