This process is sometimes employed in the stocks, etc. of pistols, and if well executed has a very good effect; carefully draw your pattern upon the work, and then engrave, or cut away the different lines with sharp gouges, chisels, etc. so as to appear clean and even, taking care to cut them deep enough, and rather under, like a dovetail, to secure the composition afterwards to be put in the channels. The composition to resemble silver, may be made as follows: take any quantity of the purest and best grain tin, melt it in a ladle or other convenient receptacle: add to it, while in fusion, the purest quicksilver, stirring it to make it incorporate; when you have added enough, it will remain in a stiff paste; if too soft, add more tin, and if not sufficiently fluid, add quicksilver; grind this composition on a marble slab, or in a mortar, with a little size, and fill up the cuttings or grooves in your work, as you would with a piece of putty; let it remain some hours to dry, when you may polish it off with the palm of your hand, and it will appear as if your work was inlaid with silver. Instead of tin, you may make a paste of silver leaf and quicksilver, and proceed as above directed; you may also for the sake of variety in your work, rub in wax of different colours, and having levelled the surface and cleaned off your work, hold it at a moderate distance from the fire, which will give your strings a good gloss.