Word To Use Today: quicksilver.

Quicksilver is an old name for mercury.

It's poisonous stuff, but if you ever get a chance to play with it you'll see how it got its name. If you drop a dollop (as I have done) on a physics laboratory bench then it breaks into dozens of tiny shiny spheres like ball bearings. 


photo by Tavo Romann

They will scatter all over the place like runaway mice, but can be rolled patiently back together into one shining sphere again.

I think that Physics lesson was probably about atmospheric pressure (quicksilver is used in barometers) but, more romantically, the Mayans are thought by some to have used bowls of quicksilver as mirrors for telling the future. Less romantically, quicksilver has been used to make wobbler lures. The idea of these is that the heavy liquid inside them makes them wobble erratically as they move through the water, and this attracts the attention of fish.

Quicksilver is astonishing stuff. Look at this:


photo by Alby

You probably have a little quicksilver about your person as you read this. Metallic fillings often contain mercury, and tuna always does.

I hope that's not the most romantic thing about you; but it might be.

Word To Use Today: quicksilver. The Old English cwicu means alive, and the Old English seolfer means silver.